Woke up this morning quite early because we had to get to our last adventure of the trip before heading back to Tauranga. We had some left over cereal from yesterday still, so we ate that in the hotel room for breakfast before checking out.
Today we were going on a 'Black water rafting' adventure in the Waitomo caves. Waitomo is a place that is a huge network of underground caves, and they actually have glow worms in them, which are the only source of light. There are plenty of ways to visit the caves, like boat tours and stuff, but we were going on the most extreme version which involved floating in a ring like the lazy river, but it was far from lazy.
The place we had to go was only 5 minutes down the road, so we were quite early. We just sat around waiting for it to start really, there was a tour group in there also waiting, they seemed a lot like Trek America, but a New Zealand version. They all seemed to be having so much fun together and it made me feel really sad because I was missing my Trek America friends so much.
Our guide soon came along and took us to go get our wetsuits and stuff on. Mine was way too tight, and I really struggled to get it on, but they would not let me have a bigger one. I was really annoyed about it because all the other girls if they said theirs was too tight were allowed a bigger one. Anyway, I finally got into it and we also had to wear helmets and welly boot things too, I was so uncomfortable.
Once we were all suited up, we had to drive in a van to the entrance of the cave that we were going into. When we got there, before we went in, we had to practice falling of the side of a small cliff with our iner tubes. The water was so cold, but it was really fun.
Then we went into the caves and it was so pitch dark in there. Luckily we had lamps on our helmets, but when they were turned off you couldn't see a thing. It was fun floating around in the dark, but also kind of scary. We had to jump of the side of ledges and stuff and I kept thinking I was going to hurt myself, but luckily I didn't. There was one bit where there was only about 10 inches between the water and the top of the cave and we had to lay flat in the rings because it was too shallow to stand. I hated that bit because it felt really claustrophobic and I felt like I was going to drown.
When we got to the bit where there were loads of glow worms, we turned off our head lamps so it was completely dark, and they were glowing like lights all over the walls. Of course I have no photos, but I urge you to google Waitomo glowworm caves to see what they look like, it was amazing.
The entire thing lasted 3 hours and by the end of it we were so freezing cold, my hands were shaking. The guides thought it would be fun to make us turn all our lights off for the last bit and feel our way out of the cave, I hated that because it was so black that I couldn't see a thing, and that made me panic. When we were finally out, we drove back in the van to the reception place to change out of out wetsuits, I was so glad to get it off, and then we got given some free soup to warm up.
We then drove back to Tauranga, which was about a 2 hour drive. We got back in mid afternoon and did some laundry, then Fabian and Treena got in from work soon after. We told them about all the fun stuff we did, and then we went out to the supermarket so get some stuff for dinner. I think me and Gary got some pasta and had it with some chicken, but I didn't write it down. After dinner we watched TV for a while, then I went to have a shower and started sorting out all our laundry.
This was the night that it really hit me that this time next week it would all be over and we would be at home. I got really upset about it, thinking about how unhappy I was this time a year ago, working long hours in a retail job I hated, dreading christmas and all the horrible sale shoppers that would come my way. At that point in my life, looking forward to this trip was the only thing that kept me going, and now it was almost over. So I just spent the next few hours feeling sorry for myself, wishing that I could relive the last 3 months all over again. Spending every day having fun, and also being with Gary every moment, was something that I had got way too used to, and I really was not ready to let go of it.
Eventually, I got over myself a bit and Gary came into the room and we went to bed.
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