Day 81: Waitomo caves

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Ahhhh finally a great nights sleep! Our little cabin was warm, comfy and quiet, which made the 7.15am start a bit easier. Our first stop was a refreshing walk along the old gold mining tunnels at Karangahake, the rocky streams and chain bridges made for some nice pictures. We then stopped at the town of Paeroa, home of the world famous 'L&P' lemon sparkling drink - thought to be a great hangover cure. Our final destination for the day was Waitomo caves, we both chose slightly different activities so parted ways for the afternoon. I chose the Black Labyrinth tour where you descend down into the cave and sit in a donut while floating underneath the amazing glow worms that light up the ceiling. There were a few waterfalls that you jump down on your ring and each time my mouth flew open with excitement and filled with yucky cave water! It gets pretty cold in the caves but they treat you to soup and a bagel afterwards. After our activities we were both shattered and fell asleep pretty early.
Bailey's bit: My activity was the Black Abyss. It started with a 35m abseil down a hole about twice the width of me into an open cave, following that it was a 30m zip line in the pitch black. After a quick hot chocolate and flapjack it was a 2m jump in a rubber donut into the freezing cave water, after pulling ourselves up stream we were treated to a nebula of glow worms. After this was a drunken stumble through the water until we reached a point for hot orange cordial and chocolate. Another walk and swim down river led to a tight squeeze through a crevice before the final stage climbing three waterfalls! A long 3 hours but an epic trip.

Daily mileage: 5 at Waitomo I was directed to a walking path which was about 3k long. It certainly was a walking track with plenty of stairs as well as the a couple natural crevices. Jumped back on the road to get back to the hostel.

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