Days 17-20 Lake Wanaka

Lake Wanaka is a decent-sized lake north of Queenstown that is home to all kinds of outdoor sports and activities, hence the reason we went there. We spent a total of 5 days/4 nights there which I will attempt to summarize in chronological order below.

Day 17 - Arrival and Mtb
We rolled into Lake Wanaka to our Airbnb in the early afternoon after a drive from Manapouri (about 3 hours in the car). The place has a fantastic view of the lake and surrounding mountains as well as fresh rolls, juice, and coffee each morning. It was great! Lake Wanaka is surrounded by mountains and was dug by glaciers back in the day. There are still glaciers higher up in the mountains, but we'll get to that in a few days. :)

View from our AirBnB

View from the patio table

Bridget wanted to rest, so she took a nap and I went mountain biking (our Airbnb had a bike I could use). It was overcast (forecast called for rain, but it didn't end up raining) and a bit on the cooler side. I biked out around the lake a bit and then ventured through some single-track (narrow, winding trails) in the woods. There is a pretty active bike club that maintains the trails, so they were really nice. I got in about 2.5 hours of riding (about 25 miles) and only a handful of wipeouts (but nothing too serious). The GoPro videos are so shaky they'd make you sick, so I'll spare you that experience. :)

Quick view from the beach on the way back

Day 18 - Canyoning
With the steep, glacier-carved valleys around the greater Lake Wanaka region, there are lots of canyons with ever-flowing water. These canyons are filled with waterfalls, whirlpools, and deep basins filled with fresh new zealand water. So, as with anything adventurous, exciting, and slightly dangerous, we signed up to adventure our way down through one of these canyons (based upon a friend's recommendation). So, with a guide (a pretty cool, funny one at that) leading the way (and manning the double-belay setup in spots), we rappelled (abseiled), slid, swam, and jumped our way down the waterfalls and sheer rock faces.  Rappelling is fun, but rappelling down a waterfall with the water thundering onto you is a blast! I put my GoPro to good use, so see a quick video below (the others were too large, so I need to edit them shorter before I can post due to file size limitations...). At the final spot in the canyon, there was a nice 20ft cliff to jump off, so we of course did that a few times. :) The water was cold, but the wetsuits we had kept us nice and warm-ish.

Gear on and ready to go!

Halfway down and still having fun!

Jump from 20ft cliff

Day 3 - Wakeboarding and Rob Roy Glacier Hike
After recovering from canyoning, I did a wakeboard session on Lake Wanaka in the morning. The water was nice and refreshing, which means pretty chilly but comfortable with a wetsuit on. The boat driver was super nice and found/made some smooth water despite the breeze and other boaters on the lake.

Enjoying the water

Catching some air

Post-wakeboard photo

After wakeboarding, we headed straight for the mountains! As I mentioned earlier in the post, there are still some glaciers in the area. One of the more famous and accessible glaciers is the Rob Roy Glacier. It's about 32 miles out of town (most on a gravel road), but lots of folks make the journey out there. The scenery is spectacular. The hike up to the viewpoint we went to is almost 4 miles with a flat section at the start and uphill from there. The glacier is hanging out at the top of the mountain (as they usually do), and the glacial stream is a thundering river down at the lower elevations as the water passes over and around boulders in its path. The canyons created by the glaciers and now occupied by the streams are pretty densely populated with trees fed by the water so we were in the shade for most of the hike. Once we got to the top, we popped out onto a clearing with a panoramic view of the glacier (see below). The clouds never really pulled all of the way up and off the top of the glacier, but we had some blue sky peek through a few times. It was really cool. As the sun popped in and out of the clouds, the view shifted slightly to show the water shimmering on the rocks as it crept its way down the cliffs, the blue hue of the glacial ice at the edge of the glacier, and the spray from the water pounding off the rocks as it shoved its way to the valley floor.

This is where you walk really quickly (Bridget is the little orange dot in the lower left corner hoping the boulder doesn't give way!)

The indigenous birds are preyed upon by invasive animals (possums, rats, etc.) so there are traps all over the place with blue markers showing where they are located. This is the 9th trap on this trail.

Panorama of the Rob Roy Glacier (click to make bigger)

View of the huge waterfall off to the west with the valley in the background

View on the trail down

We finished off the day with some drinks and apps with our AirBnB hosts and caught some wisps of a sunset.

Sunset

Day 4 - Mountain Biking and Mt Iron
We both went mountain biking together this morning. There is a small forest with well-groomed single track trails. It's called Sticky Forest, but it wasn't sticky so I'm not sure where the name came from. But it had some nice trails and we rode around for about 2.5hrs.

