Black Water Rafting and Black Sand Beaches!

After an awesome stay in Rotorua, we drove west to Waitomo to check out the caves! We got set up with a cave tour in which you climb and tube down through the caves for several hours in frigid water, over waterfalls, and sometimes in the pitch black. It was awesome! We were happy we had wetsuits and helmets with lights…when we all turned off the lights, it was very eerie. We finally saw glowworms, which are actually gnat larvae that produce a bit of light to lure prey in the dark cave.
After surfacing from the cave tour, it was a hot and sunny day, so we headed to Raglan, the beach town! There was still plenty of daylight left so we relaxed on the black sand beach, then headed into town for some dinner. Our time in Raglan was spent watching the surfing and kiteboarding and catching some vitamin D. Before we left, we met up with my dad’s friend Tony Bruce! He owns the surf/kite/coffee shops in town. He showed us around his empire and we caught up on the happenings of the past 25 years. It was tough leaving Raglan, especially with such beautiful weather, but we still had much of the North Island to conquer.