Days 47 and 48

Day 47 (12 November)

Tongariro Holiday Park to Whakapapa Village (34km) Having gone to sleep last night at about 7.00pm I woke early and felt refreshed and in the spirit of making it up as I go decided to can the rest day and do the crossing today. As mentioned in an earlier blog the issues with the crossing are that there is a 8km road walk to the start, followed by the Tongariro Crossing and then unless you camped at the Mangatepopo Hut a final (and very tough) 10km to Whakapapa.  So the usual 16km crossing becomes 34km! About 4.5 Hakas of climb and 3 of descent so not a day to be toyed with.

The day ahead!

I got away about 6.15 The weather was spectacular when I left with clear sky and cold.  On the road walk one of the shuttles that takes day walkers to the crossing stoped and asked if I wanted a ride.  Sorely tempting but I’ve made it 1100km without skipping anything so declined and trudged on.

Tongariro looking imposing on the road walk to the start of the crossing

Arriving at the eastern end of the crossing I stopped for a breakfast of a couple of bars and a chat to a DOC ranger who appeared particularly ill suited to a public facing role given he freely expressed some pretty bigoted views about foreign tourists. Doing the crossing this direction the long rather tedious downhill from the Katatahi Shelter is now an interminable uphill but remains relatively tedious. I’ll not go into detail regarding the crossing, I’ll let some of the photos speak for themselves. Suffice to say it was, as usual, magnificent and while numbers doing it have obviously taken some of the aura away it really is something all New Zealand’s should do at some stage. https://www.tongarirocrossing.org.nz

One part I was not looking forward to was going up the scree slope.  This is a steep climb (descent when doing it the normal direction) up to the Red Crater.  As expected this was a tough bit as being both very steep and loose scoria it was just hard yakka.  Not helped by a school group coming the other way with a number of kids obviously terrified of falling so having to deviate around them. Once on the top the views quickly erased the pain of the climb.

A fair bit of snow on top and as the day hikers had by this stage also reached the top from the other side the snow descending was compacted and had iced over so pretty treacherous.  Had my one tumble right beside some school kids who were playing in the snow, so they went home not only with an appreciation of the crossing and its beauty but also with a set of expletives that can be uttered if you fall in snow onto scoria.  Luckily only a small cut on my thumb so all’s good! Leaving the top I descended to the Mangatepopo Hut at which point I needed to decide if I stayed there or carried on to Whakapapa.  So the choice was: a. Five minutes walk, tent, dehydrated food and a cup of tea at the hut or, b. Three more hours (of pretty tough track),  cold beer, pizza and real bed in a cabin at Whakapapa.  The latter carried the day so on I went.  The Mangatepopo Track was as expected a pretty rugged end to the day as it goes up and down quite deep ravines and is washed out for large sections.  Nevertheless it took me about 2.5 hours so river in National Park late afternoon.

Oasis of Whakapapa and the Chateau in the distance

I hadn’t seen Alan all day so messaged him thinking he must have been behind he.  Transpires he was ahead having got a ride for the 8km to the track in the morning.  His justification is he gets up and goes for a pee a number of times each night, on each occasion asking ten or more metres.  He had banked these and used the credit generated to skip the road walk.  Even he admitted the logic was a bit random but it was working for him! Alan and I met for a beer and dinner and who walked in but Theo (the high speed super hiker from day 37). I couldn’t piece together how we’d caught up with him especially as he was telling us of 60km days.  Some was explained by him having to wait a couple of days to do the crossing, due to the spell of bad wether but hmmm a mystery.  Frankly I think my and Alans interest diminished when he told us how beer was dehydrating and shouldn’t be mixed with hiking! It is interesting how as this journey has progressed stamina and endurance have slowly improved without my really noticing.  I’m now five days ahead of my schedule having gained about four days in the last week and a bit, yet, apart from the 42 Traverse day haven’t really felt like I was pushing.  Up in Northland 25km days felt long, now they feel like a rest day and the high 30’s feel like the long ones. What I am finding on the longer days is the mental stuff is the toughest part, my brain is obviously not wired to just turn off and I do find boredom a bit of an issue specially if the trail isn’t challenging and requiring constant thought to navigate.  I’ve tried listening, and dare I say singing along, to music which helps a bit.  I can now sing the entire 8.5 minutes of American Pie knowing while doing so I’ll move about 750m on a good trail!  The singing must be bloody terrifying to other hikers out here though!

