COLD and WET DAY (only I wasn’t really so cold)

In NZ, they have glowworms that live in caves. I had seen some under ledges and overhangs in the woods, but I was keen to see lots and lots of them. Glow worms are actually glow-maggots bc they are fungus fly larvae. They have an interesting life – a glow maggot hatches from an egg on a cave ceiling, eats the eggs closest to it and then makes a sticky stretch hammock and extends some sticky hairs that can be meters long. It uses the hairs to catch other insects that fly towards the maggot’s glowing anus. After they have eaten enough to have all the energy they require for their entire adult life, they pupate, and hatch into adult fungus flies with no mouths and huge genitalia. They have sex like crazy for two or three days, lay eggs, and then die bc they have no mouths to eat and have used up all their energy. In Waitomo, I had the opportunity to do some world famous black water rafting – awesome. First, I needed wetsuit overalls, a wet suit jacket, booties, overshorts (that had a big split in the seam), and a helmet – very stylish indeed. Then I had to use feng shui to find the perfect black inner tube to accompany me – the bigger the hole the better. A practice backward jump into your rube into the creek so you know what you are doing in the scary dark cave and off we went. The water was cold, but the only part of me that was cold was my fingers from paddling, otherwise the wet suit worked and kept me at a reasonable temperature. The first part involved crawling into a hole in the ground, a lot of me scrambling over rock ledges (while carrying my tube) in ankle to waist deep water, and jumping backwards in the dark over two waterfall drops. It was all very exciting. Then the best part… we formed an eel (hooking arms over the next person’s ankles) and floated through a cavern of glow worms – sort of like gazing at the night sky. It was very serene and beautiful. Then more scrambling, paddling, and jumping to get to the cave exit. And an excellent end to the excursion – a really hot shower, a bagel, and tomato soup. Then I went to a place where they SHEAR angora rabbits. (not cut with scissors Chrissy!) they shear them just like sheep which is less stressful to the rabbits and takes a lot less time. So I stuck around to watch a bush sized fur ball turned into a scrawny normal sized rabbit and got on the road. It was off to Rotorua for some mud pools and thermal hot springs.. oh wait… back to cold and wet… first I went ZORBING. (http://www.zorb.com/) While I was teaching at LCHS, Dan would often find random things that he thought were awesome and share them. Once he happened upon zorbing and I remembered this and thus determined to zorb. Zorbing is basically rolling down the hill in a beach ball. There is a large giant ball with a smaller ball suspended inside of it and held with millions of cords. The ball is clearish so you can see out and they can see in. Only the zydro was available, which is zorbing with a bucket of water… well if that’s what’s going. I questioned some kids who were going for their third time which course was the best and decided the zigzag was the way to go (zig zag zorb). HILARIOUS. I took my waterproof camera with me to try and capture the moment but it was hard as I was bouncing, rolling, sloshing, and squealing with laughter. I kind of just stuck my arm out and pushed the button as often as I could remember. Some of the photos turned out quite good – though off center, some are not PG, and some only show the inside of the zorb. If it weren’t so expensive I would do it again. I would definitely invest in one if I had a hill in my backyard though.