Around Town in Taupo

Hello, Tom here.  So, we are winding things down here in Taupo, heading home on Wednesday morning!  I thought some folks might be interested in seeing a little bit of our town and maybe getting more of a sense of what it is like to live in Taupo and in New Zealand in general.  I've put together a collection of pictures that depict a walk downtown from our house and back again on a nice sunny day just a few weeks ago.  Evelyn had the car, I had the boys home as we were on school holidays, and we had some errands to run in town, so we decided to walk.

Just to make this tour of Taupo even more fun, we've created a new game called "Find Aidan and Jasper."  It is easy to play.  You just have to find Aidan and Jasper.

We'll start with this photo of the front of our house.  That's our deck.  It is winter, so there aren't many flowers out.  Can you find Aidan and Jasper?

This is our street.  That's Tauhara rising up above our neighbor's house.  Can you find Aidan and Jasper?

Here is the next street near our house, Kurupae.  You can see how far back from the street the sidewalks are.  They call that grassy part the "verge."  Can you find Aidan and Jasper?

More of Kurupae headed toward town.  Can you find Aidan and Jasper?

Now we are on Mere.  Many of the streets near us have Maori names.  The mere is the club traditionally used both in warfare and as a ceremonial symbol of chiefdom.  Trash pick-up happens on the side of the street using those yellow bags.  Can you find Aidan and Jasper?

We've turned onto Rifle Range Road.  There is a particularly large verge on this road.  No boys in this photo.

Now we are in Zest Cafe, my favorite cafe in Taupo.  The boys are easy to spot in this photo.

Aidan got this egg thing.  He didn't like it.  I ate most of it.

Jasper got a tasty friand.  He was pretty happy.

Here are the boys trying to choose something new for Aidan to eat.  Counter food is big in New Zealand cafes.  They serve espresso drinks, like the flat whites I order, and good breakfasts (called breaky) and tasty counter food or cabinet food.  Counter food sounds like something unpleasant or pre-packaged, but that's not what it means here.  I had a blue cheese and mushroom picnic pie today for lunch at Zest and it was yum.  On top of the cabinet you can see the friands and almond croissants and caramel slices (a slice is like a brownie) under little wire domes.  They use the domes because they often have the windows open in New Zealand and the domes keep the flies off.  George runs Zest - the coffee is never bad.  I'm going for my last flat white at Zest tomorrow morning.

There is Zest.  I go to that vegetable shop with some regularity, though it is not my favorite vege shop.  (Yes, they usually write "vege" for vegetable and they pronounce it "veggie."  There is a cutesy word for almost everything.  For instance, they say, "yum," as in "those kumara chips are yum."  They also say, "stink," as in, "Your ute broke down?  Ah, stink."  Actually, there are a million words that Kiwis say that we don't, or use in a way that we don't.  Sometimes it is a British usage, sometimes they share the usage with Australia, and sometimes they've got something uniquely New Zealand.  And sometimes they make fun of my accent, but most of the time they think it makes me sound smart.  Imagine that - an American accent sounding smart to people in another country!)

For some reason, the French Cafe in town (owned and operated by real French people!  The bread is so good!) has a playset on their grounds.  Aidan and Jasper are way to big for it, but they play on it anyway.

Here is the downtown.  It is a small downtown, maybe eight blocks.  Free parking on both sides of the street.  That's Tauhara again in the background.

This is one of the busiest streets in Taupo.  That's the lake at the end of the street.  See how they drive on the left?  That's a bad idea, but they make the most of it.

This is the SuperLoo.  They do say "loo," but more often say, "toilet."  To American ears, that word sounds needlessly specific, but I guess it makes more sense than claiming you are "going to the bathroom," as if you are just popping off for a bath.  The public toilets in New Zealand are almost always clean and free.  The SuperLoo costs money, but it is Super because you can also shower there.  Sounds pretty Super.  Can you find Aidan and Jasper?

Here is the library.  Aidan and Jasper were pretty happy we stopped here.  Taupo is a small town, but the library is pretty good.  More British authors than American, in general, but a good children's section.

Here is the intersection across from the library.  This is our one set of traffic lights!  There are plenty of roundabouts in town, but this is the only set of lights.  They take forever to change.  Stink.  That's a tourist bus stopped on the side of the road.  Taupo sees tons of tourists from all over and there is a steady stream of them even in winter, though much diminished.  Many of the tourists come from China.

Here is a photo of the Cossie.  File under: cute name for everything.  The Cosmopolitan Clubs are a network of what used to be men's clubs.  The Great Lake Big Band plays here occasionally.  I did a gig here with them a few months ago.

My least favorite store.  This is like the Target of New Zealand, but terrible.  It is horrible.  I feel scarred every time we shop here.  You know how it is when you are waiting in line a long time and then they open up a new register and take the five people who have just joined the line and been waiting about seven seconds?  And you decide to stay in your line because now you are second in line and if you move to the new line you'll be sixth?  And then the woman in front of you gets in an argument about the advertised price vs. the register's price?  And you notice that if you'd switched lines and been sixth you would have been in your car ten minutes faster?  That's how I feel every time I set foot in The Warehouse.

Now we are walking home.  That's Tauhara again.  It is sort of the patron mountain of Taupo.

And here we are walking down our street back to our house.  That's the lake just visible at the end of the street.  Our house isn't the one on the left that looks cool, but it is just beyond it and looks almost as cool.  It has a better view of the lake and blocks the view from the cool house.  Take that, cool house!

That's the end of the tour.  I hope that gives you a better sense of Taupo than just using Google Streetview.  (Streetview is weirdly comprehensive in New Zealand.  Even little tiny streets are on it.)  If you enjoyed this tour, be sure to attend my one-hour lecture, "A Year In New Zealand," to be scheduled soon at the Cranford Public Library.  At the conclusion of the lecture, you'll be given the answer key to the Find Aidan and Jasper game.