Travels with George

by Vivien Fallows

  So, that was what I was about to do and see, and herewith, for those interested in the geology of what has been created over the millennia 100 metres underground, a brief geological description. Shawls are the aptly named shawl-like folds which occur as water trickles, from side to side, down the rock-face leaving deposits of calcite – these gradually build up to create the folds. The rimstones are the calcite rims which form around overflowing underground pools. Cave corals occur as water oozes from the cave walls, depositing calcite crystals which eventually form coral-like growths. Plus, evaporation of water dripping through the limestone ceiling creates both stalactites, the icicles hanging down and stalagmites, which rise up… and when both might touch they form a column.

  And for the naturalists, in the darkness you’re never alone. In addition to the glow worms, eels, koura (freshwater crayfish) cave wetas (related to the cricket but with extra-long antennae) the lost world is home to assorted beetles, spiders and their arachnid cousins the harvestmen. These bugs of the underworld all patrol their own preferred territory within this pristine habitat.

  But all this was yet to be revealed to me. Back in the sun and an hour into my diligent postcard correspondence, when once again the now familiar summons, this time I was being herded by Greg and joined a party of three others: Fiona, Lou and anonymous. To my dismay, I soon discovered that they were all climbers and had all free-fallen from aircraft… plus they were in their twenties. I was a senior couch potato who climbed nothing higher than a step-ladder and had only free-fallen out of bed.

  As we exchanged pleasantries, I remained blissfully unaware of what lay in store. In all the blurb that I had read, including newspaper cuttings, the emphasis had been on the one hundred metre abseil, the highest known commercial abseil in the world. Ho, ho… that was only part of the story. On the drive up into the hills, Greg explained that the lost world had been discovered by railroad surveyors in 1906. The whole area we were about to enter (a large area) is littered with caves, holes and chimneys and over the years numbers of sheep and cattle have disappeared, tumbling down into the abyss.

  At our destination, more blue overalls with the now familiar white wellie boots and helmets awaited us, plus the addition of a rather (to me) complicated looking harness. A quick “this does this” and “don’t do that” and then off to the chasm. A clump of trees was pointed out which we were to remember. But first, a steep climb down, using the two harness ropes ‘cowstailed’ onto guide ropes. The process of getting from a. to b. safely required that I repeat a simple task of clipping and unclipping myself on and off the guide rope, one harness rope at a time, as I went along. I do so hate these apparently simple tasks; everyone else manages them without fuss or bother whilst I’m head down fumbling away trying to look nonchalant.

  When a knot, join or securing pin attaching the guide rope to the rock face creates an obstacle, you unclip one cowstail and move it on to the next section and then move the second one across. These clasps are attached to short ropes attached to the waist of your harness. What you don’t want happening is to find that you’re holding both clasps, simultaneously (please don’t ask…) The harness isn’t very comfortable, sort of cuts into the groin, but it needs to be snug; perhaps I misunderstood the definition of snug. The Lost World blurb describes the adventure as being ‘surprisingly gentle’. Oh, really… you decide…

  Having moved slowly along the guide rope there it was – the platform from which we would descend. And almost as suddenly as the platform had appeared, there I was suspended 100 metres above the ground, legs dangling and feeling fine and dandy. No time to think about the move from having two feet firmly on the platform to sitting with bum on a waist high perch, pitched out away from the platform, to one foot still on the platform, the other entwined around the rope down which you’re going to move, to suddenly having neither feet on the platform and the awful feeling of what happens if your wellie boot drops off? Had my camera with me and was soon clicking away, at goodness knows what. We all descended together. Greg had a safety rope which he clipped to each of us… didn’t think what would happen to us, should anything happen to him…which is probably just as well really.

