into the abyss

ruakuri caves. waitomo district. 3 hours of underground awesome.

on saturday we signed on for the 'black abyss' caving tour with the black water rafting company of waitomo, new zealand. i'd heard a lot about these caving tours and had decided before i came to NZ that i wanted to do this with jason and kelly. the caves are located about an hour or so south of hamilton and are famous for their glow worms (BIG SECRET: they aren't actually worms, but insect larvae. and what glows is their feces. which just adds to the awesome). there are a number of tours organized around this, from a sedate boat tour along the underground river (probably taking mom on this one) to a 7-hour feet-numbing black water extravaganza. after kelly researched it, we chose to go a little less extreme than that, but not too much less.

the black abyss tour starts with a 100' rappel (or 'abseil' for you brits out there) into the cave system. then you hike along for a bit until you get to the 'flying fox' (zipline in the pitch black). those two bits are pretty cool, but there is a lot of waiting around while everyone else in your group has their chance. at this point, though, the pace picked up a lot. next, we clutched inner tubes to our collective ass and jumped about 10-15' into the underground river.

a quick aside about the river: it's friggin' cold. you have on a full wetsuit with booties, a wetsuit jacket and an old army issue long sleeve shirt underneath and it's STILL cold. i could give graphic descriptions of gonads attempting to retreat into body cavities, but i'll spare you. and when you're jumping off a ledge into the water, no amount of inner tube will keep you from going under, even for just a second. it gets your attention.

anyway, once in the river, we roundly cursed its temperature, then made our way upstream via set ropes attached to the cave walls. after a time, we turned around, formed a flotilla, turned our headlamps off and floated merrily merrily merrily down the stream, looking up at the constellations of glow worms. it's just...awesome. it's awesome enough to make you forget temporarily about your feet going numb. eventually, we ditched the inner tubes and waded/swam through a sizeable portion of cave, stopping every so often for tea/coffe and cookies/chocolate/'cave biscuits'/whatever. at the end of the line, we had two choices for exiting the cave: the 'path of tranquility' or the 'two waterfalls of doom'. kelly chose the former and jason and i chose the latter. you are basically climbing up these two waterfalls through some pretty tight spaces, but it's totally safe (YOU HEAR THAT, MOM?). finally, you emerge, soaked and shivering, from your earthen womb and make your way back to headquarters for a hot shower, bagels and soup.

AFTER ACTION REPORT: it was a fucking blast. it was a bit pricey and slow at the start, but still was a hell of a lot of fun. i'm definitely taking more people to do this (peter and stephanie both have expressed their interest). anyone else who comes is welcome. understand, though, that it's hard. you're cold and wet for a long time before you're dry and warm. and it's somewhat physically demanding. but it is the sort of thing that you can't find many other places in the world and i'd recommend it to anyone who thinks they are up for the challenge. also, i don't know any of the other tour companies, but i really enjoyed the experience provided by the black water rafting company.