Earthquake!!

After Rotorua, I headed to Waitomo, which is a small town with only a few hostels/lodges and bars and of course its famous caves. I went on a cave tour to the Ruakari Caves. They discovered the caves when the Maori followed two wild dogs into the entrance. Therefore, they called the caves 'den dogs' or Ruakari. I saw lots of formations within the caves and of course glow-worms.

That night I went on a night abseiling adventure within a crevice in the earth. It was so awesome! I abseiled 150 ft and at the bottom there were lots of slugs and giant spiders! I was in my glory. My guide and I poked and prodded the holes where the spiders were hiding and got to see some very beautiful spiders. After that we abseiled another 150 ft, but this time without our headlamps on. There were glow-worms everywhere! It was so spectacular to see the glow-worms all around you and when you looked up you could also see the night sky. It looked like you had stars all around you!

My trip down to Wellington proved to be horrible. I had to go back to Rotorua and wait until 11:30 pm to catch the next bus. So I had to wait in Rotorua for a very long time. Sitting infront of the information center/bus station I waited and waited until a very creepy man came along and wanted me to stay with him. So I called the police and they suggested that I stay in the foyer of the police station until my bus arrived. So I camped out in the police station for 6 hours. The bus ride overnight was horrible and I couldn't sleep at all because the bus was packed full.

But once I got to Wellington, I slept for a couple of hours in the lounge of the hostel because I couldn't check in yet. It was too early. But the day I arrived, there was an earthquake, at 2 pm and 4.6 on the Richter scale. While here I have taken a tour of the city, including Mt Victoria and Scorching Bay, which were amazing. I have also visited a huge museum, called the Te Papa. It has six floors, but I only found two floors to be interesting. I don't find there to be alot of things to do in Wellington, mostly because of the bad weather we've been having. But I walk along Oriental Parade along the docks every day. It is very beautiful.

Within a few days I am taking a ferry over to Picton, where I will start my 71 km journey through the Queen Charlotte Track. I'm very excited!