My last week is NZ. No mixed emotions, I am more than willing to leave NZ for good. Although I must admit that this week has been really good. I joined to the gym and during 7 days I took 2xBodyPump, 2x bodyBalance, 2x spinning, 2x BodyCombat and 1 StepAerobic classes plus on Wednesday&Thursday I was hiking with my new friends I made at the hostel. Weatherwise we were lucky. Although I waited a week for a good wearther. It was worth waiting for non cloudy day. It is not that often I am afraid.
Mt taranaki/Egmont looks majestic. It must be its classic vulcanic shape, snowcap and the fact that it is standing all alone after a battle with Tongariro mountain. There a few nice treks and they are nowhere near as touristry as Tongorito crossing. New Plymouth is a bit off the most beaten path although Taranaki is popular and famous it is no such a tourist city like Taupo. Perhaps that's why I've liked it here.
We learnt that summer is about a month late. No way to climb to up the summit, ice is too thick and hard. If I was back in February, I could that... Anyway, we chose alternative trek instead. A full day hiking on Wednesday, spent over a night in a hut and on Thursday climbed up to smaller mountain summit and then went down again, piece of cake. Thursday was fabulous, no cloud in the sky, chilly winds eased, enjoy the scenery and outdoors excercise. Life is good. Even better we managed to capture the famous mirror imagine of Mt Taranaki, probably one of the most famous picture of NZ. We failed the first time when we walked to the lakes on Wednesday night. Too windy, tiny lakes (I would call them ponds were all rippled) No worries as we were staying over night a hut, we got a new chance, the sunrise. We got up 5:30am walked 20 min from the hut to the lakes and WOW, the most beautiful sunrise I've ever seen and the surface of the lake was still and reflecting his Msjesty Taranaki almost perfectly.
I liked staying overnight in the hut as well, something different. There were 3(1 Finnish, I American, 1 German) in our party plus 5 other Germans. But this time I didn't mind. As we had pretty short hiking on Thursday, we didn't rent a gas cooker or stove. You can survive one day without a hot meal, can't you. Yes you can but my concern was that can a coffee addict survive without a morning coffee? Well I guess if she has to but much better for everybody if she doesn't have to.
I am not as addicted to coffee as I used to be but still. As I had had no coffee in the Wednesday afternoon either, that was ok but in the morning, I started to feel mild caffeine withdrawals, After the sunrise, we took a nap and when we got up a young German couple and 2 middle age German ladies were gone. I was delighted to discover that the gas stove was still there. A young German bloke was in no rush to start hiking back to the circuit and he had slept in. Yes, he liked coffee and he was willing ti let me to use his stove to boil some water for coffee. Luckily I had enough coffee for him as well. Trading worked out. I didn't bring a plunger and fresh coffee for nothing. The weather and gas stove made my day.
