Waitomo Caves, North Island

Waitomo
Waitomo is a place with something (or many little things) that is very special and rather unusual. Waitomo is the home of the largest concentration of glowworms in the world. Living mostly in caves, they are larvae of the fungus gnat, and they have luminescence organs which help attract food to their sticky traps. Though they are just hunting for food, the effect of millions of glowworms in one place is simply amazing. It is so easy to feel like you are looking at the night sky with millions of stars trying to figure out the constellations… and making new ones.
Instead of going to see them the regular way, we decided it would be much better to see them… in a wetsuit. So we went on this tour with the Blackwater Rafting Company called the “Black Abyss.” There were supposed to be four other people on the tour, but they didn’t show up so we basically had a private tour exploring the caves and their glowworms! Not bad, I’d say! The first thing we did was rappel 50 meters down a narrow whole into the earth. Then we zip-lined into a larger room where it was time to get wet, jumping 10 meters into an underground river. After floating on inner-tubes for a bit, we wiggled our way up, down, through and over the cave and underground waterfalls. There were some times when let’s just say I had a heightened awareness of things, but I wouldn’t change it for anything! What an adventure! We never knew what was around the next corner. Mike back-flipped over when he jumped into the river, I lost a shoe on a waterfall… Hey, it’s all a part of the fun! The grand finale of this exploration was floating down the dark river while innumerable glowworms light our way.
This was by far one of the best things we did in New Zealand.