lies. it's all lies.

bethany does not travel. if i could muster the motivation, i'd change the name. or better yet, maybe i should just abandon the whole idea of a "travel blog". in the meantime, more dribble (ie an update):

so you know how i finished up the hut warden gig last monday? and you know how i'm totally prone to spur-of-the-moment decisions that make sense to no one but me? yeah, well... i'm still in tongariro.

one of the new volunteers quit 2 days into training... so i debated staying or going to travel the south island. and i made up my mind about 5 times and each time it was the same decision - to go. so i got out on monday and i had all my stuff packed last week; i just had to clean up and then i even had a ride all the way to wellington in the afternoon... and then half an hour later i was walking back to the doc office to tell jimmy that i changed my mind. so i'm here until the end of april... i just really like it. and i'm sure that traveling would have been good, too. but a different good. so i'm not really "traveling nz" as much as "living in nz"... definitely want to see the south island, but will just have to score another sweet hut wardening gig down there somewhere and come back... :)

another little story: so i got out of the mountains again on friday afternoon... realized while in the hut this week that my visa expires next sunday, so i have until this friday to get it renewed. right. a whole week. except that i now work monday-friday, away from all communication devices. anyway, so i got home 2ish and the immigration office closes at 330p. the immigration office that needed to explain to me how to renew my visa. right. but there were visitors at our house, so i had some lunch and a beer with them. and then i was politely reminded that i smelled... so i took my weekly shower... and then it was 305p. and i was a 10 min walk from the nearest phone. but jen has a bike. so we decided that we would take the bike. right. two grown people, one bike. she's pedalling, i'm riding on the crossbar... we make it all the way down the drive (it's a LONG drive) and out to the street before she has to turn and i start to lose my balance... and my foot gets sucked into the front tire. an excellent makeshift brake, but i can't recommend it, really. because it's very difficult to remove. so we hopped out of the road, over to the edge, and after a good few minutes, managed to disconnect me from the bike. and remove the pieces of shredded green croc as well - very sad about the crocs. and then had the brilliant idea that i could just ride the bike and she could walk! bad news: it's 24 hrs later and i have one round-ish purply colored foot. good news: no medic until monday, so i have another 36 hrs to believe that it will just magically get better. sidenote: managed to talk to immigration before they closed and it looks like i'll be spared deportation.

oturere photos (10 - 15 march)

view from rotopaunga

ngaurahoe glowing in the early morning light

fun with self-timer and a little poi practice

view from the summit of ngaurahoe

my LAST week as a hut warden!

...and i started it sounding like an old farmer - i just kept starting conversations about how fast my time here went and how i was really hoping for good weather.

but karma shut me up pretty quickly... because it was an almost perfect week! i was at oturere, which may be my favorite hut in the park... and the weather was nearly ideal... and i had great people in the hut every night... and i'm completely knackered from a long week of off-track adventures... which made the week fly by way too fast, of course, but... i'll take it.

i FINALLY conquered ngaurahoe! jen and i met up for the mission on saturday... there were some clouds about but we were optimistic so headed up. the summit was socked in, though, so we saw almost nothing but the crater. so... i made a return trip on tuesday. took an alternate, um... more adventurous route. saw everything that i missed on the first trip... which also happens to be everything that i love about the park and everything that i'll miss when i leave. sat on the summit, looking out in every direction, over all the valleys and lakes and ridges and craters that make up this place... and ended up just sort of mentally replaying the last two months of exploring each of those places. i had no intention of a "goodbye climb" but it sort of ended up that way... it's really hard to say goodbye, but i can't imagine a better place from which to do it.

photos from mangatepopo (3-8 march)

friday: rainy, but rainbows in the valley
saturday: snow! red crater with a dusting
and south crater and ngaurahoe with the white

and the rest of the week: quality time reading and writing in the wardens quarters

how do these things happen??

friday... said goodbye to cameron, the first of this hut warden crew to retire... i hate how many goodbyes you have to say when you're travelling, but cam's from BC so i feel like it wouldn't be outrageous to expect that we might run into each other again... got back into the mountains early afternoon after a hectic couple of days off and just chilled with the hutties that rolled in.

