Te Uruwera National Park is a huge, 212,672ha national park that lies between the Bay of Plenty and Hawkes Bay. The area is completely covered with native bush at a range of altitudes. It can get pretty cold, and this is perhaps reflected in the name "Urewera" (burnt penis), which apparently relates to an incident where somebody slept too close to the fire!
There are some pretty grueling tracks in this national park. Alice has never really forgiven a certain school teacher for dragging her and 60 other kids through some pretty harsh terrain when she was a kid.
However, there are also some fairly attractive walks and since the 1990s there have been a number of conservation restoration projects undertaken in parts of the Ureweras which should make it interesting to visit.
I should mention that I haven't been to the Ureweras yet; I've been far to busy with Moko and the beaches around here. But people keep telling me about Lake Waikaremoana, so I thought I should find out more and make plans to go there. The bush restoration projects around New Zealand are also very interesting.
Lake Waikaremoana is the biggest and most popular lake in the Ureweras, and there is a track called the Wakaremoana Track that follows the western shore of the lake. You can see a map of it here. The track is one of New Zealand's 10 Great Walks, as listed by the Department of Conservation. It is a 46km walk, described as a track of "moderate" difficulty which can be completed in about 5 days. The beauty of the track is that it is often by the water, so you can swim or fish any time you like. Another beautiful thing is that there are water taxis on the lake who can either give you a ride further along the track as a kind of short-cut, or can organise to deliver your gear for you, so that you don't need to carry 5 days of supplies on your back. There are huts and camp sites dotted along the track, and you book these when you buy your ticket (either online or at the visitor's information center at Aniwaniwa). If you are only making a day visit to the park, you don't need to buy a ticket. The best description I have found regarding the timing between huts and the quality of accommodation are at this website: http://www.johnb.co.nz/tramps/lake_waikaremoana.htm
Another attractive prospect is commercial accommodation on the lake, such as Big Bush Holiday Park and Lake Waikaremoana Motor Camp. Both places have a range of accommodation options, and the Motor Camp has a General Store for grocery supplies. So, I could pack my espresso maker and buy fresh milk for my cappuccino, sipping it by the lake....
If you don't have a car, there is a bus that runs from Rotorua to Waikaremoana during the summer months (November - April). The Rotorua Visitor's Information Center can organise it.
The other big attraction is Te Uruwera Mainland Island in the northern part of the park, near Opotiki. This is a 50,000ha region where predator control and bush restoration is more intensive. New Zealand has a problem with imported predators that native birds and plants haven't evolved to protect themselves from. In the Mainland Island (or TUMI for short) there is intensive trapping of predators, and monitoring of native species. Some very rare plants and birds have been reintroduced to the area, including the North Island Brown Kiwi, the beautiful Kokako and the long-tailed bat. There are two tracks that you can take through this area, and hopefully get an idea of what the bush was like before the arrival of introduced predators! This area doesn't seem to have any accommodation nearby, so I guess you'd have to look in Waimana or Opotiki.
Here is a youtube video of a baby long-tailed bat:
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