Nov 14 - Waitomo and BBQ

This morning we hustled to pack and pound back some breakfast before getting on the bus, which proceeded to drive through to Waitomo. Waitomo is the home of the world famous glowworm caves, and the bus had a 3 hours stopover here, so we signed up for a tour of one cave. 12 of us were driven about 15 minutes from the office to farmland owned by the driver's brother in law, where he parked the van and we got out. We had to walk a couple minutes on a trail and then down into a crevice in the rock face. Down about a hundred feet there was a dark entrance to the cave with a bench that we sat on as we waited for our eyes to adjust to the lack of light. Then the group passed through a little doorway and down a long and very short/narrow passageway through the limestone in pitch blackness except for the guide's flashlight out front. Then the cave opened up a bit and the guide showed us some glowworms and explained what they were and their history and the history of the caves in the area. Glowworms are little larvae with a tail that emits a 1 nanowatt blue light (1 billionth of a watt) so they are pretty dim even in pitch darkness. The light is to attract insects like mosquitos and the worms dangle "fishing lines" of sticky web - sometimes as many as 30 per worm to catch their prey and reel them back in to eat. The glowworms are skinny and about an inch long full grown, then once they eat and grow enough, they cocoon and turn into flies that have not mouths, so they generally reproduce and die within 3 days - often by getting caught in the webs of other glowworms. Pretty sucky life, but they do look cool, and as we proceeded further into the cave, there were sections with hundreds of worms. When there is a big cluster of them, it looks like a dim constellation with a blue tinge. Before we knew it we arrived at the end of the walkway and then turned around and walked back out and drove back to the office in Waitomo. It was incredibly and frustratingly hard to get pictures of the glowworms, because they were so dim and so high up in the caves. We tried every camera setting and they all turned out poorly, often ruined by other people taking pictures with flashes (idiots, how is that going to work?). We still had some time to kill, so me, B and Dan walked over to the rabbit shearing place down the road, where for $2 we could watch a rabbit being sheared. Bargain! The rabbits they had were German Angorra white rabbits. They are white as snow, with red eyes (creepy!) and their fur grows so quickly and so thickly that if they aren't sheared 4 or 5 times a year, they die. They had one out to pet and look at and it looked huge - like a small dog and you couldn't see legs or paws or anything; just tall narrow ears, eyes, nose and a huge ball of fur. The lady there gave the group a talk on the rabbits and the shearing process. Then we got to watch her shear one. To do this, she had to tie all four paws with rope and attach the rope to a device that looked like a medieval torture stretch device, in order to shear it properly. She buzzed away with shears that looked like the ones I shave my head with but that sounded like a tattoo gun. And as she was telling us how the rabbits don't mind being sheared or the device to keep them straight for it, she spun the rabbit to shear its other side. This looked like a pig turning on a spit and was so ridiculous I nearly fell to the floor in laughter. Then she stopped and said she had another group coming in later, so she would finish the shearing then, and left the rabbit strapped up. Worth every cent of the 2 dollar admission.

We all got back on the bus and continued along towards the National Park, which is today's final destination, and stopped in a town along the way to pick up groceries. We all chipped in $10 for a BBQ tonight, organized by our bus driver and B and myself picked up groceries for breakfast and dinner tomorrow (and beers for the Riders game!). We then continued to Tongariro National Park and hopped off at the YHA to check in. Chilled for a couple hours, then helped prepare the meal for the BBQ, which turned out to be a real feast of potato salad, mixed salad, pasta salad, garlic bread, hamburgers, chicken wings and sausages, with ice cream for dessert. Best $10 meal I've had in a long time, possibly ever. After that, we sat for a couple hours and chatted at a table composed of 2 girls from BC, one girl from Ontario, Dan, B, me, a girl from Quebec and a guy from Germany. And that pretty much rounded out the night. Tomorrow morning we get to sleep in til 10 then will watch the Rider playoff game, provided our internet cooperates. Most people are doing the Tongariro Alpine Crossing and we got to laugh at all them tonight, having already done that tiring journey. Bedtime. Go Riders.