Wellington was getting crowded with the red carpet event for The Hobbit and as much as I'm a Tolkien geek, I don't want to stand between thousands of people waiting 6 hours to get a glimpse of Martin Freeman or Peter Jackson. So I needed to get out of town fast. But I didn't wanted to travel too far in case Tongariro National Park opens again. So I needed to travel slow and the best way to do that is hitchhiking and go wherever your driver is going. The first day I ended up in Paraparaumu, a small town 45km north of Wellington on the Kapiti coast. It's where Wellingtonians go to retire they say. Live is very calm and slow up there. To bad they don't have a camp site so I had to walk back to Paekakariki, 10km down the road. It took a while but the walk was nice. I could walk a long time on the beach with the wind in my back and mini sand storms passing me by. After that it was still 4km through Queen Charlotte Natural Reserve. A sand dune reserve with heaps of local dune plants and great views. Going up and down the dunes with all my gear wasn't easy but it was well worth it and I ended up in a very well attended camp site.
The next day I made it to Palmerston-North and I don't have much good to say about it. It a boring gray town full of multinational brand shops, ugly buildings and people who are in a hurry. The hostel I ended up in was nice but run by an irritating women who had rules for everything. Living there felt like being in school again. The only good thing about Palmerston-North is that I perfected my advocado pasta sauce over there and that I found out that Tongariro would open again in a few days.
I couldn't wait to get out of Palmerston-North so I put my thumb up and ended up in Bulls, not far down the road but conveniently located on the junction of SH3 to the west coast and SH1 to Tongariro (and after that all the way to Auckland). Bulls' location on the junction of both highways is the reason the small town survives. All over the region small towns like this are running empty with there citizens fleeing to either Palmerston-North or Wellington. Bulls makes a good coffee brake for travelers and truckers on the road. That's why it's the only place with a mere 500 citizens that has a McDonalds, a Subway and 6 coffee shops and bakeries. Bulls tries to keep up it's image as coffee break place numero uno by putting up quirky signs. When you drive into town you see a sign that says 'Bulls, a place like no udder' and the joke is that it's the only place in New-Zealand where you can get milk from Bulls. It's all very silly but it works, a lot of drivers pull over to look at the signs and have a coffee.
I wanted to stay in Bulls for the night but I got a offer I couldn't refuse. I could book the bus to Turangi for a fraction of the price it would cost me with my bus pass. So I got on the bus and a few hours later I caught my first glimpse of the might volcanoes. It's an impressive sight, 3 snow cl0th volcanoes on the horizon of a desert landscape. The desert lies in the rain shadow of the volcanoes and is a beautiful desolate place with magnificent views. But it's used by the army as training ground so most of it is off limits. In Turangi, one of the gateways to Tongariro National Park, I found a great hostel with a big yard and a lot of freedom. Ian, the owner, made me a deal. Because his dorm was filled with a primary school on a field trip he would let me stay in his shed for 10 dollars a night and he would drive me up to the start of Tongariro Alpine Crossing for free. The shed had a squeaking bed, no electricity and is not exactly warm but it is cheap and more comfortable then my tent
I stayed a long time in Turangi. Ians place does that to people, most of the guests stay longer than they intended. I met some interesting people. There is Spencer, an American who studied sociology in Tilburg and who loves old stuff. He smokes pipe, writes on a type writer at home and he is the only traveler I met who writes his diary by hand. Spencer is a funny guy. He came back from the Tongariro crossing and said to me with a straight face: "I expected to find a Starbucks up there, I could do with a late". There was the Swedish couple who ran the Tongariro Alpine Crossing. Rasmus is a long distance runner, he won a marathon in New-Zealand not so long ago, and he actually ran up the mountain while everyone else was struggling to get up there walking. But I have the most respect for little Mathieu, the 8 year old son of a French family who has been biking for 4 months through California, Australia and now New-Zealand. The kid rides 80km a day in New-Zealands windy back country, up and down all those hills, on a bike that weights about half as much as he does.
And then there is the national park, 3 giant volcanoes surrounded by vast nothingness. It's hard to describe, words don't do the place justice, my pictures don't do the place justice. It's an utterly unreal place but very beautiful and it is awesome to be there. You feel very much alive and at the same time you realize humans are very small and weak compared to mother nature. The icy wind almost blows you of the mountain and one little eruption and a bit of lava coming out of that big volcano next to you and you're gone. I like it so much I went to the national park twice. The first time was on the day of the reopening. Me and a few hundred others walked the alpine crossing, the easiest walk in the park, but still a climb to 1800m above sea level. We couldn't walk the entire thing, the part where the eruption happened 2 weeks ago is still off limits. So we could walk up to the halfway point and then back down again. Yesterday I went to climb Mt. Ngauruhoe, it's a side track on the alpine crossing. But you can't really call it a track. There is a sign that says 'summit, this way' and after that you find your own way to the top. It's a gruesome climb, on hand and knees sometimes and through parts of loose sand and lava rocks. You take two steps and you slide one down again. But it is most definitely worth it. Standing on the edge of a volcano crater, 2300m high is pretty cool in itself, but the view from up there is just unbelievable. It's worth the pain in my knees I got now every time I sit down and would do it again in a heartbeat. But just not today.
