We had a good first night in the van (which was mostly uneventful except I had to pee in an outdoor location), albeit short. We had hoped to get to the Waitomo caves in time to hit the 0900 labyrinth tour, which is a combo of caving and rafting. When we pulled in around 0800 the tours were already booked up until noon. Happily, this ended up working out great, because the short sleep and slight time change caught up with us and we were both pretty tired. Luckily our hotel was right there with us in the parking lot and we decided to grab a nap before our tour started up. It was nice to zonk out for a bit! We got up with just enough time to make a small lunch and change into our suits!
We met the tour group and headed over to get suited up. We had a young Canadian couple, 3 Danish young ladies, and a Japanese family in our group, and everyone seemed eager for a bit of adventure! As the guides tried to learn everyone's names they started getting us our gear: socks made out of wetsuit material (that were soaking wet and cold, yum), an actual wetsuit (also wet and cold), and a wetsuit-jacket (perhaps a true sport-coat?). Then they sent us away to suit up. All of the above-mentioned items were MUCH colder when you actually put them on, and also made you feel a bit like a banana trying to get back into its peel.
The caves themselves were awesome, the waterways freezing, and the glowworms were really glowing maggot poop. Nonetheless, this was a highlight! The guides did great at giving everyone an opportunity to jump off of small waterfalls, float in the dark, and just take in the craziness of being underground floating on a tube looking at glowworms. At the end we got (sort-of) hot showers, soup, and bagels. Plus the guides took pictures the whole way, so when we get access to a comp with a disc drive, we will upload those! Fun fact: Casey is a waterfall jumping champ. :-)
Over bagels and soup we planned some more activities and chatted with our new Danish friends. We planned on heading to the Tongariro crossing the next day, and staying at a campsite suggested by another friend (shout out to Mark) outside of lake Taupo. The Danish friends mentioned at we should check ahead at Taupo because an Ironman triathlon was about to go down. Turns out this was good advice. But, unknown at the time we popped in to a nearby tavern for a beverage and some wifi to check out the sitch around Tongariro.
Turns out the bit of rain we were experiencing at the caves was actually what would come to be known as a "weather bomb". Tongariro was closed both the current day and the next two following, making our tight schedule impossible to incorporate this hike, which was supposed to be one of the main events of our trip here. We are now seriously bummed and trying to figure out how to rearrange our plans. Scramble, sadness, flusteredness ensue. After some calming, yet disappointed, words from Casey we decided we would instead head to Rotorua and see some geysers, a cute town, and some Maori gooby-tourist sights. Being that it was getting late, we made some arrangements ahead of us at a holiday park (which is like an RV park, but accommodating vans and tents ect.) and hit the road.
We made it to Rotorua around 6, and it was already super dark. The rain wasn't falling too much, but there were wind advisories all around the area. We didn't need an advisory to tell us though, the drive over was difficult keeping the van in the center of the lane. Weather bomb, go.
We decided since the rain wasnt terrible we'd go ahead and get some food and a drink in town. We found the Pig & Whistle, which turned out nicely. The bartenders seemed worried at how much food we ordered and even more worried that we housed it. Oops. But, now full and happy we strolled back to the holiday park; in the full on rain and gale-force winds. We got settled in for sleep, but Casey was worried his belly wasn't feeling so good, but he's tough and just chalked it up to all the bar food. Little did we know this would be the gastro version of the weather bomb. So much fun on the horizon for day 3...but unknowingly, we hit the pillows for our second night on the road. Whew.
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