Today with most people able to access an abundance of travel information from multiple devices and thousands of websites, it's a fairly easy process to find great places to travel to. At the tap of your finger you are able to find the most Instagram-able travel destinations and see your journey before it even happens.
If we head back 140 years, things were significantly different. Word of mouth and letters home that took months to arrive were pretty much the only travel and tourism marketing around. So its pretty crazy to think that people from the other side of the world traveled for months in pretty rough conditions to visit something that someone told them was good
The birth of New Zealand tourism began in the 1850's when the local Tarawera iwi, Tuhourangi started guiding tourists on a journey to the Pink and White Terraces. Tourists traveled 3 months by ship and then endured long horse drawn cart rides from Tauranga to get to Te Wairoa. The village of Te Wairoa was booming as more and more tourists traveled to see the Terraces. Hotels and stores were built to accommodate the visitors needs.
Once at Te Wairoa tourists would begin their terraces journey. With a Maori guide, usually Sophia or Kate, they would make their way down the Te Wairoa valley. Once at the lake they would be rowed in a waka or whaleboat across Lake Tarawera for two hours before travelling by foot across to Lake Rotomahana. You can imagine how tricky this might have been in Traditional Victorian attire!
The Terraces, pictured below were an amazing sight to behold. The enormity of them (5 hectares in total) and their natural beauty combined with their therapeutic benefits drew in crowds of international visitors including the Duke of Edinburgh.
The white terraces also known as Te Tarata or the tattooed rock were the larger of the terraces and the smaller pink terraces (Otukapuarangi - Fountain of the Clouded sky) held the bathing pools.
These sinter and silica formed travertine terraces were filled with geothermal water from a geyser perched at the top. As the water cascaded down it left behind deposits that added to the terrace formation and left behind beautiful pools of exquisitely silky clear water that felt amazing on the skin of bathing tourists.
On the 10th of June the terraces fate was sealed when Mount Tarawera erupted from its three peaks devastation the surrounding landscape and the neighbouring villages of Te Ariki, Moura and Te Wairoa. Lives and livelihood were lost that night. Over the years there has been speculation about the location and also the condition that the terraces are in. One thing we do know is that in our lifetime we will never see such spectacular natural beauty on the shores of Lake Rotomahana again.
Today the Buried Village tells the stories of the 1886 eruption - the people, the place and the memories of New Zealand's first tourist village. Celebrating a wonder that was.
