2008 2/16 Waimangu Thermal Reserve

We wrapped up the day by visiting another amazing thermal area, Waimangu Reserve.

A bit of history: Dominant on the skyline is Tarawera mountain, a restlessly sleeping volcano which has erupted five times in the last 18,000 years. Before the latest eruption on 6/10/1886 this area was rolling scrub covered hills with no surface hydrothermal actifity. Then, during that night a line of craters from the northern end of Tarawera all the way to the Waimangu Valley was formed by violent eruption. This event completely destroyed all plant, animal and bird life in the whole of the area of country visible from here. All the vegetation you now see has resulted from plant recolinisation since that date.

Three important dates dominate the history of the valley: 1886, the Tarawera eruption; 1900-1904 when the world's largest geyser was active 1 km away, just beyond the hot lakelet visible here; 1917, the Frying Pan Flat eruption which burst out at hot lakelet and sent a surge of steam and debris up to this very place, destroying everything on this site.