Wonderful day doing the 19km Tongariro alpine crossing Mangatepopo car park to Ketatahi road end, across desolate, terrifying, geothermal wasted landscape, amazingly full of colour and smell. An early is start at 06.00 got us to the start at 7.30, and after 8.5 hours of beautiful weather and varied terrain, we reached the end at 4.00pm. The highlights were a really difficult scramble up and descent down, needing knee brace applied, amazing coloured lakes, and the red crater. Photos do not do it justice
mount doom from Lord of the rings.
Chris out of breath
mount doom from Lord of the rings.
Red crater
Chris out of breath
Multicoloured lakes, and a stream of fellow walkers.
The whole track was incredibly busy, there must have been hundreds doing the same walk.
The last third was through bush then forest, thankfully a gradual descent after a hair raising scree slope earlier.
Now off to bed and hopefully a full night's sleep?
well done - and great photos
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