Government Gardens is a public park, partly laid out as gardens, located by Lake Rotorua

Lake Rotorua

Lake Rotorua is the second largest lake in the North Island of New Zealand by surface area, and covers 79.8km2. With a mean depth of only 10 metres it is considerably smaller than nearby Lake Tarawera in terms of volume of water. It is located in the Bay of Plenty region...

 in central Rotorua

Rotorua

Rotorua is a city on the southern shores of the lake of the same name, in the Bay of Plenty region of the North Island of New Zealand. The city is the seat of the Rotorua District, a territorial authority encompassing the city and several other nearby towns...

, Bay of Plenty

Bay of Plenty

The Bay of Plenty , often abbreviated to BOP, is a region in the North Island of New Zealand situated around the body of water of the same name...

, North Island

North Island

The North Island is one of the two main islands of New Zealand, separated from the much less populous South Island by Cook Strait. The island is in area, making it the world's 14th-largest island...

, New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

.

Facilities

The Rotorua Museum of Art and History

Rotorua Museum of Art and History

The Rotorua Museum of Art and History is a local museum and art gallery located in Rotorua, Bay of Plenty, North Island, New Zealand.The museum is housed in the old Bath House building at the spa town of Rotorua, located in the Government Gardens. Rotorua Museum opened in the south wing of the Bath...

, housed in the old Bath House building, looks over Government Gardens. There are sports facilities, including the Blue Baths swimming pool

Swimming pool

A swimming pool, swimming bath, wading pool, or simply a pool, is a container filled with water intended for swimming or water-based recreation. There are many standard sizes; the largest is the Olympic-size swimming pool...

, a bowling green

Bowling green

A bowling green is a finely-laid, close-mown and rolled stretch of lawn for playing the game of lawn bowls.Before 1830, when Edwin Beard Budding invented the lawnmower, lawns were often kept cropped by grazing sheep on them...

, and a croquet

Croquet

Croquet is a lawn game, played both as a recreational pastime and as a competitive sport. It involves hitting plastic or wooden balls with a mallet through hoops embedded into the grass playing court.-History:...

 lawn. There is also a bandstand

Bandstand

A bandstand is a circular or semicircular structure set in a park, garden, pier, or indoor space, designed to accommodate musical bands performing concerts...

. The Polynesian Spa

Polynesian Spa

Polynesian Spa is a developed geothermal spa facility in Rotorua, North Island, New Zealand.Local Māori acclaimed the therapeutic benefits of the water and bathed for centuries in the acidic pool 'Te Pupunitanga', now called Priest’s Bath...

 is close by, beside Lake Rotorua.

History

This site is of historical significance to the local Maori people, with battles having been fought here. The Maori gave 50 acres of land here to the British Crown in the late 1800s. The New Zealand government opened a large bath house

Public bathing

Public baths originated from a communal need for cleanliness. The term public may confuse some people, as some types of public baths are restricted depending on membership, gender, religious affiliation, or other reasons. As societies have changed, public baths have been replaced as private bathing...

here in 1908. In 1933 a second building, the Blue Baths, opened. The Blue Baths were closed in the 1980s, but have now been restored. The original Bath House was converted into a museum, which opened in 1988.