My body woke me up just after 4am. Last night’s dinner was a zero calorie meal and I’d woken up to assure the dessert wouldn’t count either. It’s one form of weight loss, although hard to plan around.

I stayed awake to track the football online. Going to be a tough second half to the season but at 6am I was happy as I tried returning to sleep.

The kids woke up at 4.30, one of them going to the loo. They got up at 6.30am, and that ended my chances of a lie-in. By 7.30 I was on my knees in the shower as it was that or crouch if I wanted anything above my nipples to get wet.

Still, three hours sleep should be enough for a quiet drive across a small island. I made it a longer drive by heading the wrong way. A sign told me to stop so I got out of the car, walked 420m down the side of a hill and found myself alone, no cars, no people, no houses. Not even livestock. Just a small river and a hill.

All right New Zealand, all is forgiven.

As I walked back to the car I realised why I hate Chinese tourists so much. I’m a photographer, I go to the best vantage point and take a photograph. I know others will be doing the same so make room for them by my side, or share that single ideal spot.

Chinese tourists don’t do this. They stand in the optimal spot and face away from the attraction. Using a long stick or a second Chinese tourist they then take a photograph that encompasses the whole standing area, preventing its use by anybody else, even if there wasn’t a Chinese person in the way. Then they rotate the camera, take another, stop to look at the results then – the newest addition – video call a family member and start shouting down the phone at them, presumably the Chinese for ‘look at this waterfall’. (Yes. Yes that did happen yesterday.)

I can handle photographers wanting to get _that_ shot. I can handle tourists with mobile phones getting the best picture they can. I can definitely handle those that stand there, just enjoying the spectacle, whatever it is. It’s the selfishness of the selfie crowd that I can’t handle. I hate Chinese tourists.

A cheeky sign on the main road suggested driving a further 2km to a cafe offering good coffee. I took them up on the offer and they delivered. A couple were sat there already, heard me mention that I’d only had 3 hours sleep, asked me if the party was any good.

I could have left him happy with an edited form of the truth. “Well, there were two Norwegian girls, combined age about the same as me, and.. lets just say they thanked me before leaving.” Instead I skipped their presence entirely, described the walk I’d done and the glowworms. He was fascinated, mainly because he was born 20 miles away (so at most 35 from the caves) and had never heard of that midnight walk.

I didn’t suggest it at the time but that may be because they only built the bridges and supporting infrastructure after he’d moved to Australia. He and his wife had bought a van, travelled Europe for 9 months, decided the rain in New Zealand wasn’t their thing and moved to near Brisbane. He ran his own car repair business, a dozen employees, rising turnover. Hard work but good honest mechanics can always find customers.

I had to drive back along the same road but this gave me three opportunities.

The first was a stop at the Piripiri cave. I’d have skipped it had I known how small it is, or that it was on the other side of the hill. Instead I climbed up the hill, climbed down the hill, turned on my torch, entered a cave.

It was the height of my house, about the size of my bedroom, a small tunnel near the bottom heading into the hillside. I didn’t see how far that went. But it was a proper cave, stalactites and everything.

Back in the car and because I now knew the road (or at least had seen it once) I could drive at a more sensible pace. The great white land barge wallows as she turns, but good use of the apex and early on the throttle lets the continual hill climbs deliver the fun they promise.

The one thing slowing me down was the scenery. I’d seen the views driving to the waterfall, but more usefully I’d seen the rare places you could stop and photograph it.

I stopped. I photographed it.

(That photo was actually a dodgy ‘through the car window’ shot on the way to the waterfall. The real camera was used when I could stop)

At one stop I stood by some cows, a barbed wire fence keeping them off the road. They were out of camera shot as I took multiple pictures of the multi-layered hills extending miles into the distance.

One of them seemed upset by this, starting making sounds of distress. I looked at it, told it to chill, continued photographing. It made more noises, getting strident, then pawed at the ground and did the cow equivalent of yelling at me.

I stooped a little, checked some anatomy, realised this cow didn’t have udders.

While the bull was unlikely to make it through the fence it was clearly unhappy with me standing just 8 feet away, telling it to hang on another minute while I got another picture. I may have upset it further by photographing it too, and its friends. It pawed the ground a few more times, dirt flying up around its head. I didn’t want it to get injured trying to get to me though so quickly finished up and got back in the car. I drove off, leaving the angry animal to simmer without me.

