Taupo and Environs: Grab the Chilly Bin and Go!

Taupo is the perfect base for exploring the vibrant center of New Zealand’s North Island. The town looks over Lake Taupo, a Singapore-sized body of water that boasts thousands of beaches and is popular with water-skiers and fishermen alike. The air is fresh, the scenery is gorgeous...it’s easy to see why so many Kiwi families pack their chilly bins (coolers) and head to Lake Taupo for both adventure and relaxation vacations.

One of my favorite things was just driving around the region; on one ride alone, we saw five rainbows above the rolling hills and sheep. The scenery all around the region is stunning, and you never stop coming across new things to see. We drove to the powerful Huka Falls for a close look, and also to the hidden Kerosene Creek for a dip in its natural springs. Taupo is the rare place that captivates you with nature’s power and beauty.

I also enjoyed visiting Rotorua, a largely Maori city less than an hour away, and its attractions. Without a doubt, Taupo is a particularly great region to visit if you’re interested in learning about Maori culture, and a huge highlight for me was taking a food-foraging tour with Maori guide and chef Charles Royal.

But my favorite memories from the region took place on the Whanganui River and its banks on an overnight Waka Tour. The canoe trip, during which I spent the night in a Maori marae with some of the most wonderful folks I’ve ever met, stands above perhaps everything else that was incredible about New Zealand.

The area surrounding Lake Taupo is a must-see when you're on the North Island. You won't be disappointed, but you will be hard-pressed to name just one highlight.

Quick Tips:

The entire Taupo region is a geothermal area, so take advantage by soaking in some hot springs, whether in a creek, spa, or hotel. The outdoor spa at my hotel, Peppers Terraces, is a reliable option and caters to people of all ages.

Stop by some of the non-swim-friendly geothermal areas as well for a look at some seemingly otherworldly geological activity. We enjoyed Orakei Korako Cave and Thermal Park.

Do your best to fit in a Waka Tour and a tour with Charles Royal—both experiences are among my favorite travel experiences of all time and are completely unique to New Zealand.

I was there in the fall and didn’t get to ski, but locals love the trails on Mts. Ruapehu and Tongariro. My guide for the area, Paul Hill of Dynamic Tours, told his fascinating story of being on Mt. Ruapehu’s chairlift when it erupted in 1995—after the eruption, debris in the air reached as far as Auckland, and night flights were prohibited for a year. But in general, the mountain is a stable and enjoyable ski area.

Even though Auckland and Wellington offer amazing food, Taupo is perhaps the best place to try New Zealand’s offerings; everything from fish to cheese to manuka honey is farm-fresh and top-notch here. And because it’s such a popular vacation and second-home destination, there is a good variety of excellent restaurants from Taupo to Rotorua.

Best Way To Get Around:

Taupo has a small airport, which I flew into on an Air New Zealand flight from Auckland. The flight was pleasant—about 35 minutes long and with 20 seats for passengers. It was a small operation—the pilot himself asked one of my companions to move seats to balance out the plane’s center of gravity.

Once in Taupo, you’ll need a car to get the most out of the wide-ranging attractions in the area. I rode in a tour guide’s car, but if you’re comfortable with left-side driving, I’d definitely recommend renting one, as there’s no public transportation to speak of. The good news for drivers? Roads are smooth and directions are straightforward—and every drive is gorgeous.

Even as the Terraces Hotel is being expanded and renovated as part of a Peppers Terraces Resort re-branding, it exudes a graceful, laid-back charm that epitomizes New Zealand hospitality.

Built in 1889, it’s one of only two hotels in New Zealand remaining from that era. It’s aged well though, and had I not read up on its pedigree, I never would have guessed that it’s a historic place.

The hotel sits across the street and up a hill from Lake Taupo, giving front-facing rooms a gorgeous view. The entryway is welcoming and open—I felt as if I’d stepped into someone’s (giant) home. My room was on the second floor and, though small, had every amenity I needed, including a large, fluffy bed. It wasn’t heavily decorated, but the muted, neutral tones seemed fitting.

The bathroom’s stand-up shower and sink were small, but everything was spotless. The room also included everything I needed for tea or coffee, including a floor-to-ceiling window to gaze through as I sipped (which will be an even bigger draw when construction is complete).

Apart from a lovely staff and comfortable rooms, the Terraces’ real draws are its fantastic restaurant and spa. GPK serves wonderful, local food throughout the day and comes alive at night with a jolly (but not too loud) bar crowd. I ate here for breakfast and lunch, and the omelet special—pumpkin, feta, and spinach—was delightful. A lighter dish, manuka honey with yogurt and fruit, was equally delicious. I can also attest to the fact that every kind of coffee drink they make is robust and enjoyable. (I was relieved, though, to discover that in New Zealand, a "plunger" refers to a French press.) All of this was made even better by the views out to Lake Taupo and Tongariro National Park.

