Day 4 - Waitomo Glow Worm Caves.

Another 8am start, checking out of our Hamilton hotel to hit the road and head south to the Waitomo Valley. Our goal was to see the glow worm caves. Our sat-nav took us off the highways into winding countryside through green hills, pine forests and dairy farms. We passed very few other cars on our way and had no trouble doing the journey in record time.

We paid for our tickets and had a brief rest before heading down with our tour group. We walked through some low caves with stalactites hanging down at head height, before walking down a number of stairs to see the 'cathedral', which apparently all caves have - a large upper dry cavern with columns, stalactites and stalacmites. We then went through to a chamber to see the feeding threads of the glow worms which hang down like sticky spiders webs to catch prey - insects flying into the caves think the glow worms are the night sky and fly upwards getting caught in these feeding lines.

After this we walked down a short flight of stairs before hopping onto a boat to continue through the main glow worm sanctuary in silence. Amazingly the boat is maneuvered by the guides as they hang onto ropes that are strung through the cavern. In near silence we looked up to the ceiling above to see the little blueish lights against the pitch black. All to quickly it was over and we had to head back to the main reception area, and the obligatory gift shopping.

Unfortunately no cameras are allowed in the caves so we can't show you what we experienced - however some photos from the internet might help to give you an idea.

We drove into the town of Waitomo (which means'stars over water' and refers to the glow worms over their subterranean lake) for side lunch before heading to Rotorua for the needy stage of our journey.