The majestic rock carving you see behind us is at the edge of Lake Taupō. It’s the face of Ngātoro-i-rangi, a semi-legendary priest who navigated a canoe to New Zealand from Hawaiki, the mythical Polynesian homeland.

The romantic in you may fancy it ancient, but it was carved in the 1970s by one of the subject’s descendants. You can only see it from the water. The best way is to book yourself a kayak tour, but you can also catch a scenic cruise.

This is what we did. It was winter, okay? We went in a replica steamboat. They gave us complimentary wine and cocoa. It was the final full day of our North Island campervan trip. We’d camped for free on the shore of the lake, and so had woken up to this:

After wandering through a market that just happened to be on, we headed to the information centre to plan our day. The town of Taupō itself isn’t very impressive, but the range of activities you can do around it truly is.

Though we ended up going for the more sedate options – the aforementioned cruise and, later, a twilight soak in a geothermal spring – we could have taken a Jet Boat ride to a volcanic wonderland, or gone white water rafting, bungy jumping or even skydiving!

With little time left to us between the Māori Rock Carvings and the hot pools, we became Taupō tourist clichés and visited Huka Falls. We’d both been before. They’re so visited because they’re incredibly powerful, a god-like stampede of water forced between narrow banks.

You can go right up to Huka Falls in a jet boat. Tim did it with his family when he was a kid. (My family did one of the other jet boat rides when I was a kid.) We watched a jet boat spinning around like one of those ground bloom flower fireworks before heading off.

There was something else I was determined to do before we left Taupō, something I remembered doing as a kid. It was awesome, but I’ll have to leave it for my next post. In the meantime, here’s a cool picture you can share on Pinterest:

Filed under: North Island, Places, Tourist Experiences Tagged: Huka Falls, Lake Taupo, Maori Rock Carvings, Taupo, things to do in Taupo