Two Beers and a Pretzel

On the 2nd, Thomas, James, Mandy, Yung, myself, and a few others attempted the Tongariro Alpine Crossing – New Zealand’s best trek, and ranked as one of the best one day treks in the world thru a world heritage site.

With this crossing only being at 1886 meters, you’d think I could easily handle it after the 4200m Inca Trail…  Probably, yes – except that I attempted to climb an active volcano in the middle of the trek.  Mt Ngauruhoe (Mt Doom from LOTR).

We arrived at the dropoff point in Tongariro National Park at 7:30 AM to see sunrise with the volcano’s in the background. Mt Tongariro (left) and Mt Ngauruhoe (right).

I have a pretty bad sense of direction, but it must be better than the combined efforts of 4 hobbits, a wizard, a dwarf, an elf, and 2 men.  I don’t know why the Lord of the Rings was a 9 hour movie trilogy…  the path was really well marked, and the whole hike only took about 8 hours.

About an hour and a half later, we made it to the base of Mt Ngauruhoe.  A group of us debated for a few minutes, then decided to climb from the base at 1590m to the top at 2281.

It’s hard to capture the steepness of the hill in a photo…

It’s easier to gauge the hill in this video.  Be sure to watch for the rockslide that I cause.  I was climbing on loose rocks and tried to pull myself up onto a larger rock (the size of a dishwasher) when it started coming down at me.  I jumped out of the way and it rolled forever.  Everyone on the volcano could hear it rolling and was talking about it.  It’s funny when people you don’t know come up and say “Did you see that huge rock roll down the hill?” and all you can say is “Yeah, I started it when I almost pulled it over on me.”  For the sake of the video, I checked for people down below and recreated the event with a much smaller rock.

Anyway…  taking the occasional break from climbing, the views were great, and there were a number of interrestng rocks.

I made it to the steaming vent at the top, where the views were fantastic.  It wasn’t so much a vent, as a pile of rocks with steam coming out from under them.  The only bizarre surprise was that instead of the expected sulfur smell, this steam carried the odor of cooking rice.

Then I literally surfed down the volcano.  Point your toes up and start sliding (check the video).  Yes, you get totally covered in dust.

At the bottom I met up with Yung and Mandy again and we continued the trek by a number of volcanic lakes and hot spring pools.  Here’s Mandy and me at the mineral pool.

The 691m (2300ft) ascent of the volcano totally wore me out.  Two steps up, slide back one.  Two days later my glutes and calves still hurt, but that day I ran out of water (crank 2.5 liters) and energy (not enough sugary food).  The ascent had already put us about 1 hour behind schedule and we had 14 more kilometers to hike, including another 300 meters in elevation to cross the pass.

We sped thru the remaining likometers, but I started getting dizzy and watched other people fall pretty badly rushing to get to their bus.  With 3K to go and had to slow down and beg for water from a few nice old ladies.  That was the best water I’ve ever had.  Dizzyness gone -  I got to the bus 30 minutes late and had to pay and extra $10NZ to the diver for waiting.  I was totally expecting to miss the bus and have to shell out another $50nz for a different bus, so I was glad to pay just ten.

The next day on the way to Wellington, we stopped along the desert road South of the pass and I got a good panoramic of the volcanos.

Speaking of Wellington…

I stayed at the Downtown Backpacker’s Hostel (Which was barely in downtown) at #1 Bunny street – across from the train station.

It’s also near the Pariment building and the “Beehive” offices of the Prime Minister.

Later that night (the 3rd), I met up with Rebecca again for the night tour of the Karori wildlife sanctuary.  This was originally the water supply for Wellington, and an old Govenor stocked the reservior with pearch to make it his private fishing lake.

Now, the area has been fenced off and traps have been laid to keep out predatory mammals so that the native fauna can live much like they did before the Maori and English brought rats, cats, dogs, ferrets, possum, and all the other mammals to the island.

Starting at dusk, We heard a pair of Kiwi calling to each other.  The male’s call is higher pitched than the female.  Then after a lot of treking and few close calls and searching with red flashlights, we saw two Spotted Kiwi (the smallest Kiwi species) running thru the woods on either side of the path.  Unfortunately, it was too dark and the birds were too fast for a meaningful picture…  It’s not like they walk up and say ”HI”.  Imagine trying to find a brown chicken in the woods at night…

…but here’s some info on Kiwi.

Today (the 4th), I’m crossing the Cook Straight to get to the South Island.  Mandy went North from Taupo, but we may meet up again in a week.  Yung is going North from Wellington.   Rebecca, Thomas and James are still here with me on a massive ferry for the 3 hour crossing.

I’ll have 3 days in Nelson and hopefully some sea kayaking in Abel Tasman National Park before moving on…