Waitomo Caves Hotel New Zealand

My partner and I and another couple visited New Zealand’s North Island recently on a self-drive tour. Part of our tour included a trip to Waitomo Caves, so we decided to stay at the Waitomo Caves Hotel overnight ?" not realising at the time that this hotel has a haunted reputation.

We checked in around 5 pm and were greeted warmly and shown our accommodation, when my partner suggested I may get a little scared as we were told the hotel is haunted. The manager just laughed and seemed to have a quirky sense of humour, he dismissed it saying a good haunting never hurt anyone.

He then took our booking for dinner and told us the bar was open if we wanted to relax and have a drink. I joked with him and asked if he was also the bar tender to which he replied no - but he was as it turned out. He then gave my friends the room key to someone else’s room who was staying there, that was funny watching our friend come out of the room somewhat embarrassed.

The accommodation was nothing special but we didn’t expect it to be, it was clean and comfortable and the ambiance of the place was fascinating and warm during the day, but pretty spooky after dark. We decided to dine at the hotel and went for a walk around the local area taking some photos of this amazing 100 year old Victorian hotel. Our booking for dinner was at 7:30pm and that’s when the weird things started to happen. It was busy in the dining room and we drank a few drinks, had a few laughs and took some photos at the dining table. Some of them, although taken seconds apart, appeared to be extremely bright for some reason and white glowing, so we just dismissed it as flash reflection,but on closer inspection, there appears to be some fog and orb shapes around us and also outside the windows looking in on us.

Our meal was taking forever and eventually around 9:40 pm we asked what is taking so long and how much longer do we have to wait for our food? By this time we were the only ones left in the dining room besides one other couple who we joked and chatted with about the long wait.

At that moment the door to the dining room swung closed by itself and it went very cold. My friend and I commented who closed the door, no one was there!

The manager came and apologized and couldn’t understand what had happened with our meals, saying they had been very busy. We eventually ate around 10pm and then retired to our rooms, I could not sleep and left the bedroom light on and tv on as every noise played havoc with my mind, creeping floor boards all night long, footsteps coming from the room above and then around 1:30 am I heard a strange moaning and crying coming from the room above. I woke my partner up, I was so scared and he said to turn the TV down so he could hear it properly but I was too scared and didnt want to listen to it. He said to me to go to sleep it must be a dog, but I knew there were no dogs here at the hotel and the noise was definitely coming from the room above.

The next day we checked out and told the receptionist what had happened with our dining experience. She looked our bill up on the computer and said that’s odd and went to get her manager. When she returned they both examined the computer and said everything seems to be taken care of, there was no charge for the meal or drinks. So we had to give them credit for accommodating us for the late dinner, they bid us farewell and off we went to explore the caves.

When we returned from our holiday we examined the photographs and one in particular caught our eye. The photograph was taken in daylight by a digital Nikon SLR camera and no flash was used. There appears to be an orange glowing ball in front of us and above our room where we stayed there appears to be a strange green cloud of light.

Overall a memorable experience,the hotel reminded me of "Fawlty Towers" on TV during the day,but quite disturbing after dark. We were wondering if you could tell us if this photograph and our other dining room photographs are of ghostly paranormal activity because it sure felt that way when we stayed there. I still have trouble sleeping now!