... aka Mt. Ngauruhoe in Tongariro NP, New Zealand It's really too bad that J.R.R. Tolkein didn't live long enough to confer with Peter Jackson about the Lord of the Rings trilogy, because ... he really needed to know that it would have been a really hard climb for Frodo and Samwise to climb to the summit of Mt. Doom in order to cast the ring into the fire and defeat Mordor's grip on Middle Earth.
Nancy and I visited the National Park on the two days before Christmas, taking a couple of really nice 2-hour hikes. On the 23rd we drove up Ohakune Mt. Rd. in order to hike to Waitonga Falls (pix), and then on the 24th we took a 45-min. drive from our lodgings up to Whakapapa Visitors' Centre in order to see a couple of videos about Maori history and the national park, and also take another 2-hour loop hike to Taranaki Falls (pictured below).
The scenery in the park is very interesting -- with the snow-capped Mt. Ruapehu (9177 ft.) dominating much of the scene,
but with relatively little of the landscape forested. 
Instead, there is lots of chaparral-like ground cover 4-10 ft. high that gives much of the area more of a desert-look. But, we had gorgeous weather on both days and guessed that the temperature must have been in the high 60's, with bright sun. So far we've been really pleased with our No. Island trip. Christmas dinner tomorrow night at a classy restaurant in Rotorua! - rw
1 comment:
Gorgeous country.. but where is the flag on the flag pole. it's missing!
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