2nd day - Mangatepopo Hut to Oturere Hut

After hiking the first section from Whakapapa Village to Mangatepopo Hut our aim today was Oturere Hut. On the way there we planned to climb Mt. Ngauruhoe. It would be a long day...

The visibility was pretty good in the morning. We could see all the way to Mt Taranaki (2518m).

And this was our aim, Mt. Ngauruhoe.

1100 m elevation gain from the hut, game on!

Lots of people did the Tongariro Crossing which is part of our track so it was fairly busy.

We ditched the bags and scrambled up Mt. Ngauruhoe.

Looking down into the red crater, in the back you can see Lake Taupo.

It got fairly steep and a bit exposed at some sections, not too bad so. I had a hard time to keep up with Judith and Kerstin.

Kerstin running up the hill for whatever reason.

Kerstin in front of red crater, central crater, a crater lake and Lake Taupo far in the back.

At the top we had a lunch break.

Looking down into the crater of Mt. Ngauruhoe. I think the last time it erupted was in the 90ties.

Pretty big and amazing crater, probably because it erupted kind of recently if you compare it to Baker or Rainier which are pretty boring as far as the crater goes.

We went down again to pick up the bags and continued our hike to the second hut.

Looking back into red crater and Mt. Ngauruhoe.

I like this picture, the clouds are wicked.

After a bit more hiking we got to Emerald Lakes.

Central Crater

Lots of steam and smoke coming out.

We had to descend a bit more towards the hut. It was amazing how fast the scenery and the colours changed.

Looking back at Mt. Ngauruhoe.

Finally after about nine and a half hours without a lot of breaks we got to the hut. We were pretty tired. We realized that we forgot a part of our dinner, the pasta so we had only tomato sauce. Luckily there were a bunch of other hikers who gave us food, that was great after such a hike.

next day - 3rd day

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