On the trail

After mountain biking, we grabbed a snack and went and hiked Mt Iron which is a small-ish mountain at the edge of town. It was only a few hundred feet of elevation, but gave great views of the very small amount of flat land around. We capped off our last night with dinner out at a place across the street from the water.

Pano from the top of Mt Iron (click to make bigger)

Sun and Sky

Days 15 - 16 - Manapouri and Doubtful Sound

With the excitement of the Tongariro Northern Circuit behind us, we spent our last night on the North Island in Taupo, as mentioned in the last post. We got up relatively early and set off for the Taupo Airport. There was no TSA Pre-check, in fact there wasn't even security at all! We got our tickets, grabbed a coffee (of course!), hopped on the free WiFi for a bit, then walked out and boarded the plane on the tarmack (not jet bridges here!). Unfortunately, we had to fly north to Auckland then transfer to a plane headed to Queenestown, but we made the connection no problem.

Smile-atte anyone?

After getting in to Queenestown, we picked up our rental car, which turns out to be an old Subaru hatchback with 158,000 miles and lots of wear. But, no worries - it'll work for us! After getting that sorted, we drove the 2 hours to Manapouri, which is east of Queenestown. I was interrupted during blogging by a magnificent sunset over Lake Manapouri. See below.

View with the sun high in the sky

Sunset pic 1

Sunset pic 2

The next day, we did a kayak adventure on the Doubtful Sound. We paddled around for about 3 hours on the sound. We did not capsize, so it was a successful day! And easiest told by picture. :)

Ready to paddle!

First look out on the Sound

This is called a "tree avalanche" - the trees grow on moss that grows on the rocks. So when the moss gets dry during a drought then gets too much rain, it can give way, and the trees go down with it.

Out in the open water

Kayak Limbo!

View along the shore

Sun at the top of the ridge

Group photo!

We then head off to Lake Wanaka for some more excitement! Stay tuned!

 

Days 11- 14 - Tongariro Northern Circuit

Tongariro Norther Circuit
And we survived! We successfully made it around the volcano and to our next destination (Manapouri). But before that, I've got some blogging to catch up on! I've posted everything at once so you don't have to scroll down and read backwards to go in chronological order. I also posted the pictures in-line (and made them bigger) rather than at the end of the post so things follow a bit easier in time. But first, some quick stats before we start.

Number of days/nights: 4/3
Total distance on the trail: 33.9 miles
Total elevation gained: 7,194 feet (719 stories)
Total time on the trail: 12 hours, 22 minutes
Average speed: 2.74 mi/hr excluding breaks (not bad, eh?)
Number of videos taken: 114
Number of pictures taken: Way more than that (it's harder to count on the iPhone than I thought...)
Number of pictures with at least one volcano: Most of them :)

And second, a bit of background on the national park. The park boasts 3 volcanos: Mt Tongariro, Mt Ngauruhoe, and Mt Ruapehu. Mt Tongariro is the namesake of the park but is more of a ridge than a proper "volcano". Mt Ngauruhoe is Mt Doom from Lord of the Rings (really) and looks like a prototypical, conical, science-class paper-mache volcano. Pretty sweet... as long as it doesn't erupt (which it didn't). Mt Ruapehu is the tallest and widest of the three and sports skiing during the winter, although there were still large snow fields that we saw on the hike. Our tramp (NZ word for hike) went around Mt Ngauruhoe, which involved climbing the ridge between Mt Tongariro and Mt Ngauruhoe (as you'll see on Day 2), which was epic!

Aiight folks - here we go!

Day 1 - The saga begins
So, the day began with sunshine, clear skies, and clouds to our north. Better than I was expecting, but the clouds to our north were ominous since that is the direction of the park we were going to be tramping through (tramping - New Zealand word for hiking).

Not bad, eh?

As we drove north, my fears were confirmed. The clouds grew, the rain started, and things looked pretty bleak outside. Like really bleak. Like get soaked running from your car to the front door kind of bleak. So, we're sitting at the visitor center asking about hiking conditions as the trail route described stream crossings and the forecast had high winds. With the deluge at hand, the last thing we wanted to experience were flash floods from runoff from the volcano and get swept or blown away. Luckily for us, there just so happened to be a parking lot about a mile from the hut we were supposed to end at, so we opted to have our friends drop us there (thanks Brian and Monica!) save a few miles of hiking in the rain even though it would cut our total experience a bit short. But with the rain and cloud "cover" (like covered us from all around), we didn't figure we would really see or enjoy much of that anyway. So, we started the tramp by saying farewell to our friends and hello to the rain. Now, this rain was impressive. The trail was more like a stream with water gushing down at us. And the rain was falling in unrelenting waves aimed directly at us. So, we tucked our heads and ran. Our non-waterproof clothes were soaked within a minute and our boots were overflowing by the time we finished the 18-minute sprint to the hut (Bridget made it there first, of course).