  Gliding down, the chasm opens like a deep gash in the earth with ferns and mosses growing on the sides and passed these we closely float. The air gets cooler and mistier as you descend. The natural tension of the rope (it feels as if it’s bolted to the ground, but it’s actually hanging free) means that the descent is very slow to start and you have to feed rope up through the locking system to get moving, otherwise you’d hang there forever. The ground seems a million miles away, well one hundred metres is quite a distance. We all chatted merrily and Fiona seemed to be ahead of us when I quipped, “Put the kettle on when you get down there.” Nervous tension meant that saliva was in short supply. Surprisingly, the others had found moving off from the platform more of an ordeal than I had. It seemed a lot easier than jumping backwards into muddy water with a ring around your bottom. Typically, the brief moment of ‘I can do it’ was soon squashed and trampled upon by what lay ahead. But of the actual descent into that incredible ‘lost world’, I loved every second of the fifteen minutes that it took… although the harness did get a little uncomfortable towards the end. Having descended gently, I’m not sure I’m ready to bounce down rock faces like an SAS commando, but I’d certainly abseil again, without the slightest hesitation.

  Now, when I signed up to this adventure I was well aware (well, I’m not completely daft) that if you go down one hundred metres there’s a fair chance that you have to regain every one of those metres to get yourself back onto the earth’s surface. Well, no one had explained how that might be achieved, and I certainly hadn’t asked. To précis, what followed was a chilly climb, scramble, crawl, panic, sweat, giggle, swear, sort of experience, but I didn’t stumble or fall – although I did receive the occasional rear-end shove. Lou, as nimble as a mountain goat, was superb at keeping an eye on tail-end-Charlie. But I did it, I did it, I did it! And then we got to this – um – cavernous cavern, where I noticed a ladder, or in fact a series of ladders lashed together and pointing straight up towards where I imagined Heaven might be. Lou and I stood rooted to the spot, mouthing, “Please, no”, but as Greg marched us passed them, we let out a simultaneous sigh.

  The lights on our helmets were on and shadows played on the back walls of the cavern, like colossal monsters looming over us. Lights were turned off and we were surrounded by a tangible thick inky blackness. A few twinkly glow worms looked like tiny holes in a big black canvas. Lights back on and we looked around at the amazing shapes hewn over the millennia by Mother Nature. Onwards the journey continued, and I even managed to walk across a pole suspended over a mini chasm – no mean feat in ill-fitting wellie boots. At no time during this subterranean sortie did I think of ‘what if’ consequences. This was, for me, a true adventure.

  Intact, we reached a lovely smooth rock, our picnic spot where Greg handed out more chocolate fish which we washed down with a swig of lemonade. Posing for pictures, sharing a laugh and a joke, wondering at our subterranean surroundings – so, what next? Oh no, back to the ladders. I think the next bit will give me nightmares for the rest of my life; a thirty metre perpendicular ladder to be climbed. Of course, the only way out.

  One at a time, attached to a safety rope, but even so, I felt very vulnerable and I wasn’t sure that I had the sheer physical strength in my arms or stamina to undertake hauling my entire muffin-laden weight up one-hundred-feet (that sounds more dramatic than the metric version). Greg went up first and it seemed an age before he tugged the rope he’d attached to Fiona and up she went at a fair pace. I turned to Lou and her partner and apologised, “Sorry… but I’m not going to be last” Mr Lou said, “No worries,” he’d take that honour. It’s not that I’m scared of the dark, but it was darkly dark. By now the lights on our helmets were giving out a tiny flicker and as each helmet disappeared up the ladder the l
ight level down below diminished even more dramatically, so the last one to leave the cavern would feel as if they were being chased by an ever rising tide of inky blackness. And even with a safety rope, if you slipped you’d be swinging out into a very black nothingness, until Greg managed to reel you in like a floundering fish.

