Charleston's glow worm caves and Punakaiki rocks

While staying in Greymouth I took a day trip to Charleston to do some black water rafting.
My day started pretty early, as apart from the caves I wanted to take a hike as well. Charleston is a well worth it stop for a hike if you have the time. I took 2 paths - the first one goes through a really old cemetery and involves going through wild bushes and climbing a cliff. The other path is a 15 minuted looped path which is less wild and far more convenient to walk. both walks give you a spectacular view to the ocean.

As for my glow worm experience. Let me tell you, so far it has been my favourite part of the trip. The Underworld Adventure takes you on a train ride through the now familiar to me rainforest, where you change into a wet suit and pick up your tube. You haul the damn thing through what feels like a million stairs and when you are all good and sweaty and out of breath finally you can enter the cave.

The cave was very user friendly. It was pretty big and walking was very easy - there were no spaces where you had to crouch or crawl through. The cave was just beautiful - it had so many different formations.
Check this one out, doesn't it look like a face?

I actually forgot that I came here to see glow worms until the guide told to turn off the lights and there they were - on the wall, close enough to touch!
The rafting part involves paddling slowly in complete darkness and looking up at the glow worm colonies. This has been definitely one of the most magical things I have seen in my life. It's like... I am not sure what to compare it to even, if you've seen Avatar then the caves look something that came from there!
The trip finishes by floating down the stream, which was fun.

After that, since there was no bus to take me back to Greymouth I had to hitchhike. One of the workers from the Underworld Adventures drove me as far as the pancake rocks.

Originally, I didn't really care if I'll see them or not. But let me tell you, it is well worth stopping for the rocks. It's not the fact that they look stacked which is the cool part, but the blow-hole part is what is going to blow you away. Somehow the entire area channels the waves/tide in an explosive way so there is water spray several meters high. The waves just smash into the blow holes and the pools and the rock sides with this awesome force.
It was far more interesting than I thought it would be.