Explore Rotorua and its surroundings by area

Rotorua is a city of around 60,000 people built on an active caldera in the middle of the Taupō Volcanic Zone, a roughly 250-kilometre tear in the earth's crust running through New Zealand's North Island. Steam rises from storm drains, public parks and private gardens across town, and the smell of hydrogen sulphide is part of daily life. The city sits at the heart of Te Arawa country, and Māori culture here is lived rather than staged for visitors; Rotorua has drawn tourists since the 1880s, making it one of the country's oldest destinations.

In the city itself, Whakarewarewa is a living Māori village, home to Tūhourangi Ngāti Wāhiao, where food is still cooked in geothermal steam, and it shares a thermal valley with Te Puia, the national institute of Māori arts and crafts and home to the Pōhutu geyser, which erupts once or twice an hour to heights of around 30 metres. About 27 kilometres south along State Highway 5, Wai-O-Tapu holds the Champagne Pool, the Devil's Bath and the Lady Knox geyser, triggered daily at 10:15am.

Waimangu Volcanic Valley formed in the eruption of 10 June 1886 and is the only geothermal system on earth with a known birth date, while Hell's Gate, at Tikitere, is the most active site in the area and the only one with a mud bath; Orakei Korako is reached by boat. Mount Tarawera, at 1,111 metres, erupted that same night in 1886, killing more than a hundred people and destroying the Pink and White Terraces, and can now only be visited on a guided tour, while Te Wairoa, the buried village, was one of the settlements lost that night. Ōhinemutu, a lakeside village belonging to Ngāti Whakaue, holds St Faith's Church, and Kuirau Park is a free geothermal park in the city centre.

The Government Gardens surround the 1908 Bath House, and The Redwoods, or Whakarewarewa Forest, is a stand of Californian redwoods planted in 1901 with around 180 kilometres of mountain-biking trails and a canopy walkway open by day and by night. On the Kaituna River, Okere Falls includes Tutea Falls, a 7-metre drop said to be the highest commercially rafted waterfall in the world. Rotorua's lakes — Rotorua, Rotoiti, Tarawera, Ōkataina, Tikitapu and Rotokākahi, the last one tapu and off-limits — ring the city, and Hamurana Springs sits on the northern shore of Lake Rotorua.

4-kilometre walk that takes six to eight hours, and the volcanic cones of Ngauruhoe and Ruapehu, the latter reaching 2,797 metres. Also an hour away, the Bay of Plenty is centred on Tauranga, the country's busiest port and a regular cruise-ship stop, alongside Mount Maunganui and its Mauao headland (232 metres), the town of Whakatāne, the roughly 11-kilometre Ōhope Beach, and Whakaari, or White Island, an active volcano 48 kilometres offshore.

West of Rotorua, the Waikato region holds Matamata and the Hobbiton Movie Set, 50 minutes away, with its 44 hobbit holes built as permanent structures in 2011 and the Green Dragon Inn; Waitomo, two hours away, with its limestone caves and Arachnocampa luminosa glow-worms, explored by boat, black-water rafting or through the Ruakuri and Aranui caves; the city of Hamilton; Cambridge and Lake Karāpiro; the Blue Spring at Te Waihou; and Raglan, known for one of the longest left-hand surf breaks in the world at Manu Bay.

Three hours away, the Coromandel Peninsula holds Cathedral Cove and Hot Water Beach, where visitors dig their own thermal pool in the sand for about two hours either side of low tide.