Kia Ora! I'm writing this sitting outside after dinner because the weather here is so beautiful in the evening. So the last two days have been absolutely amazing. Sunday was adventure day. We previously signed up for adventure packages. There were options such as rafting, zorbing, some agriculture thing, and then the one I picked, Fire and Water. We started out at a hot springs park. We walked a good 3 km. These pools were so cool. Some of them were bright teal, neon green, orange, and then some yucky looking ones, but still amazing nonetheless. There were big craters and lots of steam, and of course it smelled like rotten eggs due to the excessive amount of sulfur. We then went to see a geyser errupt. It was discovered by prisoners around 100 years ago. They had found the hot water and decided to bring their dirty clothes there to wash them, but when the soap interacted with the water, there was quite the explosion.
We then headed to a different city for a jet boat ride. The boat fit 12 people plus the driver. We went speeding down a river, and he would twist and turn the boat so you thought you were going to hit rocks and trees, but just in the nick of time, he would swerve away. The best part was when he would whip us around into a 180 or 360 degree turn in a matter of like 2 seconds. He then took us to the bottom of a beautiful waterfall.
After grabbing some lunch, we headed to Rainbow Springs, a New Zealand animal park. The animals weren't huge or anything, but they're all New Zealand animals. They even had redwood trees in the forest area. Leading up to the end were signs for the Kiwi, which is New Zealand's national bird or animal I'm not really sure. But they're really funny looking birds, and way bigger than I thought. Unfortanely they're nocturnal, and I was unable to take pictures of them. After a hot day spend in this ridiculous sun, a few of us headed to the aquatic park right behind KiwiPaka to cool off.
Today was caving day. We had three choices of trips to go on. Unfortunately, I didn't get the one I wanted because there were only ten spots, but I think all of them would have been cool, and mine was amazing anyways. It was called Tuma Tuma Toobing. We had to put on these really thick wet suits that were so hard to pull up. Then we put jackets over, boots, and a helmet. They were just a little hard to walk in. So we had to slide into the cave through a really tiny space. We then proceeded down some rocks and had to swim through some deeper water. We got down to around 70ft below ground and were down there for 2 and a half hours. It was really hard to climb some of the rocks with those wetsuit on and your boots full of water. At one point, we got on inner tubes and the guide had us turn our lights off and grab a rope to pull us through an area where there were glow worms. So cool. For those of you who don't know, glow worms are maggots. Yuck. They live for around 9 months and then cocoon themselves, turn into something else, mate for 3 days, and thend die. During the 9 months they eat around 5 times, and because they have no way to poop the food out, it all mixes with chemicals and makes them light up. It literally looks like the cave has its own stars. As gross at is, its amazing.
We then had to climb through this tiny tiny tunnel. I literally thought I was going to get stuck. There were definitely a few moments of panic. We had the option later to go through another tiny tunnel. I politely said no thank you. We even stopped in a larger area for a snack. Chocolate fish and some hot orange drink. After making it to another large area, the guides told us there was a tunnel that ran along the wall, and that we needed to turn our lights off and crawl through there in the pitch black. He referred to it as the "birthing tunnel" in case we didn't remember the original. It was kinda scary not being able to see anything. I kept bumping into the girl's butt in front of me. Oops. After crawling through some more cave, we hopped on tubes again in a chain so we were holding onto each other. We then floated through a river like area to see tons and tons of glow worms. As a group we sang Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. After crawling around some more, we had to climb up a ladder to get out. So glad we got to do that.
I don't think I could ever get sick of the country roads here. The landscapes are so unreal, they almost look fake at some places. It is really hilly here, and they 're so pretty, but they're full of sheep and cows. It makes me not even want to sleep on the bus, and for those of you who know me well, that's pretty amazing.
I pretty much still feel like I'm just on vacation, which I sort of am right now. I'm getting kind of antsy to get down to Wellington even with all the fun we've been having. It sucks living out of suitcase, and Wellington looks like such a great city. Until next time...
Kia Ora,
~Laura
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