The prettiness continued. I stopped for fuel, found it was ‘pay at the pump’ only, drove on without filling up. I stopped for fuel again, found it didn’t accept payment at the pump, put 46 litres into the thirsty beast. $1.95/litre is probably about the same price as the UK but feels extremely high when you’re watching the numbers tick up.

More prettiness, every kilometre needing a hill to be climbed, descended, crossed, frequent bends revealing lush landscapes of grass, cattle, deer, even sheep, the hills topped with rocks, lined with trees.

I stopped trying to photograph it. I’d have taken all day to reach the day’s destination. I drove over a dam, turned to track the reservoir. On one side of me a green valley, gentle hills lining it, on the other the blue water, held in place by sheer cliffs on a mountain.

My right knee screamed at the pain of maintaining a steady speed, no footrest, no cruise control, a day and a half of hills, steps and slopes, insufficient rest. I stopped the car to give it a break, took another photograph.

At 1.15pm I reached my destination. It was busy, a popular destination on a hot sunny holiday week. The carpark was full, the lane was lined with cars, the overflow carpark was full and two hills were covered in cars. I found another hill, so steep only 4x4s were parked on it and proved that hire cars can go anywhere.

For once I paid for entry to somewhere that’s not a museum or a zoo, so made sure I got my money’s worth. I took photographs. Many photographs.

The sky was that lovely blue. The vegetation was a deep dark green. The water really was luminous yellow/green.

A mile away a pool of mud, blowing bubbles. I have pictures of massive mud spurts, flying into the air. To get these I used my camera’s ability to take a lot of photographs, fast. I’ve taken a thousand photographs today.

Heading to the hotel I found Lake Rotorua. On it I watched four black swan like birds swim across in front of me, followed by another 2, all heading towards a 7th. It was hard to identify them as they were all over 50 yards offshore and the waves on the lake were higher than the bird’s bodies, just the heads staying in view as they bobbed up and down.

The hotel was a hundred yards away, inland. As I pulled into its drive a tiny child in a t-shirt and nappy ran into reception, its mother following. As I got out of the car a man joined them. Inside they all hid behind a curtain then the man appeared, gave me a key. Seems to be a thing, family owned motels.

The one in Whitianga was family run too, three generations living on site. I actually saw the whole family half a day after checking out, just walking into Karangahake Gorge as I was leaving, the little boy interchangeable with any small child but the father that did all the reception work recognisable, his father (or -in-law) had been sat in reception when I checked out and the elderly lady had been manning the kitchen during breakfast. The boy’s mother and baby girl were the only two family members I hadn’t seen before.

In my room I found out my tablet had died again. I think I’ve worked out why: It’s reporting repeated power button use. Looks like the power is getting tapped while it’s in my bag. Something to try and prevent, but the tablet travels in my camera bag. Could be it’s sharing too much paperwork in there, forcing it up into a position where it’s more vulnerable.

I think I dozed off for an hour. Early evening I walked to town, looking for food. I knew I could cut through the local town park, knew it had hot springs in it. Not just hot springs, the village pond looked dangerous.

I detoured around mud pits, boiling pools of water, steam vents and sulpherous emissions, took some photographs, headed for the town centre. Walking up a likely street I found a sign warning it was closed, an event taking place. Being on foot I kept going, declined the opportunity to give money to a man claiming to be homeless, telling me the money would go towards food. He had no belongings with him, no blankets, no bags, just a half eaten burger set aside unfinished.

A hundred yards up the street I found where it had come from. The event is a night market, every Thursday in Rotorua, a dozen stalls selling tourist trinkets and another dozen doing booming business selling food. I bought a $10 burger, bacon and cheese included, and enjoyed the best meal I’ve had in New Zealand.

That record stood for approximately 8 minutes. The chicken quesadilla from another stall was sublime.

About to buy a custard laden cake I got distracted and found myself purchasing a hot Palestinian falafel wrap. If they eat like that in the West Bank I can understand Israel wanting a bit of it.

That did leave me full, so I skipped the cake, even turned down the chance of premium ice cream (i.e. instead of ‘honey’ it’s ‘farm name honey’ flavoured). Instead I walked back to the hotel.

That walk took me over the 12km mark for the day. Not much compared to earlier in the trip but there was a large vertical component too, and my knee is giving warning signs that it may stop me walking at all. That’s a day early, Saturday’s my planned rest day.

I drove a bit too.

Tonight’s hotel is easy to see from a distance.

Yes, it does have its own hot spring. I appear to be sleeping atop an active volcano tonight.