Waipu Caves

Darkness and Silence. Only interrupted by the murmur of a small river besides us.

A drop of water falling.

Eyes slowly adjusting, we see hundreds of blue stars above us: Glowwyrms.

We have both been at caves, but we never saw something like this before. It was a magical experience. You walk down a rocky path into a pitch black hole and follow a little stream that leads into the depths of the earth.

Everything around us seemed to come alive in the darkness. The gurgling of the water turned to voices, the rocks echoed everything and looked like living things, being only silhouettes in the light of our headtorches.

And turning them out, hearing only water and seeing the wyrms shine bright everywhere around us, created a feeling of floating somewhere in the middle of the universe, surrounded by these strange blue stars, so small and so close and yet seeming to stretch endlessly.

It's a pity that we weren't able to catch this impression in photos – there was just no light the camera could possibly work with. But we left the caves really impressed and will not forget the sight so fast...