This should be a familiar side for all Lord of the Rings fans. In the movie this volcanic crater was used as Mt. Doom, where the ring was forged and the only place it can be destroyed.
In real life this is Mt. Ruapehu in Tongariro National park and part of New Zealand’s best day hike called Tongariro Crossing. This was the main reason Law and I had flown back to the North Island as this hike is something you just have to do while you are in New Zealand.
And indeed the hike was fantastic. After all we had seen in the last 6 months our benchmark was pretty high, but this hike was more than worthy.
Our first mission was to climb Mt. Doom all the way to the top.
While getting up was a torture and took us 2 hours, coming down turned out to be even more difficult and dangerous with big rocks falling down all the time. We made it down with some bruises and I had half a volcano in my shoe after our descent.
But the scenery was more breath-taking (how often have I used this word in the last six months?) and after completing three quarters of the hike we were rewarded with a swim in a crystal clear crater lake (thank god you can`t smell the sulphur on pictures).
In total we walked 20km in 8 hours (usually 11 hours) and took wonderful memories with us.
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