Glowworm caves and the roads that took us there

Notes from our weekend excursion

Dargaville is at the edge of nowhere, a little town on the west bank of the Wairoa River. We live there now. And although there is plenty to do in town (wink wink, there is not), and despite feeling sub-optimal after a bottle of wine the night before, we decided to have a little adventure this weekend.

From the edge of nowhere to the middle

We drive east out of Dargaville and turn south on Snooks Rd toward Maungakaramea. Hills roll like waves out here, and suddenly we find ourselves riding enormous swells on an endless green ocean. Neither of us says much as we watch trees and cows bob around us.

The road takes us up, up, up until we can see everything everywhere all at once (TM). Spoiler alert: it’s all rolling hills, trees and cows. Christian snaps a hasty photo, and then we are on our way down.

Christian’s hasty photo

We dip under the canopy. Christian warns me away from the steep dropoff to the stream on the left. I am well warned. We later encounter an overturned campervan and a backhoe operator puzzling over how to flip it back over. (I want to take a picture, but Christian thinks it would be mean. He’s right. We keep driving.)

We turn right for perhaps the seventh time. We’re perpetually turning right. That’s because you cannot drive straight to the middle of nowhere. You must spiral into it on washboard roads vibrating at a frequency that will a) loosen all the bolts on your car and b) send your astral body into the tenth dimension, where you experience timelessness and the obliteration of the self. The good news is, when your astral body returns, you’ll find you’ve arrived at your destination.

Digging up the buried lede at Waipu Caves

So we arrive at Waipu Caves Road. There’s a whole underground network of limestone caves in this area, some of which you can explore on your own. However, we opt for a tour on a private farm, whose sign promises “dry feet, no mud” versus the knee-high waters of the DIY caves.

Our guide shuffles us into a deep cavern and explains how stalactites and stalagmites form. We all nod reverently when she says it takes 100 years for a stalactite to grow 1 centimeter.

Stalactites that are hundreds or thousands of years old

But this is just a prelude to the real show, when we turn off our lights to gaze at the starry sky of glowworms above us. (Sorry, no photo. Too hard to capture.)

Glowworms are bioluminescent larvae of the species Arachnocampa luminosa, also known as fungus gnats (ew). Each glowworm generates a tiny beacon of green-blue light in its bum to lure food into its sticky, stringy web.

The sticky, stringy web of the glowworm

These creatures live in a dark, quiet world where time is a dripping, melting thing. Where life is about being still and waiting. Where they spend 10 months sleeping and eating. Then, in a matter of days, they mate and die, leaving several clusters of 20 eggs each across the cave ceiling. The first one to hatch eats its 19 siblings. It’s positively gothic, completely brutal and a little bit beautiful.

There is, at least, something to savor there, and it gives us something to think about as we wind back toward home.