The Early Bird Catches The Worm

May 4

Travelers we met in the South Island highly recommended the Spellbound Glowworm and Cave tour in Waitomo. We originally planned to do the more popular tour of caves in the center of town, but they swayed our opinion to make a change, so we pivoted.

We chose the Explorer tour, which visited a glowworm cave by foot and raft as well as a walk through the Spirit Cave.

Our tour guide gave us hardhats with headlamps and we entered the Mangawhitikau Cave after walking down a sheep pasture into a deep crevasse. We then crossed a small footbridge with massive eels in the riverbanks underneath until we walked into the mouth of the cave.

Although this cave is six miles long, we only explored about a half mile section of it.

Our guide Hop brought us into the cave where we saw stalactites and stalagmites shimmering silver with condensation. When we turned off our lights, it was pitch black for a few seconds until our eyes adjusted to the darkness. Then thousands of glowworms illuminated the ceiling in what looked like a clear night sky.

Glowworms are not worms at all. They are larvae of a special kind of fly known as a fungus gnat that become flies when they reach maturity. Midges, mosquitos and moths get trapped in glowworms’ sticky dangling web snares, which become their meals. One mosquito is enough food for a glowworm to survive for two weeks.

We boarded a raft attached by cables and drifted down the river to a waterfall inside the cave where thousands of glow worms lit the way.

It looked like a galaxy of stars above us. It’s hard to capture in our pictures how incredible this was. Imagine complete darkness and silence in a cold damp cave, floating on a river hearing a waterfall in the distance getting louder as you approach it and everywhere you looked these glowing creatures light the walls, ceiling and every crevice. It was like a space odyssey.

We exited the raft and our guide snapped a photo of us before we enjoyed our leisurely walk back out of the cave.

Our next stop was Spirit Cave, home to stalagmites and stalactites along with skylights formed by sinkholes over hundreds and thousands of years.

Also in the cave were the trapped bones of ancient animals that fell through these holes like the extinct moa that once roamed around Waitomo.

After our tour we drove to Hamilton to stay with friends we met on our Abel Tasman hike. The drive there was really pretty with rolling hills and mountains in the distance. It was quintessential NZ that you see in the movies.

Michael and Lucinda kindly offered for us to stay with them for a few days in their beautiful home. It was so nice to get a home cooked meal on the road and to spend time having locals show us around their great city.

We also got to finally try the NZ native fruit called feijoas. They had some growing on their property. Michael showed us how to eat them by scooping out the center. It was an interesting new flavor that was sweet. Apparently, it’s a polarizing fruit. Some love it and others hate it. Michael was a fan. Lucinda was not. Mitch and I liked it.