Wonder of the Natural World Reborn

Rotorua’s famed Pink and White Terraces – destroyed in the 1886 Mt Tarawera eruption – are being replicated 8km away at Wairakei by businessman Jim Hall. The original staircase-like tiers of pink and white silica formed naturally over thousands of years due to an active geyser on the slopes of Mt Tarawera. Hall’s Wairakei Terraces received a little human assistance; silica-rich water piped from the nearby geothermal power plant flows over a manmade progression of 8-metre stairs, creating pink shelves of brilliant blue water. “The terraces have been initially fashioned by man’s hand,” says Hall. “‘Mother Nature must now take her course to perfect the production of colours and overlaying of silica to form magnificent terraces reminiscent of the Tarawera pink and white versions that were destroyed in 1886.”