Taupo & the Ruapehu Region
If you’ve come down from the mountain with tired limbs, this recent motel makeover could be just the ticket. Behind the ochre facade is a medley of small and simple dorms, doubles and family rooms, but also a garden hot tub, a sauna and Ōhakune's only spa treatments. The lobby, with pool table, doubles as a dessert cafe and coffee bar.
There's also campervan camping out back ($10 if self-contained, $30 if using Snowman's facilities) and mountain-bike hire.
12.72 MILES
Mt Ruapehu (2797m) is the North Island's highest mountain and one of the world’s most active volcanoes. One year-long eruption began in March 1945,…
6.49 MILES
For some peaceful moments away from the mountains, consider a walk to this bush-smothered lake, the centrepiece of the Lake Rotokura Ecological Reserve,…
21.93 MILES
Northeast of Ruapehu, Mt Ngauruhoe (2287m) is the national park's youngest volcano and the most classically perfect in its conical shape. Its first…
15.1 MILES
At the southern end of the town, in a large, almost-Stalinist concrete castle, is the National Army Museum. Proclaimed as ‘history without the boring bits…
25.05 MILES
With no roads on either side, you don't need to be a genius to decipher this bridge's name. Originally built so that horses could cross the river to…
23.61 MILES
Ongoing rumbles are reminders that all the volcanoes in this area are very much in the land of the living. In 2012 Te Maari, a crater on Mt Tongariro …
0.25 MILES
Maybe not so much 'Don't Miss' as 'Impossible to Miss', this roadside tribute to Ōhakune's biggest crop was erected in 1984. Carrots were first grown in…
6.49 MILES
For some peaceful moments away from the mountains, consider a walk to this bush-smothered lake, the centrepiece of the Lake Rotokura Ecological Reserve,…
12.72 MILES
Mt Ruapehu (2797m) is the North Island's highest mountain and one of the world’s most active volcanoes. One year-long eruption began in March 1945,…
15.1 MILES
At the southern end of the town, in a large, almost-Stalinist concrete castle, is the National Army Museum. Proclaimed as ‘history without the boring bits…
18.13 MILES
Just off the Whanganui River Rd near Matahiwi is the restored 1854 Kawana Flour Mill and waterwheel – an exercise in optimism. There's historical info, a…
19.48 MILES
Around a corner in the Whanganui River Rd in Jerusalem, the picture-perfect, red-and-mustard spire of St Joseph’s Church stands tall on a spur of land…
20.32 MILES
An archaeological site just off the Whanganui River Rd: what was once the centre of somewhere is now the middle of nowhere.
20.57 MILES
The Raurimu Spiral, 30km south of town, is a unique feat of railway engineering that was completed in 1908 after 10 years of work. Rail buffs can…