Snow Go Zone

Snow Go Zone
Ohakune, New Zealand

Ohakune, New Zealand

Off we set on our magical mystery Big Thing adventure and little did we know we were going to get an ever bigger treat than we anticipated.

The drive to Ohakune was along the most beautiful road with Mount Rupehu towering over us, we even drove past the entrance to our favourite town, Whakapapa!!

When we got to our campsite the lady on reception seemed slightly confused that we had come here just for a photo of the Big Carrot and asked us why we weren’t going up Mount Rupehu. We looked a bit miffed and told her that we are not really hikers or skiers and she laughed at us and told us we just drive up it.

Not entirely convinced we dropped into the isite tourist information and they indeed confirmed that there was no reason that we couldn’t take Blondini up to the ski fields.

Ski season was well and truly over so the chances of getting to play in snow was remote but we decided to head up to see what it was like and take in the views.

We didn’t know it at the time but it turns out that Mount Rupehu is the largest volcano in NZ and one of the most active in the world!!

We happily trundled up to the Turoa Ski Fields with poor Blondini not entirely realising that it was 1600 meters above sea level. Blondini got up there like a real trooper, I think we were more concerned than she was, although as we reached the top the 30km speed limit was no problem for us powering through at a mighty 15kmph.

At the top it was pretty much deserted except for us, we had a beautiful view of the last remnants of snow on the ski fields one side and a stunning view through the clouds over Ohakune the other. This is where we had a flash of inspiration. The joy of driving around in our house with all our worldly belongings is that we always have what we need with us when we need it so this looked like the perfect location to produce the annual Currie Christmas card. Thankfully we had found an op shop in Rotorua and had sourced our outfits and with our camp table improvising as a tripod we got changed and had a lot of fun with our Christmas photoshoot. The few Chinese tourists that appeared mid-way through just looked on dazed and confused, ha ha or should I say ho ho!

Anyway, aside from the awesome volcano the next best thing about Ohakune is the Big carrot, this is no ordinary big carrot, it actually has a cool story of its own. It was originally produced in the 80’s for an ANZ bank commercial and when they were done they donated it to Ohakune as it had the reputation for being the source of a high proportion of NZ’s carrots. There you go, I bet you didn’t know that.

Onwards we still had a few more big things to pick up enroute to Napier, the Big Welly Boot in Taihape, the welly wanging capital of the world (apparently), then the Big Plane Café (which was sadly shut) and the Big Bull and novelty sign post in Bulls where every shop and service in town has a funny Bull reference.

Next stop the long awaited Napier!