The day began with a rude awakening, the sirens from our phone alarms blared at 500am. We resurrected ourselves out of the warmth of our sleeping bags to pack up the campsite in the chilled morning air coming off of lake Rotorua, and on our way out, we took advantage of the shared kitchen prep areas where there were stoves and made coffee and breakfast.
// Morning coffee at the holiday park
Shortly thereafter we found ourselves sipping filtered American coffee for the first time in six days since arriving to New Zealand; we were at McDonald's. Our prime (and only) purpose for venturing into this pastel scented place was to access wifi, which we found, to our dismay, to be available only up to 100mb. As you can imagine, our McDonalds stay spanned a duration of checking a few emails and loading a handful of photos to the blog — limited wifi and cell reception has been the backdrop of our digital struggle. — New Zealand, being this far south of the equator, has been progressively trying to revive itself from the humble days of farming with radio towers to farming with bandwidth services. Thus, beware, a road trip with consistent and good access will be highly unlikely.
// A short stop to pick up the fallen hubcap
Resuming our road trip, we set our google maps to Te Urewera National Park. The drive was on a paved undulating road for about 2 hours; however, upon entering the park the road narrowed, the surface became gravel, and the undulation increased by orders of magnitude. Though we meandered for 3.5 hours, the distance traveled was short. The road conditions restricted our average speed to 25kph and our Toyato Yaris revolted by loosing the wheel caps. We managed to retrieve one of the two that came off and decided that it's best to continue the drive without any wheel caps at all.
// Short rest stop at a freedom camping campsite
Te Urewera National Park is very remote and roads and services are kept to an absolute minimum due to conservation. While limited services and gravel road conditions are very strenuous, the scenic views compensate. The park has continuous panoramas at every turn filtered by rays of sunlight through the dense vegetation. The drive was ultimately extended for breaks taken to commemorating the spectacular views and memorializing them with our cameras.
// A grazing pasture
// A grazing pasture
// More views from the road
// Water fall from are rest stop
// Resting before before pick up for trail head
We arrived at last. A log built structure housing an old fashioned cashier station and a pub with a few beers on tap, nestled in a valley with an adjacent pond. This was the Big Bush Taxi Service, they provided us with ground and water transportation to and from the trail.
An hour later, our camping packs are fully equipped, our lunch and coffee successfully consumed, and we were off to the trial head. Our first day of a three day hike; we will clime 400 meters over 9 kilometers and finalize the day at the Pankieri hut.
// Feeling very abmitious at the trail head
The trail head was 4 kilometers away from the Big Bush Taxi Services Station, Jerry drove us to the trail head with his old 4 wheel drive SUV.
// First open vista of the Lake from the trail
// Our last ascent
Signs of the hike's end were beginning to appear; steps for the difficult ascents and trail markers pointed the way towards the hut and our first prominent lookout point, Bald Knob.
// View of the lake below from Bald Knob
Bald Knob was a detour from our trail, but the short extension was worth while. The panoramic views of the lake and surrounding mountains were awe-inspiring.
// From left to right: Mike, Claudie, Andrew, me, Lauren, Sabstien, and Aliason
After 3.5 hours of hiking with our 13 kilo packs we arrived at the Panakieri Hut. It was a really nice hut with a wood burning stove and kitchen prep counters. Fresh water is available through a rainwater catchment system, so we had to employ our 1 micron filter system to bring the water to potable standards. Rainwater is generally clean, but we took extra steps to make sure that it's clear of any debris possibly collected from the roof — if you don't have a water filtration system, just boil the water for two minutes and it'll eliminate your worries. A couple of hours have passed and we were eating our flavorful dehydrated meals with three Kiwi and two German hikers. The night came to a close at sunset over the lake and behind the mountains; the depth of the intertwined layers of clouds, sunlight, mountain range, and water were ineffable. And with that view in mind, we rested on our bunks for the night. The next post will follow the second day of the hike and our trek down the mountains.
// Sunset from the top of the trail