  Bravely I followed Fiona – slowly. I stopped twice for a breather, only a second or two, I didn’t want to stop longer and broadcast to the team that I was a bit of a coward about this element of the excursion. Phew, phew… I didn’t really enjoy the climb. With each rung, all I could say was, “Oh s**t, Oh s**t.” I tried to hum a happy tune, but soon reverted to “Oh s**t”, etc. The smell of rusty nails assailed my nostrils adding to my discomfort. I had visions of clinging onto rusty rungs that were prematurely corroding through the constant application of nervous sweat. There was one wobbly bit where two ladders met, which didn’t make life easier, but eventually I saw the light of Greg’s helmet up above and a few minutes later his calm voice said, “Hold it there,” as he took a photo of me emerging through a narrow gap into… another chamber. Hooray! I’d made it!! Or so I thought, because I then realised that the daylight was in fact the dim glow from the two helmet lamps that greeted me. Another five, less perpendicular ladders awaited and happily they were a doddle by comparison.

  Four hours after our descent, we finally emerged into daylight and the sense of achievement was enormous. Blinking, the spot where we now stood was close to the clump of trees that Greg had pointed out to us at the start of our journey. The trees grew directly above the smooth slab on which we had gobbled our chocolate fish picnic.

  So would I do it again? It was certainly (for me) a strenuous trip and even my three experienced companions felt that they’d been challenged at some stage of the journey, but what an adventure! Perhaps I wouldn’t rush to volunteer to climb one hundred feet straight up, but I’d rush at a chance to abseil down… anything. And, yes, in reality of course I’d do it again. The team I had shared my day with had been fantastic company and nothing beats a rush of adrenalin for making your heart sing. I came to New Zealand seeking adventure and would now set off on the next leg of my trip feeling totally satisfied by what I’d experienced and achieved… an adventure I wouldn’t have missed for the world, not even the Lost World. From my email home:

  The third and final adventure was for me – the big one (they do get bigger, but there are limits to my bravery/stupidity). The fact that my three companions were all rock climbers and half my age should have sounded small alarm bells but as they adopted me in a kindly fashion and the guide was something of a hunk, I was relaxed about life: how innocent! I had no idea what lay in store and yes, I had read the small print. For several days purple bruises reminded me of where I had been and what I had done: undertaking an endurance test that I wasn’t quite expecting. The bruises came from the harness buckles – the harness wasn’t just for the abseil, but also the rock climbing that followed and the buckles dug in with all the bending and scrambling and at the time I was having too much fun to notice…

  Returning to the base, I downed a quick bottle of pop, didn’t purchase the photo Greg had taken of me (a weird piece of financial economy) before getting back on the road as I wanted to be in Rotorua by six in the evening. I remember little of the uneventful drive, I’m sure I was concentrating but might have been dangling from a rope, and after my usual circuit in search of signposts, I arrived at the hotel just ten minutes later than my target time. The building is a handsome 19th-century restoration, with an ornate verandah running around the first floor, which would have provided the original rooms with some respite from extremes of weather.

  As George and I stood four-square before the receptionist, slight confusion followed as she thought I was talking about a dinner booking when I was saying ‘room’ (would I take a suitcase out to dinner?). With a large portion of guilt acting as my new companion, I was finally installed in the fabulous Johnson Room. The room was certainly intended for two: the bathroom was bigger than the bedroom at the Waitomo Caves Hotel and certainly far, far superior. Well, at three times the price – so it should have been. My back-packing credentials must be set at zero.

  What I do remember of the drive from Waitomo are the surreal puffs of steam that emerge from the ground as you approach Rotorua. The golf course temporarily stopped me in my tracks. You had to look twice as it was seemingly dotted with fluffy clouds which appeared to emerge at random all over the links; it looked totally otherworldly and ethereal. Unfortunately the town has a glitzy, touristy vibe, so I resolved to be the only person ever to stay at the fabulous Princes Gate Hotel, right slap bang by the lake and gardens and see nothing of them, as I had a date the next day – 30km south at Wai-O-Tapu. To be exact, and I had to be, my appointment was for ten-fifteen with the Lady Knox geyser.

