The Tongariro Alpine Crossing is the most famous single day hike in New Zealand. Hundreds, sometimes thousands, of walkers complete it every day in the summer high season. Even with the crowds it’s still a fantastic walk but if you are feeling more adventurous there are some side trips you can take off the main trail. One is climbing Mt Ngauruhoe (a.k.a. Mount Doom from The Lord of the Rings) which we climbed previously in 2016 (see North Island Volcanoes) and the other is Mt Tongariro. On this visit, on New Years Day 2022, we climbed Mt Tongariro.
The Crossing is in the Tongariro National Park, in the middle of North Island, and passes between Mt Ngauruhoe and Mt Tongariro.
The red dotted line is the trail and the starting point for the direction that most people walk it in is at the road-head circled in green.
There is lots of information provided by the New Zealand DOC (Department of Conservation) such as this information leaflet so I won’t dwell on the logistics other than to say that it is necessary to arrange a shuttle to take you from the northern end point of the track – where you leave your car – to the start. This proved somewhat stressful for us as Google maps navigated us to the home of Tongariro Horse Treks instead of the Tongariro Crossing Mountain Shuttle. As it was 7.50am in the morning on New Years Day we decided not to knock on their door to seek their advice, did a u-turn and made a swift exit. The only problem was that we had no mobile reception so could not look up the correct location or call the company who were arranging the shuttle. After a few minutes of driving back the way we had come in a fruitless attempt to find a mobile signal, we calmed down, used our brains, did another u-turn and drove past Tongariro Horse Treks to the end of trail. There we found a massive car park and a surprisingly long queue of people waiting to board the shuttle bus, considering the early start on New Years Day.
Our bus driver told us that the record of people doing the crossing in a day hit 3000 in pre-Covid boom times. Now it was about 200 a day. Not good for the local businesses that make a living from the trail but good for us.
This was not our first time over the Crossing. We’d previously done it in 2008. It was interesting to observe how things had changed in the intervening 14 years. Perhaps as a result of the numbers of walkers a lot more of the trail has been constructed and reinforced to make the walking surface smoother.
The trail only reverts back to earth and stones after the initial climb up to the South Crater below Mt Ngauruhoe.
There used to be a signed and marked trail to Mt Tongariro. In 2008 I remember reaching the summit in the cloud so it must have been a clear trail or we would not have set off along it. Now there is just a sign asking walkers to turn back. Likewise there is no longer a sign for the trail up Mt Ngauruhoe. I’m just speculating, but perhaps the increased number of people, coupled with the area’s unpredictable weather, meant that some walkers found themselves out of their depth and needed rescue. Similarly ‘Alpine’ has recently been added to the original trail name of ‘Tongariro Crossing’, presumably to encourage people to treat it with respect.
Lillian walked with me along the ridge to Mt Tongariro up to a rocky point about 10 minutes from the main trail. This ridge leaves the Tongariro Crossing at close to the highest point on the main trail, which is on the flat-topped rise at 11 o’clock to Lillian.
Lillian patiently waited for me while I went to the summit of Mt Tongariro. She was pretty sure that this was as far as she had come in 2008, though some old photos that we looked at later showed she had actually walked all the way to the summit; I guess one of the advantages of the cloudy conditions in 2008 was that we could not see how far we had to go! The Blue Lake and one of the Emerald Lakes are behind Lillian.
The summit of Mt Tongariro is the rocky peak in the centre of this photo. The path is visible traversing across the scree slope on the right. It would be easy to get disorientated in the cloud, and given that you need to ignore a ‘Go Back’ sign, it goes without saying that you shouldn’t attempt to walk up the peak unless you are confident navigating in the mountains. The round trip to the summit and back from where I left Lillian took me 40 minutes but I was moving quickly.
The view from the top of Mt Tongariro. As I approached the summit, Mt Ruapehu came into view from behind Mt Ngauruhoe.
We re-joined the main trail and soon reached the highest point, which gives a view into the Red Crater. This photo does not do justice to the redness of the rock and earth.
When we walked the Crossing in 2008, a gap in the cloud opened just as we were about to descend to the Emerald Lakes. This photo is replica of one we took on that earlier trip, with the main difference being that in 2008 Lillian was wearing her waterproof shell. This time it was hot, so hot that we had to ration our water (we had brought 1.5 litres each which was not enough).
The descent from the Red Crater to the Emerald Lakes is a steep path covered with gravel and stones. A few of the walkers were struggling on the loose surface. It wasn’t a problem but when the trail is busy I imagine this could be a bit of choke point!
There are three Emerald Lakes with a small trail around the lowest of them which is a pleasant diversion.
From the next section of trail, above the Blue Lake, there is a great view of a (relatively) recent lava flow from the Red Crater. To be specific it is an 1800 year old black basaltic-andesite flow; for more information on the geology that you’ll come across on the Crossing see this post.
After the Blue Lake, the trail goes down… and down… and down. Since our 2008 visit it has been reinforced so it much easier underfoot. I guess it must have been tougher 14 years ago, but nevertheless the descent completely destroyed our legs with Lillian still hobbling around three days later.
My feet were feeling sore on the descent so I persuaded Lillian to stop for a foot soak in one of the streams we crossed. The water was grey and warm but still felt soothing… I think it was the outflow from the Ketetahi Hot Springs.
We also noticed that the trail down took a different route from 14 years ago, with I think a new trail below the Keretahi Shelter. This would make sense as the previous Keretahi hut was destroyed in a 2012 eruption of Mt Tongariro. Yes, 2012, five years after we first walked over the Crossing! An impressive video of that eruption is here. Towards the end of the descent, the laher flow (see above) that resulted from that eruption means that the stream is now flowing along what appears to be a new river-bed. At one point the stream splits into two which I’ve never see in a mature stream system.
Once we reached the official end of the trail, we still had a 1km trudge down the gravel road back to the parking area, hugging the edge where there was some shade from the forest. We had been dreaming of the two cans of Diet Coke and bottle of warm water that were in the back of our car. When we finally got there, the luke-warm Coke was delicious!
Strava Stats
Total Distance : 25.6km
Total Ascent: 999m
Cumulative Walking Time (not including stops) at key points: South Crater (1 hour 35 mins), turn off for Mt Tongariro just before the Red Crater (2 hours 15 minutes), return to trail after climbing Mt Tongariro ( 3 hours 10 minutes), start of the descent just after the Blue Lake (4 hours), end of trail (6 hours 15 minutes), shuttle carpark (6 hours 25 minutes).
Mark P
Looks beautiful! We’ve never been to NZ but know so many people there! One day?
Mark
You should come for a holiday once travel opens up. You and Sally would love it.