Waitomo and the road to Rotorua

We were not allowed to take pictures in the glowworm caves, so all of the photos are from the road there.

One thing that I should mention is that New Zealand is really a pretty small country. Our cab driver the first day was saying you could drive the length of the north island in eight hours, spend three on the ferry, and then he wasn't sure about the length of the south island, but others said you could drive it in eleven hours. Obviously if you were to go at this rate, you would not be seeing and enjoying things, but the point is that you can cover a lot of ground in a short time.

The reason I mention this is because there were various places that I had thought about going when I was planning the trip, but decided against because I did not think we had time. Suddenly, as we are on the tour bus I kept seeing signs for all of these places, and they weren't really that far away. It is a good reason to consider renting a car. On the north island, things are really close together, and you can hit more that way. On the south island things are further apart, but all of the scenery is really beautiful.

This particular tour was selected because it went from Auckland (where we knew we would be) to Rotorua (where many attractions are) and stopped at the Waitomo caves. Even with that, it might have been worthwhile to be on our own, because we only saw one cave, and there are three there (Waitomo, Ruakuri, and Aranui). Actually, there are multiple glowworm caves in New Zealand, though I think Waitomo is the best known.

I definitely think seeing one of the caves is in order. There's something eerily beautiful about the glowworms, like a mini-galaxy of stars. The thread of personal connection that we experienced at Waitangi continued, as our guide was the granddaughter of the Maori chief who had owned the land and discovered the caves. It's nice to have that history built in.

For this particular tour, you walk in part of the way, and see some things, and then load into a boat to ride further in. We did not get the full tour, as heavy rains had caused the water to rise about twelve feet. We later met another tourist who had to miss the boat ride completely, as the rain did not stop after we left. We still saw a fair amount.

The tour does not take very long, and our option included lunch. There is usually a cafeteria at Waitomo, but it had burned and the new construction had not been completed yet, so they took us to the Big Apple Cafe. The picture shows the sign only. The Cafe itself is a regular building, with a normal shape, and quite large. It's more like a reception hall than a cafe.

The tour option was a lunch buffet. We had our choice of meat from the grill, and then there was a table with different things you could take. There was not much variety, but the food was really good. Partly it was that there wasn't much of a selection, and partly it was that they were not doing a good job of keeping the different dishes filled, but my steak, pumpkin soup, and fried rice were all good. So, that may not sound like a glowing recommendation, but I would go again.

Other pictures include a view of Auckland taken from Kelly Tarlton's, a tree I shot from the bus because I found it very symmetrical, and two shots from the pitstop we made. The dog building has a kind of a tourist shop/information booth and the sheep is a cafe. If I remember correctly, it is the Slightly Sheepish Coffee House, and the dog is of course the Good Shepherd, for the tourists as well as the sheep.

The drive was not at all bad in terms of distance or rough road. The company was not great. We had a very nice driver from Auckland to Waitomo, who was friendly and gave good information. At Waitomo we switched drivers, and John seemed to kind of hate us. He wasn't outright rude, but there was this thinly-veiled contempt. To be fair, there were some other Americans on the bus, and at least one of them was quite overbearing and obnoxious. I can see that if you get enough of those, you could build up a distaste for it, but then maybe you don't belong in the hospitality industry.

Again, the point of all this is that you should just get a car.

http://www.waitomo.com/