Story: Thermal pools and spas
Before the eruption of Mt Tarawera in 1886, the Pink and White Terraces at Rotomahana were a spectacular tourist attraction. The terraces had natural silica basins where you could bathe. When English novelist Anthony Trollope sampled one of the pools in the early 1870s he wrote, ‘The baths are … like vast open shells, the walls of which are concave, and the lips ornamented in a thousand forms … I have never heard of other bathing like this in the world.’ Here, three men (one Pākehā and two Māori) share a bath at the White Terrace, about 1880. Racially mixed bathing became less usual in the later 19th century.
About this item
Alexander Turnbull Library, West Indies and New Zealand Album (PA1-q-265)
Reference: PA1-q-265-35-1
Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Matauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.