When night fell, I headed to the spa area behind the hotel—about a 5-minute walk from the Terraces’ front door. There is a $14 entry fee for adults, which drops to $7 if you receive a coupon at check-in. There are large pools for all, and water slides, waterfalls, and other attractions for kids. When you pay your admission fee, you get a key for a locker to stow your clothes, and you safety-pin the key to your bathing suit while you relax in the pools. Water is pumped in from underground thermal springs, but the pools look like any swimming pools you’ve seen before. Luckily, they feel much nicer; the water is warm and wonderful. The pools are drained, and the area closes, at 9:30pm daily. I regret that I only had time to visit the Taupo Hot Springs Spa once—I’d have loved to go back every day.

I suppose I’ll save that daily dip for next time, when the hotel will have fully become a Peppers property—not that it can get much better.

The Bach is the restaurant you go to New Zealand to discover: it serves fine cuisine with lots of flair and zero pretension. With The Bach’s (pronounced similar to "batch") ingredients, preparation, and atmosphere, dinner here is guaranteed to be a memorable experience.

My travel companions and I went on a chilly early-spring evening and were seated at a cozy, window-front table overlooking Lake Taupo and Tongariro National Park. The restaurant was quiet on this Saturday night, so we received a lot of attention, but service was never overbearing, and we took our time tasting as much as we could over the next several hours.

We dove into a couple of special bottles of New Zealand wine; for white-wine lovers, the sauvignon blancs there are fabulous. Then, among the five of us, we tried 13 different dishes—and were not disappointed once.

New Zealand is the only place I’ve ever salivated over bread; the baked goods are that uniformly incredible. The Bach’s bread is no exception, and smothered in olive oil and balsamic vinegar, it was a great start to our meal and accompaniment to our wine. I moved on to a lemon-and-lime-marinated tuna tartare, followed by pumpkin fritters with risotto ravioli, the vegetarian special. Every dish on the table was beautifully plated and perfectly prepared.

Based on the dessert menu, and the high quality of every other dish, skipping the sweetest course wasn’t an option. In a ploy to consume more of the heavenly bread, I chose the bread-and-butter pudding with ice cream, and it was as good as it sounds. The Bach’s panna cotta was another hit at our table.

Appetizers run between NZ$16 and NZ$19, and main courses cost around NZ$35. The New Zealander in the crowd said these are the highest prices he’s encountered at comparable restaurants in the past year, but by US (or perhaps just New York) standards, our top-quality meals were more than reasonably priced. Another important note: the restaurant is closed Mondays.

I found out after visiting that The Bach was judged New Zealand’s Cuisine Restaurant of the Year in 2006, and I can’t say I’m too surprised, although I am amazed that such an unassuming place is so well-known. You’ve got to love New Zealand!

The Bach’s menu changes with the seasons to embrace the best of what’s around. This bodes well for a return visit—I suppose I should time it for summer, winter, or fall. Then again, that risotto ravioli was incredible...I wonder if it’s a frequent springtime menu item? I guess I’ll have to return to investigate.

I would have been happy just to sit at The Brantry, food or no food—that’s how cozy the renovated 1950s townhouse is. The fact that the food is wonderful is almost icing on the cake. Or maybe it’s the other way around. In any case, The Brantry is a can’t-miss dining destination in Taupo.

Walking into The Brantry, with its open fire and low ceilings, feels a bit (I would imagine) like walking into Bilbo Baggins’ house, if it were so tastefully decorated. On a Sunday night, our party of five was seated in the wine cellar at the only available table that could accommodate us. The cellar used to be a smoking room, our waiter, Baxter, explained, and it now houses one table with giant upholstered chairs and low lighting all around. It was called "the cave," and it was perfect.

Service was also perfect; from keeping wine and water glasses ever full to briefing us on post-season baseball scores back in the US, Baxter was delightful and knowledgeable about everything on the menu (and in sport).

I loved the look of the chefs’ spring menu, and it was hard to narrow down my choices. But I began with a duck spring roll in broth with pomegranate jelly (NZ$17.50) that was wonderful. For my main course, it had to be the fish of the day: salmon with new potatoes and roasted vegetables (NZ$29). The portions were generous, and everything was delicious, aided by the sorbet cleanser served between courses.

Other main-course choices included ostrich, beef, venison, and, of course, lamb. All of them looked wonderful marinating in their various sauces and sides, from date chutney to pumpkin-proscuitto terrine to Israeli couscous ratatouille. The menu changes with each season, so everything is fresh and at peak.

