Paihia Week #2 – Day #2

12/23/07

Today, Jenny and I went down to the wharf to find out about different activities we could book. She wanted to find out about tours to the Kawiti glow-worm caves in Waiomio and the Waipoua Kauri (pronounced Cody) forest, which is on the west coast (we are on the east coast, but it only takes about 2 hours to get to the east coast because we are at a narrow point of the north island). We found out that there were no tours to the glow-worm caves, but we could rent a car and drive down there easily. So we called one of the car rental places and it was just this woman who lives in Paihia. The car was at the airport, so she came to pick us up and take us to get it. On the way to the airport, we saw 2 wineries, so we decided to go to one of them (Marsden) on the way from the airport to the caves.

I decided that I would drive (instead of Paul, since he drove the whole time in Ireland) and it was really weird driving on the left side of the road. Luckily, the roads here are much wider and nicer than the roads in Ireland, so it wasn’t too bad. Also, it was just weird to drive in general since I haven’t driven a car in 2.5 months! So we stopped in the Marsden winery and tried a few whites but only one red. We ended up getting a Pinot Gris for me and Jenny, a Sauvignon Blanc for Paul (which has a taste of capsicum, which is red bell pepper, in it and that was too weird for me and Jenny), and 2 bottles of the Syrah. YUM! It was really beautiful there and we wanted to come back that evening for dinner, but they only do dinner on Saturday night. So sad. So Jenny and Paul had a glass of wine (I didn’t have one since I was driving) and we walked around the vineyard a little.

Here are some pics at the winery (the plant at the end was actually in the woods at the glow-worm cave):


After the winery, we drove to Waiomio to go to the glow-worm caves. Apparently, one of the towns we passed through, Kawakawa, has these famous toilets in the street that are all different shapes and made of all recyclable material (some European built them), but we couldn’t find them, so we didn’t get to see them. Oh well.

When we got to the glow-worm caves, we realized it’s just a little family operation, so one of the sons of the family were taking us on the tour through the caves. He is a descendent of a Maori tribe that found a woman in there hiding from her husband over a thousand years ago and they have inhabited the land around the cave since then.

The glow-worm caves were really cool. These worms are super tiny, like the size of a sewing needle, and just the tip of them glows. The glow comes from the oxidation of their poop! How funny is that?!? (or am I just juvenile for thinking that glowing poop is funny? :)) The glow is used to attract insects, like flies and mosquitoes, to the glow-worm’s web, which is just a few web strings that hang down vertically, but it is sticky like a spider web, so when the insect gets caught in the web, the worm just pulls up the web and eats the insect. Weird.

Our guide said that we were only viewing 30% of the glow-worms during the day, and at night 100% of the glow-worms come out and you don’t even need a lantern to go through the cave because the glow-worms completely light it up! Too bad we couldn’t see that. They aren’t open at night, so only their family gets to see it.

There are some stalactites hanging down from the ceiling of the cave that are limestone and are still growing (unfortunately some people have broken some of them off :( so sad) and if you touch the ones that are still growing, the oil on your hands could stop it from growing.

After the cave, we drove back to Paihia and did some grocery shopping and then went back to the apartment and just chilled out. Then we went to dinner and watched a movie afterwards. We are such lazy bums. We pass out early every night :)

Look how pretty it is now!