Wednesday 23 March Road trip day 3 – Waitomo caves

Gloworm threads

Glow worms glowing

A scenic drive cross country brought us to the tourist attraction of Waitomo Caves. The village is an information centre, a cafe, picnic area, one large hotel and one campsite clustered around the original limestone cave discovered in the 18th century. We opted to go with Spellbound tours which was a longer trip,including a raft ride under the glow worms and a walk through a second cave to see karst cycle features. It was also less physical which helps Mum with her bad knee.

Our experience began at 3pm with a 30 minute minibus ride out to farmland above the settlement. On the way into the cave we stopped to feed friendly freshwater eels then donned our caving helmets (mine was too big and heavy and kept falling over my eyes negating the safety angle). These glow worms are unique to NZ. Their life cycle includes a 9 to 10 month larval stage where they attach themselves to the roof of a cave, drop sticky lines to catch passing insects like a spider and then light up their bottoms to attract the insects into their sticky fishing lines. In the Waitomo caves there are thousands and thousands of them, so many that they illuminate the darkness.

English guide, Louisa, showed us the way along a path following the stream flowing out of the cave and into a inflatable for our 20 minute ride under the glow worms. I should mention our ride was forwards, turn around to the start and then forwards and backwards again to the spot we started. It was so peaceful I could have stayed there all afternoon.

Rafting under glow worms

Our next experience was a five minute walk away. This time there wasn't a full stream flowing through so drier and no glow worms. A cemented path led 700m under ground following a tunnel eroded by an earlier water flow. Along the way there was a vaulted 'cathedral' and bones from an extinct Moa bird. Moa's were flightless birds like small emus. We had plenty of time to linger and look and with only 8 people in the group time to ask questions.

intrepid cavers

Extinct moa bird bones

Petrified pools

weka

Our rickety mini bus trip backed to base took another 30 minutes and the tour finished at 6.30pm. If you're going to Waitomo and have time for a long tour, we'd recommend Spellbound.

Our night time accommodation was 10 minutes north in the small town, so small there was only one restaurant, of Otorohanga.