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Published: February 12th 2007
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We bid adieu to Barbara and Steven, our hospitable bed and breakfast hosts in Auckland, and made our way down to the CBD (central business district) hoping to find a bookstore open on Waitangi day, New Zealand’s
July 4th. Unfortunately, the stars had not aligned in our favor this morning as most Kiwis’s had favored a day of rest over hocking books to tourists. After some hemming and hawing, we accepted our defeat, bought a bottle of water for the road and set off towards our first driving destination - Otorohanga.
As I honed my right-hand driving skills, (me in the right seat with the car in the left lane), Gina played navigator, closely examining maps in her lap and the passing highway signs. A few kilometers outside of Auckland, the scenery quickly changed from urban sprawl to rolling hills dotted with farms, cows and sheep. Traffic thinned and the highway narrowed as we continued South towards Hamilton, the first major city we’d cross during the 3-hour drive to Otorohanga.
Groans from our stomachs coincided with a passing
Welcome to Hamilton sign, so we stopped at a large strip mall that sported a
Warehouse (a Wal-Mart style store), a
Bond & Bond (Circuit City on a smaller scale), a
Whitcoulls (Barnes and Noble on a smaller scale) and several stores hocking the latest in California surf wear. We found a hot sandwich shop and proceeded to satisfy our hunger pains before exploring a few of the merchants. About 30 minutes passed and our interest waned, so we continued down the road towards our destination.
A few kilometers outside of Hamilton, I asked if Gina wanted to try her hand at right-hand driving. She didn’t exactly jump on the opportunity but hesitantly replied, “Ok.”
I pulled the Pulsar onto a residential street and we swapped seats. A seat adjustment, mirror check and grimace later, she slowly inched the car away from the curb. Several minutes passed and Gina was navigating her first traffic circle, successfully dodging traffic. Comfortable with her crash course skills, I told her to follow the
Waitomo Caves navigational signs and slowly faded into a short-lived slumber.
Rrrrrrrrrrrr… engines noises pulled me from a slight drool as I fixed my eyes on the dashboard to determine if something was wrong with the car. Thankfully not - Gina was just speeding - the speedometer needle
hidden behind a small sticker stating that
Hazardous Driving is Completely the Responsibility of the Renting Party. “Babe, I think you should slow down.”
“Oh, Ok. Sorry, I was just getting used to the car.”
We had been warned prior to departing Auckland that Otorohanga was an extremely small town with two major attractions: the Kiwi House and nearby Waitomo caves - both of which we intended to visit. Cresting a hill a few kilometers from the Otorohanga town center, we quickly realized what
small meant.
Our first stop in town was a tour of the Kiwi House, a bird sanctuary where we could spot New Zealand’s endangered national bird (the Kiwi). Luckily, we had arrived 15 minutes prior to an afternoon feeding of the nocturnal, flightless animal. Gina and I struggled for a few minutes, trying to take flash-less photos in the dimly lit room that housed the birds before one of the sanctuary’s rangers entered the Kiwi pen. We learned how the Kiwi was subject to various predators, sleeps nearly 20 hours per day and lays a single, nearly bird-sized egg. We mused at the little birds’ rambunctious noises and motions as the ranger teased
it with a bowl of food. A few photos in hand, we headed back to the car and continued towards our hotel - a 1950s Bristol bomber.
While planning our trip, I ran across a website called
Unusual Hotels of the World and found
Billy Black’s Woodlyn Park, which offers accommodation in hobbit huts, an old train car or 1950s Bristol bomber (supposedly the last Allied plane out of Vietnam according to their literature). As we pulled the car off the paved road and onto the gravel drive of our hotel, I looked over and saw Gina’s jaw drop in amazement. Maybe it was more amusement than amazement but I didn’t ask.
After a quick check-in at the office, we headed to the bomber to inspect what I had gotten us into. The bomber is large enough that it’s divided into 2 units, a tail and cockpit. Naturally, we were staying in the cockpit as I wanted to play with any remaining controls during our downtime. Dropping our gear after a quick inspection of the cockpit, we set off to Waitomo Caves for a late afternoon tour.
Standing next to a group of Japanese waiting for the
next cave tour, I could sense Gina cringing as they carried on in their native tongue. “Can’t wait to get to Asia?” I joked.
“Something like that,” Gina curtly responded.
The tour started and we wound our way down past stalactites and stalagmites, closely following the torch and voice of our guide. Sadly, we were instructed not to take photos during our spelunking adventure but were in awe of the beauty of the natural limestone formations. The caves themselves are World famous for a small insect unique to New Zealand - the Waitomo glowworm (Arachnocampa luminosa). Descending further into the abyss, the ambient light began to dissipate until we were standing in a 12-foot high chamber with our guide and the obnoxious Japanese tourists who were
Oooooing and
Aaaaaaing over every little nuance. Then the guide turned off her flashlight and instructed us to crouch down and look at the underside of a limestone overhang. As our eyes adjusted to the dark we were astonished at the millions of little blue dots illuminating our chamber.
We were told that the glow worm uses its luminescence to attract prey to sticky tentacles hanging from the limestone formations much
like a spider traps prey in its web. The guide reached for a switch that lit up the overhang so that we could see the multitude of tentacles hanging like fly traps. A very impressive arrangement for sure, except for the caveat that the glow worm can only eat during its larval stage and dies a few days after becoming a flying insect - odd.
Finishing our tour, we returned to our bomber to decompress after our marathon day. I proceeded to the pilot’s seat in the cockpit and began fumbling with switches, rudder pedals and the trim controls. Gina snuck up the ladder from the lower compartment and laughed, calling me a
little boy. For a moment, I could envision myself flying the massive metal bird.
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Mom
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Fun With Farm Animals
Gina, Gina...Thunder misses you and Sparky too.