Mt. Ruapehu
Views during the climb
Mt. Ngauruhoe
Red crater
Emerald lakes
Blue lake
Crater of Mt. Ngauruhoe
Amazing view from the top of the volcano
The next day I made it to Palmerston-North and I don't have much good to say about it. It a boring gray town full of multinational brand shops, ugly buildings and people who are in a hurry. The hostel I ended up in was nice but run by an irritating women who had rules for everything. Living there felt like being in school again. The only good thing about Palmerston-North is that I perfected my advocado pasta sauce over there and that I found out that Tongariro would open again in a few days.
I couldn't wait to get out of Palmerston-North so I put my thumb up and ended up in Bulls, not far down the road but conveniently located on the junction of SH3 to the west coast and SH1 to Tongariro (and after that all the way to Auckland). Bulls' location on the junction of both highways is the reason the small town survives. All over the region small towns like this are running empty with there citizens fleeing to either Palmerston-North or Wellington. Bulls makes a good coffee brake for travelers and truckers on the road. That's why it's the only place with a mere 500 citizens that has a McDonalds, a Subway and 6 coffee shops and bakeries. Bulls tries to keep up it's image as coffee break place numero uno by putting up quirky signs. When you drive into town you see a sign that says 'Bulls, a place like no udder' and the joke is that it's the only place in New-Zealand where you can get milk from Bulls. It's all very silly but it works, a lot of drivers pull over to look at the signs and have a coffee.
I wanted to stay in Bulls for the night but I got a offer I couldn't refuse. I could book the bus to Turangi for a fraction of the price it would cost me with my bus pass. So I got on the bus and a few hours later I caught my first glimpse of the might volcanoes. It's an impressive sight, 3 snow cl0th volcanoes on the horizon of a desert landscape. The desert lies in the rain shadow of the volcanoes and is a beautiful desolate place with magnificent views. But it's used by the army as training ground so most of it is off limits. In Turangi, one of the gateways to Tongariro National Park, I found a great hostel with a big yard and a lot of freedom. Ian, the owner, made me a deal. Because his dorm was filled with a primary school on a field trip he would let me stay in his shed for 10 dollars a night and he would drive me up to the start of Tongariro Alpine Crossing for free. The shed had a squeaking bed, no electricity and is not exactly warm but it is cheap and more comfortable then my tent
I stayed a long time in Turangi. Ians place does that to people, most of the guests stay longer than they intended. I met some interesting people. There is Spencer, an American who studied sociology in Tilburg and who loves old stuff. He smokes pipe, writes on a type writer at home and he is the only traveler I met who writes his diary by hand. Spencer is a funny guy. He came back from the Tongariro crossing and said to me with a straight face: "I expected to find a Starbucks up there, I could do with a late". There was the Swedish couple who ran the Tongariro Alpine Crossing. Rasmus is a long distance runner, he won a marathon in New-Zealand not so long ago, and he actually ran up the mountain while everyone else was struggling to get up there walking. But I have the most respect for little Mathieu, the 8 year old son of a French family who has been biking for 4 months through California, Australia and now New-Zealand. The kid rides 80km a day in New-Zealands windy back country, up and down all those hills, on a bike that weights about half as much as he does.
And then there is the national park, 3 giant volcanoes surrounded by vast nothingness. It's hard to describe, words don't do the place justice, my pictures don't do the place justice. It's an utterly unreal place but very beautiful and it is awesome to be there. You feel very much alive and at the same time you realize humans are very small and weak compared to mother nature. The icy wind almost blows you of the mountain and one little eruption and a bit of lava coming out of that big volcano next to you and you're gone. I like it so much I went to the national park twice. The first time was on the day of the reopening. Me and a few hundred others walked the alpine crossing, the easiest walk in the park, but still a climb to 1800m above sea level. We couldn't walk the entire thing, the part where the eruption happened 2 weeks ago is still off limits. So we could walk up to the halfway point and then back down again. Yesterday I went to climb Mt. Ngauruhoe, it's a side track on the alpine crossing. But you can't really call it a track. There is a sign that says 'summit, this way' and after that you find your own way to the top. It's a gruesome climb, on hand and knees sometimes and through parts of loose sand and lava rocks. You take two steps and you slide one down again. But it is most definitely worth it. Standing on the edge of a volcano crater, 2300m high is pretty cool in itself, but the view from up there is just unbelievable. It's worth the pain in my knees I got now every time I sit down and would do it again in a heartbeat. But just not today.
Queen Charlotte Nature Reserve in Paraparaumu
Christmas tree in Palmerston-North
Silly signs in Bulls
Start of the crossing
Start of the crossing
Red crater
No comments:
Post a Comment