My pomegranate jelly and the sorbet both foreshadowed dessert nicely: a chocolate teardrop encasing vanilla bavarois (or what I’d probably call marshmallow) and raspberry jelly (NZ$15). The simple teardrop managed to be light and decadent at the same time, which I consider the hallmark of a successful dessert. In fact, all of the desserts at our table followed that trend—I had trouble keeping my eyes off the apricot tarte tatin.

The Brantry begins serving dinner at 6pm and also offers set two- or three-course menus. Reservations are recommended—and ask about cellar seating.

Two great things about my hike on Charles Royal’s Maori Indigenous Food Trail:

1. I got to experience eating Charles’ on-the-fly gourmet lunch under a spectacular waterfall.
2. Though we brought a small ax with which to surprise grubs, we didn’t find any, so I didn’t have buck up and taste one.

Charles Royal is a Maori chef who studies, expands, and promotes the use of ingredients indigenous to New Zealand, including plants such as horopito and piko piko. He’s one of the hardest working people I’ve ever met and is a fascinating blend of chef, businessman, ambassador, and woodsman. He’s also the perfect person with whom to explore the North Island’s fern-filled woods—especially if you have a yen for snacking on ferns.

My group of five began our food-foraging tour at Treetops Lodge, but Royal offers similar tours in other areas around Taupo and Rotorua. As we walked over the course of about an hour, our guide pointed out and collected edible plants, some of which we’d be eating for our grand-finale lunch. He climbed cabbage trees, snapped fiddlehead ferns, and grabbed supplejack as he talked. We learned, for example, that out of the over 300 varieties of ferns in New Zealand, only seven are edible. Luckily, or perhaps unluckily, when we asked if eating an inedible fern would kill us, Charles assured us that it would not—at least, "not straightaway."

Refraining from impulsive snacking, then, we continued absorbing Charles’ encyclopedic knowledge of the culinary and medicinal riches growing in his country’s woods. His impetus for learning, and teaching, the subject is the fact that the only traditional Maori food making it to tables today is the hangi, a method of cooking on hot stones. And Charles believes there is much more to explore.

I could have continued hiking and listening to Charles for hours, but before we knew it we rounded a bend that took us face to face with a spectacular, hidden waterfall. It was one of those great moments in travel that reminds you why you do it.

We set up the table and chairs that were waiting for us on a platform under the waterfall and Charles commenced with preparing lunch, searing salmon, venison, and more on a portable stove top, and infusing it all with ingredients from the bush and his own creations, such as spicy horopito rub and piri piri herbs. The feast included bread with horopito hummus, mussel salad, fern focaccia bread with piko piko pesto, venison with horopito rub, kumara and taro fritters, South Island salmon with kawakawa rub, manuka-honey tea, and kawakawa shortbread.

Native herbs or not, Charles is a wonderfully talented and inventive chef, and an even more wonderful person to talk to on the trail. I highly recommend taking one of his tours for an educational and gastronomical day of bliss. I'm still talking about my tour—and enjoying the free samples he sent home with me.

Stepping into Orakei Korako Thermal Park might be the closest you’ll ever get to visiting another planet—so you’ll just have to accept that your otherworldly trip will be slightly Disney-fied. You have to purchase your ticket in the gift shop, which is next to the café, which is a few steps from the boat that shuttles you across the river to the park. It’s all a bit Jungle Cruise, but that can’t take away from the wonder of seeing geothermal activity so close up.

Located between Taupo and Rotorua, the park is a worthwhile stop on your drive from one town to the other, and for NZ$28, you can spend as much or as little time as you’d like. The trip starts on the motorboat, today’s version of the dug-out canoe Maori people used for the same trip across the Waikato River during the last two centuries. Once on the opposite bank, wooden planks and steps guide you around the park as you wind your way past gurgling mud pools and colorful silica terraces.

We spent a couple of hours watching the park’s active geysers, hot springs, and mud pools do their thing. They’re quite beautiful, and I enjoyed taking photographs—each one has unique colorings, swirls, and steam patterns. Each geological feature also has a unique name, posted on a plaque; one is christened the Soda Fountain, and others are named after people.

The walk, though for very valid safety reasons limited to the designated path, is also beautiful above ground level. Orakei Korako was my introduction to New Zealand’s distinctive flora, such as giant, palm-like ferns. There weren’t too many other visitors, and the walk was very pleasant. The sulfuric odor emitted from the geothermal ground? Less pleasant—but bearable. The rotten-egg scent hangs in the air all around Rotorua, and I got used to it pretty quickly.

The thermal park opens at 8am, with the last boat leaving for the thermal area at 4:30pm in the summer and 4pm in the winter. The boat keeps no schedule, but runs frequently and according to the needs of visitors.