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Nat and Beck Go Large!
The drive up from Wellington was fairly uneventful...we saw lots of sheep, lots of hills, lots of cows, 1 pig and a mountain. Lovely! New Zealand is really picturesque actually, very green and mountainous. Anyway, we had been driving for about 4 hours when the sun set, but we still had another 2 hours to go before we reached Waitomo. Night driving is not usually a problem, but when there is no road lights, and the road twists and turns round random hills and mountains, it gets kind of difficult! We reached Waitomo around 8.30pm last night, and Georgie's front bumper was looking slightly worse for wear after the amount of moth-killing on the road. At least we didn't hit a possum though.
Got up early today and made our way to the Aranui Cave first. The tour guide was the spit of Becky's Uncle Mally - he was a big bloke in shorts and had a voice that made you want to go to sleep! He took us into the cave which has been formed by water - looks like a big pile of candle wax in the shape of icicles (it's kind of hard to explain). He told us all about the Maori history, how the Europeans came and exploited it for tourist purposes - seems like a running theme!
We then went to the Glowworm caves. Our guide was called Kiwi, and we were herded in with a large number of Japanese and American tourists. Luckily, cameras were banned, so we made it through the caves without any murders being committed, though Kiwi did point out a large 15 metre deep hole which we could have used to our advantage. There was one 4-foot woman who was seriously asking for it, but we left her alone...lucky for her. One of the American bum-bag clad tourists really cracked us up...after Kiwi had explained to the group how the caves are formed (by rivers, streams, rain, waterfalls, lots of water in general) she exclaimed "isn't it damp in here!" We always thought Americans were an intelligent race.
The tour of the caves ended with a boat ride down the river, lit only by the millions of glowworms along the banks and on the ceiling of the cave...was very atmospheric (Kiwi made the Japanese shut up).
Back off to Taupo now to try and do our skydive...
Love Nat and Beck xxx
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