Day 147: MOUNT DOOM

While we've been in New Zealand, Claire and I have actually not sought out any Lord of the Rings settings, and, for two ex-fanatics, have been remarkably blase about living in Middle Earth. However, with my brother in tow, we decided that we would have to make our way to Mordor. Or, in that silly English tongue, Tongariro National Park.

Today, we learned that one does not simply walk into Mordor.

(insert joke here)

One might say that one wakes up to a grey morning, dons many layers of wet weather gear and wool, drives through a blanket of fog and cloud, climbs many steep stairs in pouring rain, hears an impending thunderstorm, and then decides that destroying the One Ring isn't worth it and heads back to relax in some heated pools.

(Little known fact: That part was cut from the books.)

Anyhow, we woke up today to a grey morning and not the stealth sunny day that we had all been hoping for. Rather than just skip the crossing, we followed the advice of Ian, our good hostel keep, as well as a few others who had made the walk in the previous days and decided to go on until we couldn't.

Driving to Mangetata gave us a hint of what the weather was going to be like. The forests we drove through were tall and dark and the tops were lost to fog. It looked positively gothic. (Our windshield wipers did their level best to contribute, SKREE SKREE SKREE-ing with Psycho-esque verve.)

By the time we got to the start of the track, the weather had cleared up enough to alternate patches of almost-sun with drizzle, and I was saying things like, "Oh, this isn't too bad, guys! We can totally do this!" Of course, just as we hit the first ascent (as prefaced by many WARNING! and CAUTION! and ADVISORY! signs), the clouds gathered and waited to release buckets of rain at the opportune moment.

As we climbed, I think we were actually in the midst of the low hanging clouds because we were enveloped in white. The visibility of the path seemed more or less normal until you looked forward and saw that each dip and bend seemed to lead into nothing.

Is that the edge of a cliff? No, just a turn in the road.

Anyhow, we made it up to the Red Crater, which was a truly bizarre experience. The land itself was really sparse and flat, and it felt like we were in some combination of the moon and the American Southwest. Combine that with the fact that we were in the center of a crater in the middle of white clouds, and it was just this almost eerie sensation of isolation.

The only cure for isolation is more banana

At this point, all we had to do was climb one more uphill section, and then the rest would be downhill. However, as Claire started to pick out a path through the slippery and steep rock slope, the rain began to pick up again, slapping our raincoats as if to mock our optimism. As we made it about halfway up, thunder started to rumble in the distance and I began to have some serious reservations.

We ended up turning back shortly after, because the rain didn't seem to want to stop and I am a wet blanket. (And, in all seriousness, because I didn't want to test the three of us with a pretty rough uphill climb in a thunderstorm.)

As we turned back, it felt like we made the right choice because it began to pour rain. I am pretty sure that if I stood under a shower fully dressed and then jumped into a swimming pool, I could not have gotten wetter. Rainwater was streaming around our feet, flooding the little waterways they carved around the steps, and I could feel my socks squelching in my (waterproof) shoes. It was truly epic.

Of course, by the time we returned to the springs at the valley, the sun was starting to peek out and we ended up having a nice little picnic on the rocks.

Would you believe the hand holding the camera was raisin-y with wet?

The final walk back to the car was absolutely unbelievable, with beautiful skies and only the lightest sprinkle of oh-you! rain. We peeled off our layers to enjoy the sun, arranging them carefully in the car to avoid excessive puddles, and then took our leisurely way back to Turangi.

Oh, and then we nearly ran out of gas.

But anyway, we eventually got back to the hostel, our bodies aching and wet, and then Ian, our good hostel-keep, told us about the local thermal pools. We ended up trotting (or limping) or way over there and finished off the day soaking in some hot pools. That was pretty neat, especially since it started to rain and we had the dual combination of hot water and cool rain.

(And even in the pools, I'm pretty sure I wasn't as wet as I was coming down the mountain.)

And that was our Tongariro adventure! I confess, I was a bit bummed that we weren't able to do the whole walk, but I figure the sheer insanity of hurtling down a mountain in a thunderstorm more than balances it out.