Fields of fire

Our alarms went off at 0445 and we rather reluctantly crawled out of our tent and got ready to take on the Tongariro Alpine Crossing. We packed away our tent as quietly as we could, had a hearty breakfast of porridge and crumpets, then made our way to the car park to meet our shuttle bus. This would take us from our car to the starting point, and we’d then walk back to the car. The Tongariro crossing is one of NZ’s most well known walks. Usually done one way, it winds its way up through a volcanic valley, strewn with the debris and detritus of eruptions past and present, before you climb up and across a steep volcano edge, cross an old lava flow, and then plateau underneath the gaze of two recently active volcanoes. We made the top of the crossing in good time, fuelled by Cadbury’s chocolate and marmite muffins, and enjoyed the beautiful views from the top. All around us there were geysers of hot steam erupting from the ground and a sign at the top warned us that we were standing on an active volcano that could erupt at any time. With the recent White Island eruption fresh in our minds we took our photos rather rapidly and then practically ran down the far side, putting our Cotopaxi ash field downhill running experience to good use. We debated telling off a guy who was doing the walk in his flip flops, but decided against it as we had places to be.

Soon we were descending the far side of the plateau and heading towards our pick up. Here we saw signs telling us of another relatively recent – 2012 – eruption. This came from a smaller volcano off to the right hand side of the path. Smaller did not necessarily mean weaker; this eruption had managed to throw a 3 tonne lump of rock hundreds of metres into the air and the impact craters from this and other large rocks were all around us. We even saw the remnants of what used to be the local camping hut. It was basically destroyed in the 2012 eruption and, although it was rebuilt, in 2019 they decided to take it down as it was just too dangerous for people to to stay there. We completed the rest of the walk practically at the double, both out of nervousness but also because our watch batteries were getting low and we didn’t want to lose our gps data. If it isn’t on Strava, then it didn’t happen!

We were therefore glad when we got back to Kitty and swiftly got on our way, heading towards Wellington. Hoff surprised me on the way by mentioning that she would actually ‘like’ to go the the NZ Army museum. I almost crashed the car in surprise but I didn’t want to let an opportunity like this go, so set a course for the museum before she could change her mind. On the way we had to call the police – well, actually we pulled into a police station and then called the emergency number – as a huge truck axle had fallen off a lorry ahead of us and was lying in the middle of the road. As we got through to the operator, a policeman came out and knocked on our window. What was most surprising is that he enquired what we wanted, in a thick Yorkshire accent. We explained the situation and he set off to have a look, leaving Hoff and I confused as to whether we’d taken a wrong turn somewhere and ended up in Leeds!

The Army museum, when we got there, was excellent. It gave a full history of the founding of NZ and the interactions between the Maori and the Europeans, NZ’s contributions to the first and second world wars (which were astounding) and then some more background on recent operations. ever since our visit we have kept an eye out for war memorials on our way around the country, and it is humbling to see the sacrifices that were made by such small and rural communities. In some tiny hamlets you drive through you’ll find a memorial to 8-10 men, often fathers or sons or bothers from just two or three families, all whom died in the wars. The impact on these small communities and NZ as a whole must have been huge, and we weren’t surprised to learn that NZ had the highest casualty rate per capita of any country. Although the ties back to the UK are weaker now, back then people flocked to serve King and country, and that meant England, so we as Brits have a lot to be thankful for. The Kiwis, both Maori and European descendants, were known for their cool headedness and fearsomeness in battle, and were often sent it to the hardest battles to break the deadlocks, such as at Monte Cassino, which meant they suffered high casualty rates. It was all very interesting and moving at the same time.

Another positive of our stop at the museum was that it got us out of the rain that hard started just after we finished our walk. It was still spitting when we left so we headed towards the coast hoping that the sea breeze would clear the clouds. This worked slightly but it was drizzling when we pulled up at our campsite. Luckily we found a spot under a tree that kept us pretty dry, and we tucked into a well deserved pizza and garlic bread, thoughts of which had kept us going in our trek earlier in the day. Tomorrow we’d be heading all the way to Wellington, NZ’s capital city and our final stop on this leg of our north island trip before we got the ferry to the South Island. We crawled back into our little tent and were asleep within seconds, dreaming of volcanoes and tanks (well, I was anyway…..).

Next up – Hoff takes you on a journey across to the South Island of NZ