To Waitomo Caves and Beyond!

Today, we ventured from Rotorua to the world famous Waitomo Caves. The caves are part of a very large grop of limestone caves about 1 hour drive southwest of Hamilton, NZ. The most notable of these caves are the famous Glowworm caves, which features thousands of little worms that glow in the dark to attract insects that they then trap and eat. We went through two different cave tours, one featuring the glow worms en masse.

From looking just at these different attractions we've visited already, it's clear that NZ is a much less litigious society than the USA. Things that would never fly in the USA because you, as the attraction owner, are beholdent to John Q Public to ensure that he doesn't do anything stupid and hurt himself, go over very well in New Zealand. Yesterday, for example, we went down a concrete luge on little scooters easily reaching 25mph down the side of a mountain. It would be simple to drive off the edge of a cliff. Protection? Bicycle helmets were required and elbow pads were "optional." You can also bungy jump off basically anything with height in this country as well.

Shandelle's bogged down with allergies and I'm desperately trying to finish The House of Morgan, a 750 page tome I started earlier this week. Like an idiot, I packed more books than clothing. So, I'm hoping to finish this book and post it and other victims back to the States so I needn't carry them around any more.

Quote of the day: "This whole place looks like Lord of the Rings." -- Shandelle on today's hike.

Tomorrow, we're heading for the coast. We're hoping to outrun Shandelle's allergies that have been acting up down here.