[Day 1] New Zealand: Waitomo Glowworms (Maggots) Cave & Night in Rotorua

Glowworm Caving

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(Not my picture)

This activity is one of the top ones to do in the North Island of New Zealand and if you look it up, you will see pictures with thousands of glowing dots in a cave. This was exactly what it was! We went through the cave to see these 'worms,' which are actually maggots but 'Glow Maggots' don't have same ring to it. It's about a 3 hour drive from Queenstown so we left early the first full day and headed to Waitomo Caves. We had two really great guides, Christine, Viet chick from Texas, and Jack, a guy from Fiji. They were both hilarious and really personable! They really made the experience that much more enjoyable. 

The first part was not that fun...putting on wetsuits. I mean, I'm thankful for them but boy are they a pain to put on. Why hasn't anyone invited a wetsuit that's easy to put on? Adding that to the future company idea list. Next we got into a van and heading out to the cave with our tubes. The whole trip lasted about 3 hours and consisted of walking through water, cliff jumping into our tubes, climbing through cave openings, and floating through the water admiring the glowworms. The water was freeezing let me tell you but sooo worth it and so much fun! 

The glowing is actually from the animal's poop... yes, we were looking at shiny shit. The maggot in larva stage for 9 months and that's the period where they will flow. After, they will turn into maggots but they only live for about 2 months because they don't have digestive systems so they can't feed themselves. It's a pretty sad lifecycle... but we still pay to come see them anyway. 

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(Not my photo)

We weren't allowed to bring our own cameras or GoPros inside so we didn't get any pictures. The ones they took weren't that great of quality so this part of the trip will just be in our memory bank. After getting out of the cold and smelly wetsuits, we were rewarded with a nice warm shower and hot tomato soup.

Night in Rotorua

After, we had to drive to Rotorua, a 2.5 hour drive, where we would spend the night. The hostel was miles ahead of the "best hostel" in Auckland. The beds were comfy, free unlimited wifi, and they also planned a beer pong tournament that night. Everyone was against me! Haha in a good, funny way of course. But I was just getting played by all the workers there. For example, both teams had to pick a number from 1 to 6 and the closest number went first. I said 4 and the worker told the other team to pick 5 then he goes "I picked 5 so they go first." Haha like what?! -___- ugh haha. All the rules were different so that threw me off. I made 4 out of 6 cups and my partner made 0... so we ended up losing. After the tournament, we hung around playing a few more rounds of beer pong and just hanging out. After, Kels and I tried watching My Big Fat Greek Wedding but the movie had too much dialogue and the room was way too loud to hear anything. A few people we were hanging out with went out to a bar but we weren't really in the mood since it was a really small town and I didn't think much was going on anyway. 

Ooh another great part about the hostel was free pancakes the next morning!!