Niue Cave Tour Photo Gallery

Tali and at the entrance to his first cave

The crews of Layla, Rainsong, Felicity, Altair, Velella, and Sunbow had reserved a half-day cave tour with Tali. Tali and his daughter led us on tours of two of his cave systems. The first cave was Ulupaka Cave. The tour lasted about 2-hours as we crawled through the cave system.

The entrance to the first cave is marked by the human bones of an ancient Polynesian burial site

The following are pictures from Ulupaka Cave

Stalactites in Ulupaka Cave

Photo from Wendy Hinman

Tam, Ken and I ready to go caving

Ceiling covered with stalactites

Spooky black pool that was home to some cave dwelling crabs

Ken and Tali by a huge column of limestone

Stalagmite formation that looked like a huge jellyfish

The limestone formations resembled melted wax

We all passed the claustrophobia test as we had to wriggle our way through the 'keyhole'.

Vernita, Jason, and Garth all navigating the "keyhole"

Suzette carefully picking her way though the cave

After our exploration of the first cave, we took a break on some benches and Tali provided fresh coconut milk.

Judith & Ken from Sunbow, Suzette and Wendy muddy but enjoying a refreshing coconut drink

Drew & Vernita sharing a coconut

The next cave we visited, Tali had just opened in 2000. He called it the Alien Cave. We're not sure how much of it was the power of suggestion, but the second cave did have a spooky, Sigourney Weaver feel to it.

Entrance to the second cave

Roots growing in the cave connected a stalactite and stalagmite

Large cavern in the Alien Cave

Hollow stalactites that sounded like drums when they were tapped with stone

Paul very carefully watching the stalactites

We all managed to escape Tali's caves with no more than some dirty clothes and a few bumped heads

Tali provided us with a nice lunch of sandwiches and fresh fruit as well as bottles of water and bars of soap to try and scrub off the black fungus that covered our hands and legs.

Although we had only signed up for a half-day tour; Tali, who is very proud of his island, insisted on showing us some more of the sites.

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