On the trail

View from the hut

Luckily we had grabbed rain covers for our packs so our gear wasn't soaked. We the joined the humid and overcrowded crew in the hut and got our clothing/boots in rotation by the fire to dry things off. We passed the rest of the day playing games and waiting for the rain to let up, which it finally did around sundown (~9pm).

Day 2 - Up and over and back again
Day 2 started with much brighter skies (and hopes for staying dry) than when we went to sleep. The clouds had risen and the rain stopped by the time we got started on the trail (around 10am). We could finally make out Mt Ngauruhoe (Mt Doom) on our right as we started up the trail.

Mt Doom looming over us

As we climbed up the ridge between Mt Ngauruhoe and Mt Tongariro (the trail is nicknamed the devils staircase), the clouds began to spill over from the other side. By the time we reached the top, we were back in cloud soup with no visibilty. And no rain either, which was appreciated. And luckily the trails were very well-marked with posts every 50 feet or so. So we continued in near blindness scrambling up and over ridges and hoping for a break in the clouds.

Following the signposts into the mist...

We saw a few mostly-obscured crater lakes, but they could barely be made out. We waited for a bit at the highest point on the trail, but the clouds kept coming. Rather than stay up there in the wind and clouds, we shrugged our shoulders and started down the trail to our hut for night 2. 

Coming down in the clouds

(little did we know we were at the edge of a huge crater at the time!)

After about another hour of hiking down, we finally emerged from the clouds and could actually see something. The barren landscape looked like Mordor from Lord of the Rings - a rocky mixture of reds, browns, and blacks as the valley had been shaped over the centuries by volcanic eruptions, wind, and rain. we made it to the hut around 2pm and had lunch (pita bread with PB&J) and got our packs off of our shoulders. What a relief!

Someone was happy to be out of the clouds

This just looks like a chunk of frozen lava

And, as luck would have it, about an hour later, the clouds start to break and the views back to where we had come from starting getting clearer. And clearer. And clearer still. By 3:45pm, we could see the whole trail we had just walked down. And it looked spectacular. So, despite having already hiked 7.8 miles with 2,357 feet of climbing we decided to head back up the ridge to take pictures since we may not have another chance. You know, why not? Bridget took a cat nap and we were off! And boy were we glad we did. The views were unbelievably spectacular. It turns out that we had hiked up and down the side of a huge crater, down past emerald-green crater lakes, and past a steaming hillside of steam and sulfur. Even the panoramas don't do it justice, but here are some pictures to try...

One of the emerald crater lakes

The red spot on Mt Ngauruhoe (Mt Doom)

At the crater lakes

The valley beyond the waterfall

Video pano at the top


The ground was literally smoldering

Video of smoldering rocks

By the time we got back to the hut (~7pm), we had tacked on an extra 3 hours on our feet covering an extra 6.8 miles and 1,794 ft of climbing. A long day, but worth it. We finished things off with dinner (soup) teaching some new-found friends how to play Dominion, a card game that Bridget and I enjoy (apparently enough to have me haul it around in my pack around a volcano in New Zealand). Our game was interrupted by a spectacular sunset with fiery spokes of orange that looked like they were coming out of the volcano! So cool!

Day 2 sunset

Day 3 - Best weather yet
We woke up to more rain and clouds, but since we had less than 5 miles to hike, decided to hang out in the hut until things cleared up. We were so glad we went back up the ridge the day before - it was cloudy and the wind was so strong the ranger turned back! Our trail, on the other hand, went around the base of the volcano = minimal wind exposure and little climbing. The trail wound around through the volcanic landscape and headed toward Mt Ruapehu; giving us views of both big volcanoes at the same time. Check out the view at lunch break!

On the trail with Mt Ruepehu in sight

Not a bad lunch spot, eh?

Trail takes a turn into the woods (it was hot in there!)

We arrived to the hut with blue skies at our backs and a light breeze wafting over the landscape. The hut was recently built and had wooden porches and picnic tables for outdoor enjoyment - it felt like the Hilton after the crowded bunkhouses of the previous 2 nights! We enjoyed the sun with a relaxing afternoon of reading and soaking in the sun (me getting sunburn). We had more soup and played more Dominion with our friends who beat us twice in a row! The sunset wasn't as spectacular as the previous night, but was still great.

