Tongariro is the first National Park in New Zealand. This is an area of immense beauty with active and dormant volcanoes in the area. In fact, there was an eruption just in August this year and there were warning signs on our hike about watching out for eruptions and staying away from certain areas.
We were told a little bit about this hike but none of us were prepared for how tough the hike would be. The distance of the hike is almost 20 km, or about 12 miles. However, we climbed up about 800m elevation and through different weather conditions. We started out wearing shorts and T-shirts but by the time we got to the peak of the mountain, we were wearing 3 layers of clothes, with the outer layer being an alpine ski jacket. Up on the mountains we had to walk through snow and by the time we finished, we were walking through dense forests. There is steam coming out of some of the mountains. There is hardly any vegetation up on top. One of the mountains was "Mount Doom" in the 3rd Lord of the Rings movies. The hike took about 7-8 hours. All of us were dead tired and hungry that night but we all thought this was one of the best scenery we have seen so far.
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| "Mount Doom" from Lord of the Rings movie |
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| Hiking through rugged terrain |
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| A lot of snow as we get to the top |
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| Looking down from one of the trains |
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| A few craters filled with water |
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| There were warning signs everywhere about active volcanoes |
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| Not easy hiking through snow with sneakers |
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| Steam coming out of some of the mountains |
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| On the way down |
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| Dense forests and stream at the bottom of the mountains |
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