WAITOMO CAVES
Waitomo Caves is a rural community in the King Country region of New Zealand's North Island. There are several solutional cave systems in the area around the village, which are popular tourist attractions. Restaurants and accommodation are centred in the village to serve visiting tourists.
The word Waitomo comes from the Māori language: wai meaning water and tomo meaning a doline or sinkhole; it can thus be translated to be "water passing through a hole". The caves are formed in Oligocene limestone.
The village Waitomo Caves is named for the hundreds of caves present in the spectacular karst landscape. The limestone landscape of the Waitomo District area has been the centre of increasingly popular commercial caving tourism since before 1900.
- Wikipedia