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17: Hineana cave
If you have been on various sites to do with the skeletons of the 'tall ones' you will have read about the Tameana and Hineana caves. Some of it is true, I'm not sure where the rest came from. However, as promised earlier, we will now provide some photos of Hineana. And there is a surprise. But first it was described that Hineana has a low narrow slit of an entrance. It once did, but the cave front has naturally collapsed since 1965, allowing an easier entry. It's a pity, the crawl would have been awesome.
It is well hidden. Below are the inside shots going in about 150m or so. It is much drier compared to Tameana and the second Hineana cave. Oh - did you not know Hineana has a twin sister called Tuahineana? And not far away there is a third...more of a cousin really, I've called it Taineana. This has a tiny entrance. Between Tameana and Hineana there is another with a small crawl entrance...and even more in the surrounding hills.
While Tameana is full of boot prints, Hineana is free of anything except pig hoof prints where they have come down a few metres to drink. Apart from a few scrambles, it is like walking along a stoney wet path. There is evidence of entry from about the 1970-80's and there is much damage, mostly from students of that era who used to study at Waikato University. So if you know of any 'professionals' who have small stalagtites, they will regrow. But the scumbag who broke the big white stalagmite with an approximate circumference of 50cm, and has it at his home, needs to be shot. This stalagmite used to almost reach the ceiling, about 3 metres high. It now stands at a sad looking 1.2m.
There were reports that skeletons once lined this cave. There are only a few places they could have laid them but there is one hidden side cave that is up high that we didn't explore. All bones have been long removed - thankfully before the students got there in the nineteen seventies.
And below is Tuahineana (sister cave)
Tuahineana is also very assessable and roomy, but has the potential for an enormous flow of water through it, directly from the hills. A lot of debris sits far inside. As such, this cave is deep but also broken up by the constant force of runoff that runs through it. It's almost pathlike except where partial roof collapses have occurred which are easily climbed over.We didn't explore too deep as the battery on the camera was failing along with moisture on the lens and moisture in the air making visability poor - not something I expected. You would not wish to go too deep in this cave except in dry weather, but my guess is that further in, some large caverns exist because this volume of water has to go somewhere.
