Liam was up at the crack of dawn to get back onto the giant bouncing pillow which he was on last night until it deflated at 8pm. It is amazing what gets him out of bed early. The rest of us followed suit with the aim of getting some much needed washing over and done with before the day got away from us.

We headed down to the hot pools and spa area shortly after it opened at 8.30am and got the kids passes for the slides. There are two hot mineral pools, one at 40 degrees and one at 38 degrees. Very warm and relaxing. There is one cooler pool too, a couple of spas and three slides. We spent a couple of hours there first up, and I had my very relaxing massage.

We then drove into Taupo town to check it out, get some lunch and do some grocery shopping. Town was very busy – not surprising given it was Saturday and New Year’s Eve. We had a delicious lunch at an interesting place called BurgerFuel, looking out over the Lake Taupo. There is a smaller bay in the larger lake at Taupo and the whole lake is huge – Emily thought it was the sea to start with. Snow-topped mountains are visible on the far side of the lake. Liam counted this as the first time he has seen snow for real, even though it was a very long way away.

Back at our accommodation, Liam needed another bounce before heading back to the hot pools. I had a lovely relaxing couple of hours in the hot pool, reading my book, while the kids ran amok on the slides and in the pools. Colin stayed for a while then went back to cook dinner. We are having a quiet New Year’s Eve (as we usually do) with a movie and early night. There are fireworks planned for the town tonight, so they might wake us up to see the new year in.