simply the 8th wonder of the world! (Waitomo Caves)

Member Name: emma_ski

Product:	Waitomo Caves
Date:	08/06/09 (23 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: amazing, breath taking, natural wonder, a truely unique experience

Disadvantages: none

Waitomo is a very small place surrounded by lots and lots of trees. The caves are amazing and a day trip here is a MUST!

The caves are natural lime stone caves and were firsted explored in 1887 and were opened to tourists by 1889! so they have been well visited and popular over the many years! They are open from 9 am to approx 5.30pm depending on how busy it is and open 365 days of the year.

I spent the day here as part of my backpacking adventure. I went off a full day tour of the caves, which lasted around 7 hours. This was quite a physical day but less physical tours are available to suit all! There are a variety of other trip options from a gentle boat trip down into the caves and half day tours. some tours are not suitable for children, and it is some times a tight squeeze!

The day tour consisted of first practicing abseiling down a grassy hill in preparation for the abseil down to the caves. We abseiled down a hole 35meters into the centre of the cave. This was well supported by the tour guides who simply lowered a couple of the group who were nervous.
We walked around the higher levels of the caves with amazing natural beauty! Then taking the flying fox down to the deepest part of the cave where the river ran through. At this point we stopped and had a hot drink and snack.
We turned off our lights and it was pitch black, absolutely scary! Couldn't even see your hand in front of you! BUT you could see thousands of beautiful glowing glow-worms hanging from the top of the cave; it was an amazing sight, almost like looking up at the stars! This was one of the most spectacular sights I saw whilst backpacking!!

And it didn't stop there! Next we jumped down into the shallow river flowing through the caves and went on donut rings through the caves, very relaxing, laying back and watching the natural cave formations and glow worms.

We continued through the cave, ducking under low walls and climbing up through waterfalls. It was an amazing journey! When we finally reached day light again, we were kindly greeted by a warm shower and hot soup by the tour providers. While this was happening they put all our photographs onto a disk to keep a memory of the special day!

The staff were really helpful and so friendly! going into a dark cave is a bit scary and they were very supportive and didn't rush any of the group, meaning we ALL had a fantastic adventure.

This was one of the very best days in my gap year and i would love to visit the caves again!

Summary: tours to suit all abilities and budget, a must do before you leave NZ!