Taupo, New Zealand (February 17, 2025)
As we packed up and drove from Wellington to Taupo, Elena, Violet and I noticed how cold it is and much rain continues to fall … in the summer. Each of us are wearing our warmest clothes and rain jackets most days here in the northern island of New Zealand.
But after we settled into our new AirBnb in Taupo, we walked down to the lake to catch the sun setting and get our first good look at Taupo.
Selfie during the sun setting on Great Lake, Taupo, New Zealand
The street we walked from our AirBnb to the lake dropped us onto the water treatment center which is a lot more iconic than it sounds. There’s all sorts of monuments, benches and history integrated here.
The view of the lake is awe-inspiring. Even with all the clouds (or perhaps because of the clouds), there’s a mystical feel to the vanishing point off in the distance surrounded by the large mountains on either side.
After the sun began to set, Elena walked back to our AirBnb while Violet and I hunted for the best playground in the area. We didn’t have to go far and we were so happy with what we discovered right off the lake (and just a short walk from where we were).
Needless to say, Violet and I had at it. The swings were all facing each other in a circle, which was a fun, community-feeling, design. The donut spinning thing is the same one we found in Sicily (Italy) and we continued our training on how to walk while it freely spins. This time we saw how fast we could go to do ten times around without falling off. Neither Violet nor I could get under a minute, but at 1:07 we were darn close. And, of course, who doesn’t LOVE a ground level trampoline.
What’s fun is that earlier this day, Violet and I were discussing what kind of playground that we would build that was multi-generational. This one had just about everything EXCEPT the giant hamster wheel that we played with back in in Oamaru (see related blog post).
We left as it was getting dark and on our way out we saw this beautiful butterfly that had a dedicated red light highlighting it in the park:
Butterfly statue that we missed on the way in, but brightly lit at night
And yes, on the way back the hashtag for the dedicated Instagram posting was also lit up.
Make sure you tag #LoveTaupo in all your social media posts!
I still like how you can focus on the keyword, “Love”:
LOVE truly is the greatest power in the universe ;-)
