(David) Now I know that this is a cycling blog – but this next few entries have no wheels and only describe a walk – or a “tramp” to give our activity its local name here in NZ.  For those who are only interested in cycling, I suggest you “look away now”.  For the rest, this is a description of one of the NZ “Great Walks”, the Tongariro Northern Circuit, also known as the “TNC”. 

The TNC is a walk in the Tongariro National Park.  It takes up to 4 days and goes around the conical Mount Nguruhoe (2287m), a classic volcano which looks like a mountain that a child would draw – straight sides and a snow covered top.  The smaller mountain, Mount Tongariro (1967m) is north of Mount Nguruhoe, and the walk crosses the saddle between the two mountains. On the other side of the valley is the much higher Mount Ruapehu (2797m) which is longer and has an extensive snow covering at this time of year.

We drove from our accommodation in Turangi (having failed to find time to go fishing in a world fly fishing mecca) to the strangely named “Whakapapa” village to start the walk.  We later learned that it was pronounced “Fu-whack-a-pappa”. The road took us gradually up to the village which is at about 1150m.  The landscape was high altitude moorland, dominated by the two volcanos to the north, Nguruhoe and Tongariro and the Mount Ruapehue (2797m) range to the south, where there is extensive skiing in the winter.

There are huts along this walk but they were all fully booked before we got our act together and so camping was the only option.  Overall, this was better for us as it meant we got a good night’s sleep most nights, as opposed to the hit and miss of a night in a shared hut.  Having sorted out renting a locator beacon (being either intent on being as safe as possible or as pessimistic as it goes) we put on our packs and started walking.  A word about our packs – and thanks to our great friends Gill and Peter who provided advice and encouragement from their many years of trekking.  We got lightweight rucksacks before the trip, good poles and a few other items such as a gas burner, but most of the kit was the same as we have used for cycle touring.  The difference was we also packed freeze dried meals and other food for 5 days – 4 days plus a spare.  The packs were heavy but not ridiculously so; probably about 14g for David and a bit less for Bernie.  

We started our trek in the dry, but with cloud over the top of Mount Nguruhoe.  The terrain was marsh/mud which went up and down across numerous streams that flowed down from the mountains to our right.  Heather was introduced to this area to provide cover for grouse in the early C20th, but was a disaster as it wiped out the native species.  Grouse never survived and so the original plan of turning the slopes into Scottish style grouse shooting never occurred.  But heather spread at pace, with local fauna declining.  The invasive heather is now a pest which the NZ Department of Conservation is attempting to remove – but it is a massive job as it has spread over vast areas. 

The walk was steady rather than dramatic.  There were a few others on the track – some overtook us and others came the other way.  We could tell instantly if someone was a day walker – small pack – or a multi-day walker – big pack.  The day walkers were faster (of course) and most of the multi-day walkers were faster than us (again of course).  Lots of jolly greetings along the way.  As we walked, the shape of the mountains changed – but far more slowly than on a bike.  Gradually the top of Mount Nguruhoe cleared of cloud, revealing its classic shape, and we got to see the saddle we would have to climb tomorrow.

After 3 hours of sliding along muddy tracks we reached the Mangetepopo Hut at about 3pm, and found a place to set up our tent.  The huts are hugely sociable places and we chatted to other walkers, all of whom had come to the hut under their own steam.  There was no warden, no electricity and no hassle – everyone just getting on with things.  We chatted to a couple from Tasmania who were about our age, a young couple from Boston, USA who were on a delayed honeymoon having negotiated 4 weeks holiday (amazing in a US context) and lots of New Zealanders.

Our first experiment with freeze dried meals was about 75% successful – we will get better with them – but it was tasty.  By 8pm we were in our sleeping bags as the temperature began to fall and the light faded.  This was both remote and not remote.  It was remote in the sense that there were no roads, we were in a tent and felt tired from a decent walk; but it was also not remote in the sense that another tent was pitched very close to ours and we were on a fixed and very popular walking route. That seemed about the right balance to start getting used to the experience of tramping.  If it goes well, we could explore more remote settings at a later date.  For now, this was as good as it gets.