Glowworms and Hobbits

It was time to visit the famous glowworms in Waitomo and Hobbiton, we had our touristy week and it was definitely worth it!

We had much more time in Waitomo than most tourists, because we stayed for two nights in a hostel and most visitors just spend a few hours here. On the other hand, Waitomo is very small, so you can see the whole village in a hour. At the first evening we tried the Buffett, that was advertised in our hostel and were quite disappointed. The advert was not wrong, we just thought about something else when we heard Buffett and “all you can eat”. When we arrived at the restaurant, with the free shuttle, quite some people from the shuttle made a face. In front of us was just a big pot of stew, some rice from the rice cooker and potatoes. We tried the make the best out of it and enjoyed the nice view at the restaurant.

Next morning we visited the famous glowworms. First we did a two hour tour in the Ruakuri Cave, which was very interesting and we were in a nice and small group. We saw our first glowworms, which are actually cannibalistic maggot with shiny poo. Further this cave had stunning speleothems, which you can see at the pictures below:

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The second cave we visited was the one and only Waitomo Cave. It was unbelievable how many glowworms we saw. It was like looking at the stars in the sky. Sadly, we were not allowed to take any pictures in the Waitomo Cave.

At the very top of our New Zealand must do list was always Hobbiton. The famous movie set in Matamata is a highlight for every movie-nerd. Hobbiton is a beautiful small village of Hobbit holes and gives you a real feeling of being in the Shire. At the end we even had a beer at the Green Dragon, which is due the high number of visitors in the Shire now the busiest pub in New Zealand.

At the end of our very touristy week we stayed in Rotorua. Rotorua is a very special town, because it has seismic activity nearly everywhere in town. There are a lot of hot spring, geysers and colourful ponds. It was amazing just to walk through the park, seeing the activity. On the downside it smells constantly like rotten eggs in Rotorua.

After Rotorua we did a nice, but short trip to the East Cape and the east coast. We had some beachtime and saw the most eastern point of New Zealand. At the end we arrived in Rotorua again and celebrated Maeve’s birthday at the local food market. Today we are leaving, going to Lake Aniwhenua.