Category: New Zealand

Wide view of the cloud swept landscape of the Tongariro Crossing

New Zealand: Two Islands, Two Walks. # 2, The Tongariro Northern Circuit

Our Wanderlust 6 Comments

The four-day Tongariro Northern Circuit winds its way around the sacred mountains of Tongariro National Park; Ngauruhoe, Ruapehu and Tongariro. The stunningly beautiful volcanic landscape holds a profound cultural and spiritual significance for the Māori Ngāti Tūwharetoa iwi. In 1886, the iwi gifted them to the New Zealand people as the country’s first national park. In 1993 Tongariro National Park became the first site in the world to be inscribed on the world heritage list for both its natural and cultural landscapes.
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New Zealand: Two Islands, Two Walks. # 1, The Heaphy Track

Our Wanderlust 2 Comments

Aotearoa, New Zealand, the land of the long white cloud. We fly in over the rugged snow-capped southern alps to breathtaking glimpses of Mt Aspiring, Lake Tekapo, ice-blue ribbons of water and the grey scoured ghosts of long receded glaciers. A dramatically beautiful landscape. Then the wild country vanishes and in its place are the neat, green fields and hedgerows of the Canterbury Plains. We’ve come to tramp two of New Zealand’s ‘great’ walks; the five-day Heaphy Track in the north-west of the South Island and the four-day Tongariro Northern Circuit in the centre of the North Island.  
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