Geothermal Valley Te Puia

I'm Maori born and raised on the east coast. My wife and our two girls are Canadian born and raised. We flew home from Canada to visit Whanau over the Christmas/New Year period. Wife and kids wanted to experience Rotorua's cultural and scenic wonderland. Wife booked Te Pō Hāngī Dinner Buffet + Haka package online. You get to see, hear and taste Māori culture with a hāngī buffet dinner and cultural performance. A delicious hāngī buffet at the Pātaka Kai Restaurant & Bar, which overlooks a geothermal wonderland. We enjoyed freshly sourced produce, traditionally cooked meats and vegetables, kai moana seafood, and a selection of sweet desserts. My wife and girls were captivated by the cultural performance in the beautifully carved meeting house, Te Aronui a Rua. The performance includes a pōhiri traditional Māori welcome, waiata song, mōteatea chant, poi, and haka. We didn't attend the evening stroll down to Pōhutu Geyser and sip on hot chocolate as my oldest girl felt tired. The staff said we could come back the next night free of charge to visit the geyser and sip on hot chocolate. Empowering night and cultural experience for the family. Mauri Ora

Very interesting and informative walk with a local guide. Make sure that you don’t wear sandals and take advantage of interacting with all that is described. Great gift shop well worth a visit.

Really enjoyed the guided tour, learning about Maori culture & seeing the schools for carving & weaving. The Geothermal pools& bubbling mud were amazing. Loved that the tour was slow paced and relaxed and they split us into smaller groups. I didn't try the buffet but the food at the lunch counter was amazing. Really enjoyed this place. Well worth the admittance fee. Oh, and the Maori cultural performance, wow. Amazing dancers with beautiful voices and smiles scary faces too for the Haka. So powerful. Loved it!

Great place and walk. We got interesting insights into the Art of carving and related skills.nAlso the Geysir behaved well and was active when we were around.nnWhat we were a bit dissapointed about was the price- value ratio.nEntrance fee is quite high and the Park & walk actually small. The thermal wonderland around the corner was significantly better. But has no Geysir.

A pricey family attraction but at least the money goes to the on site Maori cultural arts center. Some of the most affordable and unique Pounamu NZ Greenstone Carvings we have seen on the whole trip. Constant small geyser eruptions and if you look close plenty of Sulphur crystal clusters to see.

Directions to Geothermal Valley Te Puia with public transportation

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