We are up early, 7am, and instead of our usual routine of having breakfast in bed and then getting on the move, we are on the road quick smart – the place we are going to has very limited parking space and we’re not exactly in a mini! This is Tongariro National Park. There are three mountains here: Tongariro, Ngauruhoe & Ruapehu. The whole area is still volcanically active and highly monitored. We have decided not to undertake the Tongariro Crossing – claimed to be New Zealand’s best day walk, mostly because there can be anywhere between 500-2000 people a day and we are here to wander quietly. So our first walk of the day is a 2hr tramp to Taranaki Falls which passes through tussock, alpine shrublands, and beech forest. This landscape is vast and makes you feel small. You are watched over by Tongariro, Ngauruhoe & Ruapehu as you tramp up and down, across streams before arriving at the falls which tumble over an ancient lava flow formed by the Ruapehu eruption of 15,000 years ago. It is another OMG moment. Just beautiful to watch the water crashing down into what looks like a very inviting pool. There is a bench here and we decide to have a water stop & just sit, watch, be in the moment and have a banana! We get chatting to some other trampers and our 2hr walk becomes three!

Our next stop is Mount Ruapehu to take a ride on the Sky Waka (Gondola) up the mountain. It is almost the end of the season and there isn’t too much good deep snow left, but it is the start of the school holidays and it is busy! The views are lovely, the scrum of people, not so much. After coming back down, we stop briefly at Chateau Tongariro, this building was completed in 1929 and is listed by Heritage New Zealand as a Category 1 historic place. It closed permanently on 5 February 2023, largely because the building has significant seismic risks! Moving swiftly along the road, we stop for a short walk to Tawhai Falls (Gollum’s Pool). It’s a short but steep walk down to the falls but wow what a view when you reach the bottom. Large boulders need to be climbed on to get a really good view but it is well worth it! These falls drop down into a beautiful blue pool which was used in the filming of Lord of the Rings – hence the Gollum’s Pool name. I watched a clip of the scene filmed here, it looks dark and not very pleasant – a far cry from the actual views we had.