The Wairakei geothermal power station is a working industrial facility, but the visible network of silver pipes carrying steam across the valley floor is striking in its own way — a permanent cloud of white steam rising from the ground, a reminder of what is churning beneath. The area around Wairakei is dotted with secondary features worth visiting: the Wairakei Terraces offer a reconstructed version of the silica terraces that were destroyed when the power station altered the hydrothermal system in the 1950s.
The Prawn Park at Wairakei uses waste geothermal water to farm freshwater prawns — an unusual attraction that doubles as a café and offers the chance to eat prawns caught in water heated by the same volcanic system you've been looking at all day.