Rotorua Warnings Or Dangers

This is not exactly a danger tip,

Just be aware though that if you have Silver Jewellery, it may pay to pack it away in a sealed container or the air in Rotorua (which contains sulphur dioxide) may well turn it black for you.

Rotorua is quite unsafe and empty at night, it is a town with no nightlife (all cafes and facilities close at about 6pm) and the streets are empty except young people (many of
them Maori) hanging around or loitering by the lake. Also, I have been asked for drugs
and hassled for money on the streets.
It is not recommended walking alone.

Be careful when you are heading to a Maori function.... the Maori men may challenge you to a game of Paddy-Cake or Rock Paper Scissors!

I did not believe till I see it, but the guy on the left looked excited when he won... maybe the winner gets to eat the loser!

Have a great time at the village!

As you go through the Rotorua Museum, make sure you do not open up the radiator in the basement. It is where the thermal demon has been trapped for all these years and who every once in a while erupts with great fury. His fury is seen by all of the steam that is released throughout the region... so be careful!

On a serious note, if you do go down into the basement of the Rotorua Museum, make sure you are careful, as the pipes were not designed to have tall people work on them.

Mind your head!

OBEY ALL INSTRUCTIONS signposted, especially in thermal parks/areas!! You don't want to get yourself in a burning situation like the trees shown. Well, they were actually "burned" by a fury volcanic activity in this park few years ago.

Breathe all the sulphuric air you can here!! HAHA!!

Ok its a really cool thing to do, go and have a mud spa and bath, but what ever you do, wash that days clothes very well and rince them more then once, don't wash them with your other clothes as they will all smell of sulpher......you have been warned

I never thought to have to give this warning to anyone about a 1st world country....but this is not about New Zealand specifically, this warning. It could happen anywhere, and it's a wonder it doesn't happen more, because it happened to me so easily.

I didn't just get food poisoning, but also contracted a kind of bacteria which is found in soil (so, I imagine whoever prepared my meal at the restaurant hadn't washed their hands enough).
The meal came fast (so could have been pre cooked) and wasn't very hot (maybe microwaved to an insufficiently high temperature to kill the germs which must have already been there) - and I should have sent the food back to the kitchen, but it wasn't very cold, and I thought it would be ok.
Never again. Chicken, Fish, Pork, are all dangerous meats when it comes to food poisoning.

The result of this meal was, within hours, stomach cramping which gets steadily worse, 'the runs' (for which tablets won't fix) and then, scariest of all, internal bleeding.
A few hours later, I was rushed to hospital. It was only Day 3 of my 2 week NZ holiday adventure, but the rest of the holiday was spent there in the Rotorua hospital.
My husband even took a photo of me in the Emergency room (because it was all just so unreal and he didn't think people at home would believe what had happened without the photo - but I'm not sharing it, sorry!)
I had this wonderful view from my window...but it was several days before I was off the drip and able to even sit up enough to see out....The moral of the story is, wherever you go, if you get a meal that isn't totally hot or doesn't seem totally cooked - send it straight back.
What I got (a relative of Cholera) could have killed me (luckily they didn't tell me that till I was home, recuperating for a month and not even allowed to go to work and do my non-active desk job) so don't take the risk.

When you're exploring the Thermal areas, you need to beware of jets of rising steam and boiling mud, which can also erupt slightly from fissures in the ground. Fortunately, most of these are signposted or fenced off, so you just need to pay attention to the Warning signs.

This pic was taken at Wairoa Park.