So here we plan a trip to Waitomo caves. We made the essential bookings on the previous day. They are guided tours and are recommended to be booked prior.
We set out on a Saturday in one of the long weekend. The drive to the place was around 3 hours, owing to the traffic of the long weekend. We started early in the morning and were greeted by mist and more mist on the way. As mentioned earlier too, the drive in this country is beautiful. It is a mix of long stretches of graze lands and forests, once uphill and sometimes downhill. Beautiful homes with big flowering gardens in the towns. Its a pleasure to drive.We reached the caves and were ready to start the tour of the first cave. We had booked a tour for all the 3 caves; 2 caves that have limestone formations - stalactites and stalagmites (believed to be formed a million years ago, and risen to the earth's surface from the ocean), and 1 with the glow worms.
The first cave called Aranui, is named after the person who discovered it. It was a small one, and took around 45 minutes. The formations were huge and in all shapes and sizes. It was a humbling experience to see the nature's wonder. Deep down a few metres below the earth, here we were looking at huge limestone formations. The temperature was around 10 deg Celsius.
It was a guided tour and there was enough time to see around. At one place in this cave, we could relate the formations to some veggies like carrots, turnips, cabbage head! Our imagination ran wild and we could even see a Christmas tree and a dwarf man! The ceiling of the cave resembled a big chandelier with sparkling crystals hanging down. Only difference being there were many many chandeliers with no end to one! In some places, the running chandeliers gave way to a bunch of sharp knives ready to fall off......like I said imagination had no bounds :-)
The tour of all the 3 caves is planned in such a way that there is ample time in between each one.
The second cave is known as Ruakuri, it has a small story behind it which i cant recollect now, and the word roughly translates into a dog that entered this cave first, or something like that. This is a big cave as compared to the previous one, and took around 2 hours, roughly 1.5 kms inside. The entrance to this cave was interesting. It has descending stairway in a spiral shape. Before entering, some effects by our guide, he does not reveal the spiral stairway. We all walk in a line along a railing, just like a balcony railing, and stop for some light to go ahead. We have no idea whats before us, and how are we to enter this cave. It is all dark and quiet. When we are expecting some huge brown coloured cave walls around us, he switches on the light. And t
here we see a big spiral stairway descending.Once you descend it, there is a hall that leads you to a door. The door is circular, and (again my wild imagination) I felt like entering a secret room in a Star Trek space vehicle! The circular door opened in semi circles (some more effect!) and we went in. Of course, all this is man-made. For a little gimmick and excitement!
The excitement continued as we saw much bigger formations and also heard something trickling. After a few more steps into the caves, we realised that it is a river that is flowing, a further more steps and some loud noises of shouts. Before I could use my imagination to conclude about the noises, the guide told us that it was a group of people who were on their black water rafting experience. I got curious to see where the river is actually flowing, and was thinking about, rafting in a river that is inside a cave!
After some more formations that resembled ocean waves and crystals on a jewellery box.....we came to
a dark spot. Up above us were these shimmering glow worms! The sight was just like a star lit sky. It was beautiful! We cud see some even below us under the walkway, but when the torch light was flashed, did we realise that there was the river flowing below, and we were actually seeing the glow worm reflections in the water! We waited to see the rafting group. They had absolutely no lights. A small torchlight with the leader. I wonder how it would have felt to raft in the dark, a couple of metres below the earth.All these was far more scary than exciting to me!
The whole tour was exciting and was as if we were walking in a freezer, the formations being white and off white in colour reminded of ice.
The stalactites cave tours were nearing an end, and it was time for the actual glow worm cave next.
The glow worms caves called Waitomo are the most popular and takes around 45 minutes.
After seeing a glimpse of the sight earlier, we were eager to see how the whole roof looked like with the shimmer. After a very short tour of some more formations in this cave, we made way to a bay. It was dark all over and we spotted a couple of boats......just as we were wondering, we were ushered into the boat. The boat slowly sailed into the waters, and above us was a large canvas filled with shimmer. There were hundreds and hundreds of glow worms above us! The sight was awesome, below was dark waters and above was light. It resembled a dark background sprinkled with tiny lights. We continued to stare at the large space as the boat slowly made way into the other side of the river. Though the sail is a small one, the sight is worth it. These creatures so small and tiny, it is hard to believe what they are capable of.
Photography and filming is prohibited here, because the artificial lights will make the worms extinguish their light. The worms are sensitive to light and require fresh water to feed. Hence they breed in this dark place just above the water body.
Some trivia about these caves - the caves are laden with wooden walk paths and small lights to illuminate the pathway. Huge lights are installed to view the formations. Our tour guide told us that it took around 2 million NZ dollars, a handsome number of labourers and around 2 years to pave a way and lay the wooden pathways inside the caves. And I must say their hard work has paid off. It is made so easy for the tourists to see the nature's awesome creations.
It was a humbling experience to see the huge limestone formations and the tiny glow worms. And we made our way back home.
