WAITOMO

We drove across country to get to the Waitomo Caves.  Wai means water and tomo means hole. We stayed at a really nice little bed and breakfast called Waitomo Caves B&B Guest Lodge, with a great restaurant just across from it called Huhu with the most delicious food.  We were really impressed.

Our first tour was in the Glow worm caves.  We went by boat into the caves at which point all the lights were turned off and the glow worms were so numerous they were like tiny pin pricks of stars - it was just magical.  It was a very short tour and I wished we had more time to either go on the three hour tour or float down in the water through the caves - maybe a bit too adventurous for me.  Anyway, it gave us a taste.

The next tour was to the Ruakuri cave which lasted a couple of hours.  The rock formations were amazing with stalactites, stalagmites and some sheet like formations.  Most interesting.

We went back to Huhu for lunch and bought a couple of extra cheese buns for the road. We drove via Hamilton and stopped at the botanical gardens for a short while. They had many small gardens all with different themes, such as Chinese, Japanese, Modernist, Sustainable etc.  I particularly liked the medicinal and dye garden.

It started to rain, so we got back on the road to Tairua.  This was the view from our bedroom window at the Paku Lodge, on the Esplanade.  We were the only people there as the holiday makers didn't usually start coming to this area until after the holiday weekend.  We got the best room in the place, with a fabulous view.  We spent quite a long time on this beach as we met a very kind man, a retired geologist,  who told us all about the rocks only found in this area which contained crystals like chrysanthemums.  There were also lots of lovely shells and I spent a nice time sketching and painting in my journal while my other half bashed rocks and went off with our new friend who gave him a lovely specimen of the local rock.