  But first, why was my room so hot? I felt the radiators and they were off and it was only when I caught sight of my reflection in the bathroom mirror that I realised I was suffering from external combustion. My outdoor postcard writing session that morning had given me a bright red face; I was burning. The bath was beckoning and I couldn’t wait to ease my weary limbs into a froth of warm soapy bubbles. Stripping off, again in front of the too-large mirror, I was mildly startled at the sight of two enormous bruises at the tops of my thighs where the harness buckles had dug in. The most impressive bruise measured about six inches by four and did little to enhance an already sorry looking aged thigh. The bath was bliss, but the water carried a fairly potent whiff of sulphur. Refreshed I ordered a Caesar salad and a beer and ended the day with a phone call home.

  Later to bed than usual, I couldn’t sleep and wasn’t sure if it was too much sun or the last rumblings of ladder fright. Whatever the reason sleep eventually won the battle but when I awoke, it was to the rhythmic throbbing of a sun-induced headache. Another stumble past the mirror revealed a large radiating cold sore. So now I would meet Matt and Alice complete with suppurating sore. I had one when I last saw them at Christmas (festive stress), so they’ll probably think it’s a permanent feature.

  Friday 5th April: sulphurous smells and Maori memorabilia

  I well remember the day of sulphur, silica and sinter and of course Lady Knox. Up at daybreak and on the road by eight-thirty to enjoy a lovely drive through forests and mountains down to the thermal wonderland that is Wai-O-Tapu.

  On arrival discovered that the Lady Knox geyser was a short detour from the main thermal area and so with time in hand, I walked around the slurping, burping, smelly sulphurous pools, with names like champagne pool, frying pan flat and mud pool. The colours were extraordinary, such a range in a relatively small area; all the colours of the rainbow appeared to be present and correct, from a pretty primrose yellow hued sulphur to the deep red-brown of iron oxide, plus the black of carbon and more sulphur – this time at the opposite end of the yellow spectrum from its delicate floral cousin.

  In awe of nature’s simmering energy, I sauntered back to the car in readiness for my appointed rendezvous. Up to this point I had been fairly much on my own, but by the time I reached the geyser car park, most of North Island seemed to have joined me. The attendant giving directions promised me a sight to remember and genially beamed with enthusiasm for Wai-O-Tapu and all its magical pools. From what I had already seen, I didn’t doubt him.

  As instructed, I found my seat and sat staring at the docile looking white cone that was Lady Knox, waiting for the action. With minutes still to spare, I browsed my information leaflet and read that volcanic activity in the region dated back approximately 15,000 years. The thermal area covers some 18 square kilometres of which only a small portion is seen by tourists. Thinking about my meander amongst Beelzebub’s cauldrons, possibly the reason for areas being out of bounds to a wandering public is the combined challenge presented by the sheer number of collapsed craters, the abundance of sinter-edged pools of boiling mud and water as well as the numerous steaming
gas emitting fumaroles. Trying to weave safe walkways through all that thermal activity would present a health and safety nightmare.

  Focusing my attention back on the cone, the chap from the car park morphed from car park attendant into geyser guide as he re-appeared and poured something into the void of Lady Knox. Ah ha! So that’s the secret. Soap! Soap breaks the water’s surface tension, which is why, bang on cue at ten-fifteen off she blows. A few minutes of dribbling and drooling precede the main event, but when it happens, a fifteen metre flume of water, erupts skywards to the oohing and aahing of the massed ranks of spectators. Apparently, if left to Mother Nature, the geyser would have a twenty-four to forty-eight hour cycle which would be a bit tricky to manage as a money spinner. I didn’t think to ask if consequently the naturally occurring plume of water would be any larger. I guess it would. Lady Knox’s dramatic reaction to soap was discovered by accident. The geyser is on a site that was once a penal colony and for some reason the prisoners tipped soapy water into the cone and bingo up she went and a money spinner was born.

  A guy in the audience, another lone traveller, asked me to take a photo of him with the erupting Lady Knox in the background, I obliged and he then returned the honour, saying. “That’ll be a great shot”. Have now seen the result – my very excited face appears at the bottom of the photo with a massive steamy blur above and behind me, which looks very odd indeed. Not a great one for the album. I hope my effort on his behalf was better.