'Twas in the darkest depths of Mordor

Trip Start Jan 05, 2005

Trip End Dec 13, 2005

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Flag of New Zealand Tongariro National Park, New Zealand
Thursday, March 10, 2005

After leaving Auckland I drove about 5 and a half hours south to Tongariro National Park. The park was given to the NZ Government by the Maori tribe who originally owned the land. They did this in order for their sacred land to be preserved otherwise the colonists would've stolen it and parcelled it out for settlement. This practice was actually pretty common and is how many New Zealand National Parks were created. The park is dominated by 3 volcanoes, Tongariro, Ngauruhoe, and Ruapehu. Ngauruhoe is the youngest at 2500 years old which is obvious seeing it's nearly symmetrical sides. As mentioned before it is the one that played Mt. Doom in the Lord of the Rings movies. The vast majority of the Mordor scenes were also filmed here. It really felt like Mordor there and even if they hadn't made the movies I feel like I would've made the connection anyway. It was a rugged alpine volcanic environment that with a little imagination looked evil. Especially with the weather I had which was cloudy and rainy the whole time I was there

1 Mordor

. My plan was to summit Mt. Doom and I got about 300 feet of vert from accomplishing it. The summit route is off of a very famous NZ hike known as the Tongariro Crossing. Normally you just do the crossing using shuttles as it's a one-way hike. The big highlight from the parts of the trail I missed are the Emerald Lakes, 3 sapphire-blue ponds. I didn't feel the need to see them as I went to Yellowstone twice last Northern Hemisphere summer and saw dozens of such pools. The hike was great, it started out in a big valley that you could tell was carved by lava since the creek running through it was tiny and the valley was huge. Once at the top of the valley a tough ascent up volcanic rock brought me to a saddle where the summit route began. The volcanic rock was really jagged and totally destroyed my 15 dollar shoes I bought at the Warehouse, ("where everybody gets a bargain") which is a New Zealand Walmart and also a young traveler staple. Once I got to the saddle the summit of Ngauruhoe was socked in with clouds as it had been all day so I ate lunch hoping for the clouds to part. They didn't so I decided to just hike up into them. Once on the side of the mountain the climb was tough, it was all sand and small bits of pumice so basically for every step forward you took another half-step back. At the bottom of the clouds it was not too bad to see but when I started closing in on the top the clouds got really thick just as the trail got really steep. Also, it started getting really cold. Being by myself forces me to err on the side of caution so I turned around and headed back to my car

2 Mt. Ngauruhoe

. In the end I made it farther than Sam and Frodo did in the movies but they had me beat in the books. It was a really fun hike, about 11 miles in total. I've tried to find an elevation profile of it but the kiwis just aren't as concerned about elevation gain as the Coloradans are. I took about 60 pictures and posted some of the best ones. I really like being in National Parks and their campsites. I got a sleeping pad for the wagon (also at The Warehouse) and it's a lot more comfortable now. It's a really good thing I brought my Northwoods tested sleeping bag because it was extremely cold at night. Speaking of the Northwoods I passed by a paper factory on my way to the park. There's a paper factory in International Falls, Minnesota, which is right on the US-Canadian border. We pass through there every summer on the way to Canada for canoe trips and the terrible smell reminded me of good times. On to Wellington.