Black Water Mischief

To those in the camper van world, black water is what one has to dispose of from ones chemical toilet. In Waitomo, however, black water is the name given to the gentle rivers that flow through the underground caves.

Waitomo is famous for its glow worms, as for some reason, the conditions in the caves are perfect for their growth, and there are a remarkable number of them. After our drive from the volcanoes, we knew that there were a few options open to us for seeing the glow worms, which are the most coveted in NZ. One was to walk through the most popular cave and then go on a small boat trip to see them in the dark. And then there were the adventurous options as well, which I have to admit I wasn’t overly keen on. The one we’d talked ourselves in (and out of) was Black Water rafting, which is an adventurous 4 hour trip involving climbing through an underground cave, squeezing through tiny tunnels, clambering over rocks, floating down subterranean rivers in inner tubes and swimming in freezing cold water (it doesn’t get above 4 degrees), whilst seeing millions of glow worms and stalagmites. So after much deliberation, we decided that we’d take a chance and book on the
“Tumu Tumu Toobing” trip aka Black Water rafting. There were just five of us in the group – us, a girl from the Lake District and two guides – one American girl (who took a shine to Keef straight away and a had an instant dislike of me) and a kiwi called Gav, who turned out to be a nice bloke and a lot less hyper than little Miss Yankee Doodle Dandy.

Our guides drove us out from the village to some farmland which housed the cave, and from there we proceeded to get togged up in full wetsuits, booties, wellies and hard hats. Not too bad so far, apart from the fact that it was cold and miserable and the wetsuits were still soaking from their previous use. After trudging through the farm and some delightful poo piles for about fifteen minutes (our body weights having doubled due to the wet suits) we made it to the entrance of the cave. And then the panic set in. The opening was about 2 ft across, with a ladder that descended some 30 ft into the darkness. I got to go first, and I have to say that the ladder was probably the worst bit of the whole thing. Once we got down into the cave, it was amazing – the glow worms lit up the roof like a miniature milky way, and once our eyes adjusted to the near darkness, we climbed through the cave for over two hours – Keef being taken off to the front with the happy camper and me stuck at the back, feeling more like Bridget Jones than ever before in my life. Seriously, for anyone that has seen the first Bridg film, Keef was Mark Darcy for the trip and Mel was (ironically) playing the role of the B*tch called Natasha. I stumbled and fell all over the place at the back, and when it came to get into the inner tubes, we had the option to just get into them normally, or to jump from a 20ft ledge backwards into the river, with inner tube held to one’s rear. I was naturally happy to go for the first option, however after much goading from little Miss Seattle, I took the challenge of jumping from the ledge (for those who don’t know – I’m petrified of heights and am very clumsy around water – think Blackpool fall) and upon impact with the river I bounced straight back out of my tube and slap bang into the water, much to everyone’s amusement. It reminded me of when Bridget jumps from the plane and lands in the pig field, fuelling my Bridget day. After inner tubing, we got to swim through some more cave, we floated through tiny holes on our backs as the current was so strong, it just pulled us through and when we finally made it to the end, I’d never felt more relived in all my life. However, despite this, I was also really pleased with myself and actually felt like I’d achieved something. Keef thoroughly enjoyed himself, mainly because it involved getting grubby, soaking wet and lots of investigating. Stupidly enough, neither of us picked up any injuries from the actual cave, but I am now sporting a bruise the size of a tea plate (maybe not quite that big) on the back of my leg from getting out of the coach.

*Note – Maybe best to not look at this picture if you’re eating or its early in the morning, it’s not too pleasant. And also sorry if anyone is offended by my non politically correct American references – she really got my goat.