Posted March 9 at 10:21pm local time.
Guest post by John Clayton.

Whoosh! Bang! Eeek! These were the sounds we made as we went luging on the track, twisting, turning, and careening down the hill that Tuesday afternoon. Earlier that day a gondola had slowly pulled my family and me up the hill. Looking back at large Lake Rotorua and the town I exclaimed, “you can see a long way!” When we finally got to the top, we chose helmets and then we climbed into three-wheeled plastic luges with handle bars to serve as the steering and brake mechanism. An instructor checked our brakes before we left.

First I had to go on the scenic track. This was a long, thrilling ride down many turns on a gently sloping hill. The next track I tried was the intermediate. This one had many more sharp turns including a u-turn. All of the tracks ended at the same place, so I took the chairlift back up the hill. After we finished the first and second tracks my brothers and I had had so much fun that my dad went down the hill to get my mom and sister. When the three of them rode the gondola up the hill from the car we all rode the scenic track together because beginners had to. Then we all rode the third and hardest track. This one had many more banked turns but was shorter and steeper. We all had a blast that day!