This evening I did an extremely unnerving hike. Quite memorable. But unnerving and creepy. Had it not been for the blog, my "audience of readers", and my developing plans to do just what I'm doing now, I'd have likely turned around without finishing it.
Instead of telling you about it and then showing you pictures as I usually do, I'll let you experience it the same way I did. Dim your lights, turn up your volume, and turn on your headlamp. Move quickly, it's getting dark. And you're alone.
It's 6:00 PM. The trailhead sign said the hike is 1.5 hours round trip but it won't get dark for a few hours so you should be fine. It's been cloudy all day. Several times it looked as though it may rain any minute, but it never did. The sun never came out so it's a little cool. Jacket weather for sure.
Instead of telling you about it and then showing you pictures as I usually do, I'll let you experience it the same way I did. Dim your lights, turn up your volume, and turn on your headlamp. Move quickly, it's getting dark. And you're alone.
It's 6:00 PM. The trailhead sign said the hike is 1.5 hours round trip but it won't get dark for a few hours so you should be fine. It's been cloudy all day. Several times it looked as though it may rain any minute, but it never did. The sun never came out so it's a little cool. Jacket weather for sure.
Such lush forest out here.
It gets a little cooler when you are in the thick of it. The damp breeze doesn't help either.
Is that the sound of a river? Or maybe a waterfall? Didn't expect that on this hike.
Ah. A river. Nice.
The trail is starting to get more narrow...
.... and is getting steeper....
Glad this isn't muddy. Pretty sweet trail, actually.
Should be almost there. The sign said 40 minutes and it's been about 30. I wonder if it will be obvious.
There's something up ahead. This must be it.
Not sure what that thing is, but it looks like the trail continues to the right.
There are some stairs going down to the tunnel....
This is it. You've got water shoes on, you'll just want to turn on your headlamp now. You also want to turn off your imagination... at least if this was happening in real life. Your mind will start to pull up every horror movie you've ever watched, and if you give it free reign you'll turn around. I really did feel like I was closing a door on my imagination. I passed someone on the trail that turned around at this point, and talked to someone later that got this far twice, but was too creeped out to go much further. But you're moving ahead. Don't think, just move ahead.
By the way, I'd originally come up planning to use just my iPhone for pics. Something I saw at the end of the tunnel made me want to get a better camera, even with an hour round trip down and back up the hill. This next pic is the entrance the second time I approached it, over an hour after the first time. It's now dark out. My pics from here on out will be a combination of the two cameras.
So back to your hike....
I hear the sound of running water. Looks like there may be water running through the tunnel. This tunnel was created to help pipe water to a mining project just over 100 years ago.
Whoa! That water's cold! It's about ankle deep in places. The tunnel is of course dark. There is no way to know what lies ahead. Is it long? Short? Are there people in here? Does it drop or climb? What is at the other end? It's the unknown that makes it the creepiest. Being alone doesn't help.
[The following video is sideways. Sorry, I'm told that can't be fixed.... Maybe tilt your head :) ]
Alright, you're in and your eyes are adjusting. You can hear running water at your feet and an occasional area where water is dripping down from the ceiling. Your feet are starting to adjust to the cold water around your feet as well.
There's some light up ahead
I guess that's the end.
It was at the end of the tunnel, while walking back that I saw this on the ceiling....
Glowworms! Hundreds of them throughout the cave, their dot of indigo light on their tail ends speckled across the ceilings.
It's cold in here and I'm losing feeling in your feet Let's head back.
See. That wasn't so bad.
So I mentioned that I came back a second time with a better camera. While just inside the entrance of the tunnel I saw some light moving around just outside the tunnel. It was coming from two flashlights. Since I was taking pics in the dark I didn't want to startle anyone who might already be on-edge approaching the tunnel. Two girls came to the entrance - Nicole from Switzerland and Martina from the Czech Republic. Martina had attempted the tunnel twice before, but turned around each time a little creeped out by it. Nicole had picked her up as she was hitchhiking and was talked into going with her this third attempt. I offered to go through it with them as they'd both gotten a little spooked out coming up the hill in the dark.
Afterwards we went down the hill and talked at the bottom a bit until we were too cold and tired to continue. Martina is heading south from here. Nicole is heading to Greymouth 2.5 hours away which is my next stop as well. We talked about connecting, but will work that out on Facebook as the time approaches.