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Thursday 17th December we travelled to Waitomo, the word Waitomo comes from the Māori language wai meaning water and tomo meaning a doline or sinkhole; it can thus be translated to be water passing through a hole. Waitomo is famous for the vast amounts of underground cave systems, which were formed over millions and millions of years through erosion and movement of the earth’s tectonic plates. What is left today are beautiful caves with amazing rock formations, cool waterfalls and plenty of underground passages. I was extremely lucky to be able to experience the beauty of these caves. I went on the Haggas Honking Holes trip, which was a combination of abseiling, rock climbing, glow worm watching and getting extremely wet! The first bit we had to do was a 27m abseil down into the caves, which was just so cool, lowering myself down into the darkness with a small waterfall following me down. The caves were (as you’d expect being underground) very dark, but the ceiling was lit up with small glowing lights…you’d have thought you’d be looking up into the sky at night with all the stars, but they were in fact small glow worms. These glow worms are easily described as lazy, cannibalistic, sex addicted maggots with glowing s**t. Or that’s how our guide explained them. They lay around all day in their silk hammocks waiting for flies to get snagged in their silk fishing lines, if another glow worm comes near they’ll eat them, they live to breed, they hatch and become flies that only live for a few days before being caught in the silken lines that other glow worms have set down, and they don’t have an exit for waste in their body so the way around that is that all the waste is broken down in their body in a chemical reaction that produces the green glow, hence the name glow worms. Cool! The experience I had today was exceptionally special, being able to walk through passages that had taken millions of years to form and to be able to see the amazing rock formations (stalactites and stalagmites) as well as fossilized clam shells (that were so strong they withheld the weight of the rock that settled on top of them) was something that I’ll never forget. It was so enjoyable I think that when I go back I will do it again, a different activity or cave system though. The trip lasted 3 hours, and in 2 and a half hours we had covered a distance of 200m…and we had been constantly moving! The trip was named Haggas Honking Holes because the land that the caves are on are owned by Mrs Haggas, and the company pays her a percentage of the admission fee, so basically she sits around watching the money pile in without lifting a finger…what a life!!!
We moved on from the caves to Maketu, via Okere falls (which I will be white water rafting down when I get to Rotorua), which will be our cultural stop on this trip. Our accommodation was at a place called Uncle Sam’s Place, Uncle Sam is a Maori chief who made a huge hall purely for the use of Stray customers. The fee we paid covered us for a Hangi (Maori meal), cultural performance, learning the Haka, accommodation and breakfast. We first had to pick a chief (the oldest male in the group, who would be our main figure in the performance) before feasting on the Hangi. We then saw two young warriors who challenged our chief and then give him a peace offering which was really quite a powerful performance, and really special being able to see what life was really like back a few hundred years this was followed by the Hongi (the traditional Maori greeting) It is done by pressing one's nose to another person at an encounter. In the hongi (traditional greeting), the ha or breath of life is exchanged and intermingled.
We then sat in the hall and watched the cultural performance, which was a collection of traditional Maori greeting songs followed by one of the many different forms of Haka. After this we were taught the Haka, with our chief taking the lead. This was a real laugh as we were so uncoordinated and hadn’t a clue how to pronounce the words. Once we felt confident of doing it all the way through we performed it to the ladies of the group (video to come!) and it felt really powerful actually doing the Haka…what an experience! My thighs were very bruised, in fact they were still bruised a week after doing the Haka ha ha!
We finished the performance and set up our beds in a communal hall, and we then walked to a local beach a mile or so down the beach in pitch blackness (with alcoholic beverages of course!) and enjoyed a small fire whilst watching the stars!
On Friday we stopped at the beach we were at last night to get some decent pictures, before driving through a rich Kiwi fruit growing area (hence the picture with me by a huge Kiwi fruit) before driving down to Rotorua. The first thing we did there was White Water Rafting, which was so much fun! Okere Falls which I mentioned earlier is a 7m waterfall, and we went down it!!! Take a look at the pictures, and you’ll see the smile on my face in every picture! This experience was the best value for money I’ve had all holiday. Anyways, we unfortunately didn’t flip after the 7m waterfall, so our instructor got us to jump out of the raft and go down some rapids in just our lifejackets, which was brilliant!
Rotorua (when we got there) absolutely stank, the smell of rotten eggs is caused by the geothermal activity releasing sulphur compounds into the atmosphere. The city is known for its geothermal activity, with a number of geysers, notably the Pohutu Geyser at Whakarewarewa, and hot mud pools located in the city. We dropped our stuff off at the hostel and went for a walk in the park across the road, this park was filled with geothermal pools and mud pools that were constantly giving off steam and that lovely pungent smell of rotten eggs. Apart from the smell, the park was quite nice to walk around. Some of the pools were so deep you couldn’t see the bottom, some were amazing colours (orangey yellow, green etc) some were just filled with mud that was so hot it was constantly bubbling. The pools are too hot to swim in and probably too dangerous with the amount of sulphur in them, however there are pools in the city which have been heated using the geothermal heat that are safe to sit in, this is what I plan to do next time I get to Rotorua! I also plan to do some Zorbing. Anyway, the guys on the bus and me all went to the pub and got quite drunk that night! Good times!
On Saturday me and Tim (Ohio, USA) walked for 2 hours to a redwood forest on the outskirts of the city, and spent another 2 hours walking around it with some massive trees and we eventually found a beautiful lookout onto the Whaka Thermal Site, and had great views of the simmering pools and erupting Pohutu Geyser! As we were walking back we saw a bus going for the city, so we hopped on it and trust me it was the best $2.20 I’ve spent, I couldn’t have bared to walk for another 10 minutes let alone another 2 hours!
On Sunday we travelled to Taupo, and ont eh way we stopped off at a secret Stray stop in the middle of the forest at a hot spring. Of course, it’d have been stupid not to have gone in so we all got off the bus and into our togs. The water was lovely and warm. Basically it was like having a bath but in a stream that was heated by geothermal heat, another great experience. However, the water had sulphur in it so there was a slight smell of eggs, and when I got out I did smell a bit! Next stop was Taupo. Taupo is located at the outlet of Lake Taupo, New Zealand's largest lake, in the northeast part of the lake where it discharges to the Waikato River. The river flows over one of New Zealand's most spectacular waterfalls, Huka Falls, a short distance north of the town. Huka falls spews water over the water fall at a rate of 2 Olympic size swimming pools full of water every second, and the water rages down the river before it reaches the falls like nothing I’ve ever seen before. The lake itself it huge, and looks like your by the sea its so big, in the background you could see the snow covered peaks of the mountain ranges.
On the Monday I came back to John’s house because apart from the extreme activities in Taupo and the lake, there isn’t really much to do. And this gave me a chance to chill out before Christmas!!!
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