Tongariro Crossing, Taupo, Rotorua

The next phase of my journey was meeting up with Bernard and heading to the volcanic/thermally active central part of the North Island. Our first stop: the Tongariro Crossing, known sometimes as the best one day hike in the world! We have both been really looking forward to this hike for a long time so anxiety was running high when the weather looked worse and worse the closer to our hike day we got. Unfortunately our worst fears came true as the weather the day of the hike was even worse than predicted.

The Crossing goes across the volcanic area in the middle of the island between Mt. Tongariro and Mt. Ngauruhoe, aka Mt. Doom from Lord of the Rings. This is where Mordor from the movies was filmed, which is part of the reason for its fame, but also because it has weird and amazing scenery (on a sunny day). We spent the first two hours climbing up lava flows while the mist turned to rain. We’d hoped to go to one of the summits but because of weather this was out of the question. The weather turned into a full on rain and wind storm at the high point of the crossing and at this point we were so wet pictures, or even stopping, were out of the question because we were freezing. Hope was lost for the weather to turn around when we got to the Emerald Lakes, the coolest part of the whole hike, and barely even noticed them because it was so misty. From here we just trudged on down because we knew all the pretty parts were past and the weather wasn’t getting any better. It was a real letdown because we were both so excited for this trip but we vowed to come back and do it again one day so we can actually SEE the Crossing instead of just saying we did it.

View of Ruapehu and Ngauruhoe in the sun - the only one we got!

Ngauruhoe aka Mt Doom, if only we could have seen it or climbed it!

The lava fields of Mordor

This is when I became really depressed about our awful weather and how we could barely see anything :(

Crazy hiking outfits, I enjoyed feeling superior to these girls when I stopped worrying about them getting hypothermia

We left our disappointment in Tongariro and headed on to the sunshine at Lake Taupo, where we stayed and enjoyed fish and chips, a trampoline, and hot pools at our campground. The next day we headed to Rotorua, aka Rotovegas because it’s the most touristy spot in New Zealand, but this is rightly so because it has lots of really cool geothermal stuff to see like mud pools and geysers. The thermal pools at this campground weren’t half bad either!

A little sun in Taupo

Huka Falls

Rotorua

Despite weather setbacks we had a great holiday checking off a few New Zealand things Bernard hadn’t seen yet. From there he dropped me off at my new home near Rotorua to WWOOF (work on an organic farm in exchange for room and board) with Dahlia!