Das Tongariro Crossing - a wet adventure

Hello everyone,

As promised, today I want to tell you about my attempt to conquer the Tongariro Crossing. Since it's raining heavily at the moment, we unfortunately can't leave the car to rearrange it, so we have plenty of time to take care of such things. Speaking of rain, it was also the reason why we couldn't complete the Tongariro Crossing. But let's start from the beginning..

As I mentioned in my last blog post, the weather forecast for the next week was not very promising, and Friday seemed to be the best opportunity to attempt this hike. So on Thursday afternoon, we booked transportation from the end of the trail back to the parking lot. The staff at the iSite said that the weather should be cloudy with a few showers and since all the tour operators offer the hike on Fridays, there shouldn't be any issues. After taking care of this, we drove to our campsite and set up for an early morning, as we were supposed to be picked up from the parking lot at 7:30 am. After a delicious dinner, we went to bed early.

The next morning, we woke up at 6 o'clock and were immediately disappointed by the weather. It was gray, foggy, and damp. But well, maybe it's better on the other side of the national park where the starting point of the hike is. So we had breakfast, packed up the car, and headed to the meeting point. When we arrived there, we encountered the next disappointment. The toilets could only be used by people who were camping there... which I think is unfair. Calling it a Base Camp and then not even having a toilet. But well, that's how it was. Unfortunately, the weather didn't improve during our 20-minute drive, so we had to wait for the bus in the rain. But luckily, it arrived relatively quickly and we could start our journey to the starting point of the hike. On the way, we received a map of the trail to mentally prepare ourselves. I was surprised by how busy it was at the starting point. Before we got off the bus, the driver wished us good luck again and repeated that according to the weather report, it should only get better. Unfortunately, that was not the case.

After a short detour to the provided toilets, we started on the trail. The first hour of the trail was labeled as an easy hike and led to a small waterfall. After that, the next hour was a steep climb up the mountain with lots of steps. The higher we went, the windier and wetter it got. After fighting our way up, it leveled out a bit. However, the wind there got even worse and the next part was supposed to be steep again and the path would also get narrower as we walked along the edge of the crater. This meant that we could be blown off by the wind from both sides. After my backpack's rain cover got blown off, luckily I managed to catch it and collect it again, we decided to turn back as it was simply too dangerous. As instructed by the bus driver, we immediately called the office and informed them that we would be turning back, and started our way back. By now, we were completely wet everywhere as we had also waited for half an hour in slushy snow. I must say that my hiking boots held up remarkably well. But since my pants got soaked from all the rain, they eventually started transferring the moisture to my socks and eventually it was raining into my boots from the top. When we arrived back at the starting point, well below the allocated time, to our horror, we realized that the bus hadn't arrived yet. So we had to wait in a small shelter, where the wind and rain still came in, with many other people for another three-quarters of an hour. A sigh of relief went through the crowd when we finally saw the bus. During the bus ride, we were able to warm up a bit, and when we arrived at the car, we completely changed our clothes in the parking lot, as we were wet down to our ski underwear. Fortunately, as a reward for the exhausting hike, we had booked a hostel room in Nelson for two nights. With the joyful expectation of soon being dry and warm again, we left the national park.

It's a shame that we had such bad weather, the photos from other travelers look impressive. But it simply wasn't meant to be. However, I still believe we can be proud of ourselves, because we walked about 18 kilometers in four and a half hours. And that in the mountains...

Well, that's all for now about my experience with an alpine hike. I learned that if the weather is bad, it's better to skip it, because in the end, you could end up standing freezing and soaking wet to the bones. Not to mention that we couldn't see anything of the beautiful landscape. But who knows, maybe we'll be lucky and can try the hike again.

See you soon,

Your Jessi