"The Buried Village"

Just outside Rotorua, the volcanic Mount Tarawera erupted violently on June 10, 1886, killing about 150 people and burying eight villages. Most of those villages have remained underground, but the Smith family purchased the land above one of the villages, Te Wairoa, and began excavating in the 1930s. The family continues to open the site to the public and we surveyed their progress on Wednesday morning.

Te Wairoa was home to about 120 Maori and 15 European residents before the eruption. It was the departure point for tourist visits to the Pink and White Terraces, a series of hundreds of stepped thermal pools that ascended the side of a mountain. The Terraces, New Zealand’s main tourist attraction at the time were destroyed in the blast that also took the lives of eleven Maori, five European settlers, and one tourist in Te Wairoa. Our guide was the great-grandson of one of the town’s survivors.

This village was extremely lucky as most of the others were completely annihilated, with their residents and buildings still buried in several meters of mud and ash. Below are some pictures from around Te Wairoa ("The Buried Village"), including yet another beautiful New Zealand waterfall.