Day 3 sunset

Day 4 - And back again
Our last day started early (8am wake-up), as we had a long walk to catch our shuttle at 3pm. We had our oatmeal and tea, packed our bags for the 4th time in 4 days, applied sunscreen (key activity), and took off under blue skies dotted with whispy clouds hanging out by the peaks of the volcanoes. The trail we took is right between Mt. Ruapehu and Mt. Ngauruhoe, which lent to infinite new views of the same thing. There was still running water draining from the deluge a few days back in the newly cut trenches and streams. About halfway through, there was a side trail up to two crater lakes. We figured we hadn't walked enough (joke), so we tacked that on.

Beauty and the Beast

Mt Doom and Crater lake

Mt Ruepehu and Crater lake

Taranaki Falls

Nice wooden walkway over the marshland

Phew! What a tramp, eh? Loads of fun and bunches more pictures to boot!

We finished up the day with a shuttle to Lake Taupo to spend the night before flying to the south island the next morning.

Refueling with some Indian cuisine!

Bit of a squall working its way over Lake Taupo

#LoveTaupo sign

Thanks for reading the whole thing! See you in the south! Cheers!

Day 11 - Ohakune

Day 11 - Ohakune
Short post today. We drove from Rotorua to Ohakune in preparation for starting our first multi-day trek tomorrow (Tongariro Northern Circuit). Only problem is the weather... Tomorrow is supposed to be driving rain (up to 2 inches!) and gale-force winds (up to 85km/hr). And the hiking for the first day of our trek is mostly exposed along the base of the volcano with multiple stream crossings. So, there's a slight chance we may skip that part of the trek and just drive to the first hut. Just kidding, there's a pretty good chance we'll skip it. The wind chill will be near freezing and pneumonia doesn't sound too appetizing. So, we're planning on talking with the rangers in the morning and see what they recommend. We were told they already canceled the public bus service for one of the trails tomorrow, so this one may be a doozy of a storm. As the lady at the info center today said, "Well, looks like you picked a bad day to hike." Thanks. Thanks a lot.

Stay tuned. We'll be out of WiFi for the next few days, but next post should be pretty interesting....

Storm clouds all day... watching from our AirBnB

Days 9 + 10 - Wai-O-Tapu, Rotorua, and Waitomo

Day 9 - Geothermal Parks (Wai-O-Tapu and Rotorua)
Today, we ventured to some geothermal parks to check out the geology. Rotorua is along an active fault line but, unlike California, the pressure and energy are constantly escaping to the surface. Which means that it looks like the place is constantly burning (there are plumes of steam all over the place). Wai-O-Tapu is a park created around one of the most active areas and demonstrates some pretty cool volcano-esque features shown on TV and such - water boiling through cracks in the rock to the surface, sulfur wafting out of collapsed sinkholes eaten from beneath over the centuries by the acid and minerals, bubbling mud pits fit for witches brew, and lots and lots of stinky steam. Rotorua itself has some geothermal features dotted throughout the city. And since the water comes up at a toasty 100C, it's not to be trifled with. At the end of the day, we were invited to join our gracious AirBnB hosts for dinner and drinks on the first-story patio. We ate and had a wonderful time chatting as the sun set and the moon rose over the lake playing hide-and-seek with the clouds moving through the region.

Day 10 - Waitomo
We drove a few hours this morning to experience the world-renowned (or so we were told) glow worm caves in Waitomo. Unfortunately, cameras and videography were strictly prohibited, so you'll have to just imagine floating down a pitch-black river with the ceiling overhead illuminated by thousands of tiny specks of bioluminescent glowworms. It was bright enough to make out the features of the people sitting around us. The glowworms use the light to attract insects toward them and then capture them in hanging threads of sticky web-like material. After the tour, we got the included lunch platters and headed back to Rotorua and checked out the downtown a bit. There was quite a food scene, but most of the shops closed at 5:30, so the shopping got cut short. But we grilled out back at the AirBnB and sketched out some plans for tomorrow before settling in for the night.

Giant Burger

Not that warnings should really be necessary, but the water is HOT

Amazing view of one of the larger geothermal areas (click to expand)

Pano of the Champagne Pool (click to expand)

Yep - the water really is that green (#nofilter)

Cool texture on some of the rocks eaten away over the years by the unrelenting water and minerals

Yep - it really looks like Mordor...

Bubbling Mud Pool

Time Lapse of the steam off of the Champagne Pool