Tongariro Crossing

This past Wednesday & Thursday, Dave and I went to the Tongariro National Park for an overnight camping trip. We started in Whakapapa (Wh sounds like an F) near the summit of Mt. Ruapehu and the Grand Chateau. We arrived around 1:00 and figured out our sleeping situation first. Around the Tongariro Park are lots of different hiking trails with huts along the paths for sleeping in. We had planned on parking up this on side road and staying at a hut around there, but the lady at the vistors center highly suggested we stay in the lodge/camping area where our car could be looked after. We walked over to the camping office to find a place to stay. But first, Dave had bought batteries for our camera to get some sweet pics, but they were complete duds. The camera wouldn't take any pictures, so we had to buy batteries at the office which cost $15 for 4 AA batteries. I took a picture to make sure the batteries actually worked.

Once we were good to go with the camera, we purchased a tent site for that night. Since we don't have a tent down here, we figured we'd take heaps of blankets and sleep on the ground. We were going to try and rough it.

Our first hike on Wednesday would take us to the Lower and Upper Tama Lakes. I first wanted to get a few pictures of the Chateau since I didn't do that last time (Dave added the ring for a nice Lord of the Rings effect).

We were told to stop at the Taranaki Falls and experience the "Taranaki Effect." You stand at a certain vantage point and pick one spot past the falling water to stare at. After 30 seconds, look at the rocks beside the waterfall. It was so crazy. It looked like the rocks were moving/shifting/shrinking. It was very trippy.

It took about an hour to hike to the Taranaki Falls. We continued to the Lower Tama Lake. On our way we passed time by playing a few games. First off, name a famous person (i.e. Johnny Depp) then the next person has to name another famous person starting with the first letter of previous person's last name (i.e. Denzel Washington). Pretty much it's the longest round of Scattergories imaginable.

We reach the Upper Tama Lake and had a little snack consisting of Cheerios, Carrots, Apples, Bananas and Peanut M&M's. And of course water.

Does anyone else see the upside down rubber ducky?

Dave showing off his amazing hiking socks from my mom. He absolutely loved them.

Chillin' by Upper Tama Lake.

Tama Lakes was our main destination for Wednesday. We headed back to our campsite for the night. There were a couple cafes around the lodge, so we ate dinner at one. Yeah, we were really roughing it. It was a little after 9:00pm when we walked back to our tent site. Before we start our hike, we had moved a picnic table onto our area and draped a blanket over it to claim the land. But with these tent sites, it doesn't matter if you've claimed the alloted area, other people can pitch up their tent too if there is room. We had a larger area and there is was, another tent pitched right where we wanted to sleep. We had parked our car right in front of the area so it would hide us when we slept on the ground with just our blankets. I wasn't too keen on sleeping right next to another tent with our pathetic camping gear, so we went back to the office and asked if there were any other available sites. He said they always save #15 for emergencies like this, but a big camper van had already taken that too. We decided to head into the lodge and find an empty room. Room #17 was available, so we grabbed our blankets and headed inside. So much for sleeping outside.

On Thursday we drove over to the Tongariro Crossing, but first stopped at the Tawhai Falls. These are said to be the inspiration for Henneth Annun from Lord of the Rings. (I know, I'm such a dork.)

Here's a picture what it looked like in the Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. This is where Gollum swims in the pool and catches a fish in the "Forbidden Pool."

Any minute Orcs will be popping over those cliffs to attack us.

Mt. Ngauruhoe and all it's rubble.

This is what part of the Tongariro crossing consisted of, which was really nice. You could walk without having your eyes glued to the ground so you wouldn't trip on the rocks. That only lasted for maybe 10 minutes. The nice, easy trail then leads you to the rightfully named Devil's Staircase, because oh man! was that a doosie or what!

Climbing up the forever ascending staircase.

After making it to the top of Devil's Staircase you can either take a right to one of the side trails of the Tongariro Crossing and keep climbing up to the summit of Mt. Ngauruhoe or turn left and continue on to the Emerald Lakes, which would lead you to the end of the crossing.

We went left to see the Lakes first. It was a nice little climb down at first which brought us to the South Crater, a long flat piece of lang that gave us a much needed break from climbing up,up,up. But then you reach another huge incline, but at the top you get to see this:

And the Red Crater with a weird gorge-type thing, maybe from lava flow.

Just a little further and you see the Emerald Lakes and the incredibly steep pathway down to them. You can also see the path continuing to the Blue Lake at another higher part of the mountain.

Taking a breather before our climb or should I say slide down.

We took a seat by one of the lakes and whipped out our lunch, PB&J's, celery, Cheerios, and apples. We were getting really low on water and had to save as much as we could.

Blue Lake.

Nice sunglassess Dave.

Although the Tongariro Crossing continued North, we had to turn back to get to our car. We stopped at a couple steaming vents by the Emerald Lakes on our climb back up the slide.

We notcied that someones car keys were placed on the top of this sign. Hopefully they found them. We thought about climbing up Mt. Ngauruhoe, but we had about two gulps worth of water left and were quite weary from the hiking already. Forget that.

The hike back wasn't so bad. Climbing down Devil's Staircase took some carefully footing. We were pretty much out of water at that point and had at least another hour to go. Dave had read about Soda Springs at the bottom of Devil's Staircase, so we ventured a looksie to see if there was any fresh water for us. You bet there was. We filled up on ice-cold water and were on our way feeling very refreshed.

We hiked a total of 8 hours that day, bring our grand total to 14 hours in two days. It was very extreme and not suitable for the lazy couch potato.