I remember hearing a lot of gusting and creaking while I was sleeping, so the semi-bad weather continued through the night and the next morning. But when we woke up, it was somewhat clear with a nice rainbow outside. What was more worrisome was that the next day we were playing to go to Rangitoto to do a big, adventurous hike. Clear weather was key, because otherwise they would not let us go up the mountain (because all you would see when you got up there would be clouds and bad weather instead of breathtaking vistas).

We had some time in the morning, so we went down to the trail next to the Aranui Cave again and walked along the whole length. The river was still pretty active because of all the recent rain. When we finished that, we checked the time and figured we just had enough time to go further along the road past the Aranui Cave and check out a couple more short trails (really short, they are like 10minute trails, roundtrip). So we went to see a waterfall and a natural bridge. There was nobody at the waterfall when we got to the trailhead, but a car did turn in and stop after we parked. They looked lost because they had their map out and looked like they were trying to figure out where they were. I wanted to go over and see if we could help, especially since I had my GPS, but we were short on time (we basically jogged to the waterfall and back). By the time we got back to the car, they were gone, so hopefully they figured out which way to go.

Well, we made it back to Waitomo Caves in time to catch the daily shearing at the Shearing Shed, where they shear Angora Rabbits! We got to see a lot of products made from natural Angora rabbit fur, and a rabbit being shorn. The rabbits were so cute! They stretch them out and then shear them. It looked a little alarming, but the rabbits don't struggle or seem to be in any distress (any more than rabbits usually are), so it looked OK.

Afterwards, we grabbed lunch at the Huhu Cafe, which was right next to where the Spellbound tour was going to leave. There was only one other group of people on the tour, which was nice, because we got more personalized attention from the guide. The other group was odd. It was a husband and wife from Auckland, and they brought their baby (about 4 months old). The baby was great. She was quiet through the whole trip (they might have slipped her a drink when we went in the dark cave though). But they didn't look like they were prepared for the tour at all. The girl was wearing these thin shoes, I don't know what they're called, I'm not a shoe person, but they look sort of like ballet slippers, with no support at all. And I was like (in my head), "You're going to go into a cave with that?! You'll step on rocks and get your feet all wet and everything..." The guy was wearing shorts. They had a handbag with all their stuff (like baby formula and what not), and they seemed to be struggling with it often (well, I didn't notice it much, it bothered Patricia more). They had the baby wrapped in a blanket. Later on, we wondered what was wrong with using a backpack to hold stuff, like we were doing, and also what about a sling to carry the baby on your back or to your front, leaving your hands generally free? I mean, c'mon, slippery cave, and possibly dropping the baby when passing her from one person to another so you can get stuff from the bag...jeez...

It was a little drive over to the cave that the Spellbound company operates out of. We got to see lots of sheep on the way. I also had the honor of getting out of the van and opening/closing the gates that we came to. I guess I was the logical choice, but it was wet outside, and the gates were wet. One of them got stuck on the ground so you had to lift it a bit before it could swing all the way open. That one made my gloves wet.

The guide dropped us off at the top of a small hill, and Patricia and I followed a trail down to get to the cave entrance (the tour guide drove the others down to the cave entrance on the road). We got to get up and close with a lot of sheep that were standing around. They were naturally afraid, so they kept running away from us. As I tried to avoid all the sheep poo lying around, I wondered what kind of steps they would make us do upon arriving back at the US.

The cave itself was cool. There were no pre-installed lights; the guide gave us little helmets with lights on them so we could see. I again tried to get some handheld shots of glowworms -- the guide suggested that I could lean my camera on the rail to get it to be more steady, and that was an awesome suggestion. We got into a little boat and turned off all our lights, and the guide took us down the river a ways where there were loads of glowworms all over the ceiling and walls. That was cool. Definitely a highlight. Also, after a while, our eyes got adjusted to the dark and we could see a lot more.

Afterwards, we stopped by a little shack (well, a covering -- it had no walls) just outside the cave to have some drinks and biscuits. Patricia and I opted for the hot chocolate to warm ourselves up. After that, a little more driving and gate opening, and we got to another cave. This one was a little bit more natural than the other ones we had seen, even though there was an installed path. There were bones littered here and there, from when animals fell into the cave and then couldn't get back out. Some of the other caves had bones too, but the guides told us they were put there in order to give the tourists an example of bones in caves. The ones in this cave largely undisturbed, or at the very least, wasn't placed there from somewhere else by humans.

