In a world where cultural travel often gravitates towards tourist hotspots that are overexposed, there still exist places that hum with quiet power and forgotten grandeur. Tucked away in remote landscapes or in the heart of ancient empires, they embody history, revealing the indelible mark of human ingenuity, ambition and devotion.
Rotorua, New Zealand 38.1446° S, 176.2378° E
Bryn Celli Ddu, Wales 53.2077°N, 4.2361°W.
Rotorua was first a Māori settlement dating back to the 14th century. They attributed the remarkable exhibition of hot springs, spouting geysers and boiling mud pools to the tohunga (priest) Ngātoro-i-rangi, who called upon the gods for fire-bearing spirits to save him from the freezing cold. Waimangu, formed after the eruption of Mount- Tarawera in 1886 and Wai-O-Tapu featuring the Lady Knox Geyser that erupts every day, in addition to a host of other geothermal features, make Rotorua an unusual ‘hot’ spot for visitors and residents alike.
Called the ‘Mound in the Dark Cave’ in English, Bryn Celli Ddu is two historical sites in one. In the early Neolithic period, a henge, a ritual enclosure, was built that was later replaced by a mound that housed a tomb where human bones, carved stones, arrowheads and other artefacts have been found. Each year on summer solstice, the chamber within the mound is illuminated by shafts of sunlight coming straight through the passageway of the tomb.
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