I have got pretty slack at noting the hundred km marks, so, it is worth noting that the 1000km point was on day two of the Timber Trail and 1100km was early today before the crossing. So now over a third of the way down the country!

In the 1150km so far there has been about 90 Hakas (27,000m) of ascent and 87 (26,000m) of descent.

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Day 48 (Black Friday, 13 November)

Whakapapa to National Park (20km- a nice short one)

Well today is the last day hiking I have for a few days.  The reason for this is I’ve arranged to canoe the Whanganui River leg with three great mates and established the date for this based on my original programme. I’m now about 5 days ahead of that hence need to kill a bit of time until I hike in to Whakahora and meet them there.  Hence I’m having a zero day in National Park then Marie is picking me up and we’re going to watch Leyton (my grandson) play cricket in Palmerston North. I’ll return here on the train next Wednesday. 

One thing I did notice this morning was my shoes (the second pair, having already discarded one pair in Hamilton) are looking pretty shoddy with splits in the sides of both of them.  Presumably a consequence of the scoria on the crossing yesterday. I’m thinking this time I’ll try to repair them with some braid and a needle and see if I can get through to Wellington with them. At the current rate the shoe bill is working out to be about 50c per km which is not far short of what IRD allow for running a car!

John’s shoe repairs! Might be new vocation .

Knowing it was a short day I started slowly, having coffee and breakfast at the food truck in National Park.  Met up with Alan there and we wandered down to the DOC office to get our respective Whakahora hut bookings sorted.  Might be Black Friday but this was a stroke of luck as it seems this hut is actually a great walk one and hence does need to be booked, I’d assumed it was just your run of the mill backcountry hut.

Didn’t leave Whakapapa until a bit after 9.00, the trail initially following the Whakapapiti Track.  It’s over 40years since I tramped this track and in that time they’ve bridged the stream and put boardwalk across most of the marshland so all in all a really relaxed start.  One interesting thing about Alan and I hiking together is we’re both pretty hard of hearing and our good ears are both the right, consequently, when talking we often stop and face each other which isn’t the most efficient way to hike. 

Last time I did this track there was no bridge!

After crossing the Whakapapiti Stream (over the spoofy  new bridge, so feet still dry!) the trail goes onto the Mangahuia track.  It would also seem this is where DOC’s budget ran out. The track deteriorates to a back country tramping track, not as bad as the Mangatepopo Track yesterday but still a bit more challenging and clearly dry feet are a thing of the past. 

Looking back to where I came from yesterday

Crossing the Mangahuia stream Alan and I had differing strategies. I walked on across accepting my feet were already a bit damp and full on squelchy was no problem.  Alan meanwhile stopped and took off his shoes and came across barefoot.  Unfortunately an out midway he dropped a shoe into the water and it stated floating off downstream. It was Friday 13th after all so disaster was always possible. Fortunately he managed to arrest its progeress with one of his treking poles and I waded back in and retrieved it for him. So he got across half dry!

My noon photo with a mouth full of jerky, just as Alan needed help to get his shoe!

After the crossing the trail deteriorated further to become a sort of Cokers track lite.  Some quite big muddy puddles of varying depth to either they to get around or just wade on through. 

I think this sign indicates where the DOC track maintenance budget finishes!

Eventually arriving at SH47 the route to National Park was a shortish (6km) road walk which was a nice easy end to a pretty relaxing and very enjoyable day. 

I did wear the hat Marie included with the new pack today for the first time.  Alan thought I looked like a Chinese market gardener (all I needed to complete the ensemble was a bunch of bok choy) but it was really practical and cool in the hot sun.

Prior to dinner I had a game of mini golf with Alan.  His occupation of professional golf caddy and previous golfing prowess showed and I got a good old lesson in the finer points of put put.

We said our goodbyes as barring an issue Alan will now be ahead of me and we won’t meet again on the TA.  The time with him has been great.

As mentioned above I’m now going off trail for a bit until I hike in to Whakahora to meet Mingle, Arch and McVet to canoe down the Whanganui River.

Obviously there’ll be no blog for this period but to keep it simple I’ll restart the blog at Day 54 when I launch out from National Park towards Whakahora on 19th November.