We left Nelson pretty early this morning to drive South to Charleston (which is just south of Westport). Charleston is a small town (150 people), but many years ago (New Zealand’s Gold Rush) the town population was up to 130,000 people and there was talk of making it New Zealand’s Capital. We were doing the Underworld Rafting adventure. This company was started in 1987 by two teachers, Ray and Geoff, who were taking their students on this adventure when many of the parents said they would also like to participate.

When we arrived they outfitted us with all of our gear – wet suits, boots, life vests and of course a helmet with a head lamp. The gear was a bit wet and a little stinky. .

We were teamed up with a German group and we loaded into the vans to be transported to our start. Geoff and Ray have built a train (including laying all of the tracks by hand) that takes you through the rainforest to get to the bottom of the caves. Once we stopped at the end of the line we got into our gear

We took a short walk along the Nile River and crossed a suspension bridge (also built by the team). From here we ascended 117 steps to the top of the caves (by now Greg’s stinky wet suit was overwhelming him).

We entered the caves at the Triclops entrance – the caves are exactly as they were found and so we were very careful not to touch any of the formations.

All of the formations are formed from pure calcium carbonate – and just amazing! This area has lots of volcanic activity but the limestone areas in the cave remain perfectly still preserving the formations. The stalactites and stalagmites grow at 1 inch per five hundred years – slow going.

We ducked and shuffled through the caves to see all of the different rooms – I was feeling happy about being a bit vertically challenged, especially as I followed Greg. Many places in the caves the stalactites had grown to meet the stalagmites creating columns – .

Once we had made it through the formations we moved into another part of the caves where we could see water. Now for everyone who talked to me before I left, I was so excited for the glow worms – they brochure says you get to raft through caves using only the lights from the glowworms. As our guide pointed out a few glowworms I began getting really excited – then he said a flood had come through in January and wiped a lot of the worms away. I was feeling crushed. The four glow worms that we were looking at were cool but where were the sea of shiners…

Ray had us get into our tubes and practice steering by using our hand paddles. We were floating around in cave wondering where it was that we were going to get out.

Ray had us hook our feet together like a train and turn off our headlamps. He took the back position and began paddling us and told us to keep our heads down. He pulled us through a narrow opening in the cave (it was a super tight fit) and once through he turned off his head lamp and VIOLA! There were the glow worms – tons of them.

We floated through the caves in the dark and eventually we could see light. The caves open up into the lush forest – an area that would be hard to get to unless you were in our tubes.

From here we floated into the nile river and down the rapids. We exited the river and got back on the train back to Charleston. I had my expectations set pretty high for this trip and they were totally exceeded – for those coming to NZ this is a must. I think they also have glow worm caves on the north island, but rafting through the dark only lit by glow worms can’t be beat!! This rocked!