All in all, a great experience. I liked the small group, and our tour guide was awesome. When we got back, I tried to tip him, but he told me that he didn't accept them and wouldn't take my money. Oh well...I tried. Patricia and I had been wondering the entire trip whether we were supposed to tip guides or not...but we definitely felt like this guy deserved extra.

Once again, we were leaving the town after check-out time, so we had already loaded all our bags into the car before the tour. We decided to call our hotel at Whakapapa village to see what the situation was up there. We had called the previous day and had gotten a recorded message saying that all the trips up to the mountain had been cancelled, but to check back later for the day that we were planning to go.

Well, basically it was a no go. Nobody would be going up to the mountain due to weather, and in fact, some people had gotten trapped up in the ski slopes the previous day. Some of the smaller trails were probably open around the base of the mountain, but I figured it probably wouldn't be so great if the weather was bad. The hike that we were planning to go on was a 7-8 hour trip, one-way (you take a bus or coach to the start and they pick you up from the end).

On top of that, we found out from talking to the hotel staff that Patricia had booked the hotel on the wrong day, she had booked it for the night we arrived in New Zealand instead. So at first they couldn't find our reservation, and then they said that it was missed, which is when I started checking our papers and saw that it was the wrong day. Oh well.

So it wasn't really worth it to go to Whakapapa Village and Rangitoto anymore, so we decided to adjust our plans and went over to Taupo instead, sort of along the way to our next stop, Rotorua. On the drive over, the sun started setting, and we started looking for a place to have dinner. It was really funny -- Patricia was looking at the map, and said, "There's a small city up ahead that we're going to pass through." So we decided to have dinner there. Well, we entered the "small city," according to the map, and passed maybe a total of ten buildings (it was probably less, it felt like only five buildings). And then we were pass the "city". That was pretty crazy. So much for dinner there.

We did pass another place to eat though. When I took a wrong turn, we ended up passing a pizzaria-type restaurant that wasn't out in the middle of nowhere, so we stopped by and grabbed something to eat. For a while it looked like we wouldn't ever get attended to (it was one of those places that you go up to a counter to make your order), and I was on the verge of leaving to just eat at Taupo once Patricia came back from the bathroom, but then she took our order. And of course they were out of the dishes that we wanted. But we ate there anyways.

We arrived at Taupo without any idea of a place to stay, so I first went all the way down to the lakeside where we found a bunch of motels. We went into one, but then decided to try to find the one that was in our guidebook. So we took off and with a little more driving got to a hotel that looked liked it was used primarily for business conferences. They had little standalone duplexes for their rooms.

The building was weird because it had three glass doors -- one was definitely for our room, and one was for the other room that people were in (the lights were on), but the middle one was dark. It seemed like the other door in our room led to that dark room, but we never figured out what that room was for.

We picked up some travel brochures from the hotel to try to plan some interesting things to do in Taupo. Of course, the hotel wireless network was another one that I should have been able to access with iPass, but it was still not working properly. It was at this point that I found out that there were toll free New Zealand numbers I could call to get connected to a modem too. So I no longer even had to pay the $2 per local call for internet access any more. At Waitomo Caves, we paid Colin $2/hr to use their wireless network, since our room didn't have a phone (we only used one hour's worth).

So that was it for our caving adventures. The Lucas Cave was a good overall experience, it had a lot of people, but also a lot of different basic cave-type things to see. I thought the Orient Cave was better primarily because of the weird helictites sticking out in so many places. As soon as we walked into the Aranui Cave, it had a totally different feel than the Jenolan Caves. I can't really describe it, the formations just looked different. The Aranui Cave tended to have really tall ceilings. The Ruakuri Cave was just wet -- there were a few glowworms there. The Spellbound trip was awesome because of all the glowworms.

The second word to describe New Zealand is that it's hilly. The roads wind back and forth along the hills, so it's not like I-5 where you can turn on your cruise control and just head straight for miles and miles. It's more like 17 when you're trying to get to Boulder Creek. I never did figure out whether our car had cruise control or not. The hills are apparently left over from volcanic activity, which is what gives New Zealand its look (think Hobbiton or Rohan from Lord of the Rings). At night I used my highbeams since there were very few people on the road. And I tried very hard not to repeat my mistake in Oregon and was not afraid to use the middle of the road when it was safe to do so. =)