Tongariro Crossing

After driving down towards Whakapapa and sleeping in the car overnight, we woke up early to get hiking the Tongariro Crossing. The T.C. is one of New Zealand’s “Great Walks” and I think is the shortest… 19.6 km (about 6-8 hours to complete). I’d never done a hike that long before, but was looking forward to some exercise (free too ;) ). It seemed like a pretty popular hike since there were busloads of people getting dropped off by the half hour, and you were never far from someone else on the trail. Quite comforting, though sometimes tricky to get a photo without someone in it.

"Mt. Doom"

The hike was totally worth it, and ended up taking us only 6 hours to complete (that’s including stops for lunch/photo stops). The scenery is really different from what I’m used to… you’re hiking up volcanoes and rocky terrain, vibrant blue lakes, craters, and even steam being released from the earth (not sure of the scientific term for that but… it was sweet). Parts of the Lord of the Rings movies were filmed here, Mt. Ng…. was the fill in for “Mount Doom” where the ring gets dropped in… I overheard that part from someone else, it’s been a while since I’ve tried watching those movies. 

Stteeaammm

We started the hike at 8:25am, finished at 2:30pm… then drove 4 hours back home. Such a looong day and we could barely walk after haha so tired! Passed out pretty early that night… Things aren’t feeling overly Christmasy around here. It’s just not fair when there’s so many treats around that you have to eat then you’re expected to sit on the beach in a bikini rather than cover up in a layers of clothes like back home! The malls are jam packed and crazy Christmasy though, I think I’ve got everything finished though thankfully! In a couple days were heading to the South Island for a little less than two weeks, were flying down then driving back in a rental car relocate (free! Except gas) so I’ll keep ya posted!

Snoowwz