GEYSERS ACTIVE

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2338, 21 December 1914, Page 6

GEYSERS ACTIVE

CHANGES IN THE THERMAL DISTRICT PROLONGED DRY SPELL (By Telegraph,—Frees ABgoolatlon.) Rotorua, December 19. Owing to the dry season, the lakes in the Thermal District are very low. Rotomalmua has dropped seme 6 feet, and Taupo and the Waikato River are lower than for 18 years. The bar at the outlet of the Waikato from tho lake is so shallow that the large lake steamers cannot be taken to the wharf in tho river. The Crow's Nest Geyser at the Spa, which played regularly daily during the winter up to 180 feet on occasion, is now quiet, being always affected by a drop in the river level, on tho banks of which it stands. The Hot Springs at Wairakei are unusually active, one reason assigned being that so little cold water percolates through tho pumice to cool them down. On last St. Patrick's Day the famous Champagne Pool at Wairakei turned itself into a geyser. No one saw its first shot, but it must have been of considerable size as the falling water ploughed large furrows in the hillside, and a stone larger than a man's heaa was thrown out of the Cauldron on to the terrace. Since then it has been shooting to various heights at irregular intervals, with dense clouds of steam. Tho Great Wairakei Geyser is also spouting higher than before, and many of tho hot pooh in tho valley have become intermittent geysora to some extent. '

At Frying Pan Flat, at Waimangu, a large new m'udhole has broken out ill front of the bath house, and a new geyser on the top of one of the small hills in front of the Guest House. The Frying Pan itself is steadily extending, and is now '60 feet in length. The famous Blowhole, which was one of the great attractions qf what is known as "the round trip," and was formerly located at the cteaming cliff called Gibraltar, was blocked by a fall of stone, and after shifting its exit sevtral times, now issues its jet of steam at a point some hundreds of yards further along the bank. The vent is much larger than before, and the steam does not roar so much as it used to. A report has been going about lately that the terraces at Rotomaliana were forming again, but the only foundation for the rumour is a few trickles of silicious deposit up the face of one of the steaming cliffs. As Mr. Warbrick, the well-known guide, says, it would only need's some pools of hot water on top of the cliff to start the formation of new In good earnest. It is a consummation which , may be devoutly prayed for, but it is not in sight. 1 _ At Whakarewarewa, Pohutu Geyser has been uncommonly active. It has played 707 times in the last fourteen months, and sometimes fires off _as many as, four times a day. Wairoa and' Waikiti, howevor, show no signs of activity, and have been quiescent now for nearly four years