saturday... skies looked pretty promising when i woke up, so i decided it would be a good day to head for the tops... set about getting ready as quickly as possible and it started snowing about 10 min later. yes, snowing. but fresh snow on the craters, etc looked really cool so i grabbed my camera and set out. wasn't sure how far i'd make it because it was still snowing and blowing pretty hard but there were also gaps between the clouds racing by with these great views... so i climbed up to south crater, and then up to the tongariro junction, and then up to the top of red crater... the wind was really picking up, so i decided to turn back from there, after i got just a few more photos... and then bam! the clouds closed in and i was hunkering down next to the ground and a million tiny chunks of ice were stinging my face... there was no way i could walk back along the ridge so i tried a bear crawl on hands and feet... then i was on hands and knees... and for a bit i was army-crawling on my elbows... the wind was so strong! so i headed down and it didn't take 10 minutes until i started running into daywalkers heading up, some well-equipped and some in jeans and runners... crazy fools. so i was heading back to the hut... talking to people about the conditions... about halfway back to the hut i suddenly stop in my tracks. maybe 20 feet in front of me, just down the track... i know those faces... "declan hanley! and donal! what the hell are you doing here?"

it took a minute to compute, but it was two lads that i worked with in dublin. but i left there over a year and a half ago, and i haven't kept in touch with any workmates... unbelievable. and not just two guys from the office... i probably worked with declan more than anyone else that year, and donal sat right behind me... but there they were. in new zealand. on the tongariro crossing. in shorts and runners... we had a quick chat... mostly comprised of alternating "i can't believe this" and speechless head shaking... but we were all freezing so we agreed to meet up later. their shuttle had been cancelled because of the weather, but they had seen the carpark sign driving up the road and decided to check it out... and then just kept walking... so had no transport at the other end... so i took their keys and one of their mobiles and walked back. they rang when they got near the other end, i walked out to the carpark and drove around and picked them up from the other end, and we headed into the village to catch up over a beer and a burger.

they both quit mercer as well, to go travelling... but then got an email while in vietnam about some contract work for mercer in auckland... so have been living the life for the past couple months... a sweet corporate apartment, working for hourly contractors wages, converting schemes to mercer's valuation software... anyway...

so we have a burger, and a couple of beers... i take evening radio call from the parking lot so i have the weather report, etc when i get back to the hut... but then they're meeting up with the other 8 who also drove down and had their shuttle cancelled, but actually took the advice and didn't do it... so they go gloat to the rest of the crew and we have a few more beers... anyway, long story short they finally kick us out about 1a so they can close... and no one is going to drive me back at this point, so i can stumble back to the hut in the middle of the night... so i crash with the lads and set my alarm to get up early and greet my hutties first thing in the morning. in the morning, all is going well, i'm out the door in plenty of time, driving myself to the park. will sort out the hut then come back for the lads at a more reasonable hour... i get around the parking lot, up a little rise... and the car sputters and then dies. and won't start again. donal gives it a shot... we try push-starting it. dead. so i end up just going back to bed and donal gets the car started a couple hours later (diagnosis: flooded) and i finally make it back to the hut about 11a on sunday.

seriously, though, how many dimensions of fate have to align for that to happen??

not surprisingly, the rest of my week in the park was pretty uneventful. the rain stopped for a few hours on monday afternoon but otherwise it was about 3 days spent holed up in the wardens quarters, reading, napping, etc...

more photos...

red crater, with ngaurahoe behind and ruapehu in the back
sunset from mangatepopo

mara and jen on the rim of red crater

waihohonu, take 2 (feb 24 - mar 1)

i'm back to waihohonu? that can't be possible! you see... there are 4 huts and i work 8 shifts, which means if it's not my first time to a hut, it's my last... which means that i'm more than halfway through my time in the park!

this was a much more mellow week in the park than the past few (see last post re: ankle) but... a bad week in the mountains is better than a good week... well, most other places, and i wouldn't call this a bad week. it just included more stream swimming and spoon carving and hut baking and less peak climbing and ridge exploring.

mara and jen and i have gotten together for sunday lunch the last couple weeks, which is great fun. and unbelievably good food. especially when you consider we didn't plan anything, just showed up and threw together whatever we had for food... the first week we had brie and crackers, fresh vegetable soup with warm scones (from scratch!!), and cheesecake. with chocolate shavings and kiwifruit. so good. this week, the menu included sushi and fresh homemade cookies and peanut butter/banana/carrot cake. yummy! and so much fun to eat on the picnic tables in the sun, while all the hikers stopping by for lunch eat dried fruit and nuts...

other major disappointment of the week was the complete lack of production from my possum traps. waihohonu is the only hut where we trap for possums, and i set the traps nearly every night while i was there... and i didn't get a single possum! so i've still never seen a possum (apart from the glowing eyes at night) and i was completely robbed of the hut warden experience of digging a possum grave! most unfair.

ruapehu photos

RTM, part one

I decided to spend my days off this week in the park, walking the other major track in the park, the round the mountain track. It is a little longer, more rugged, and less traveled than the northern circuit (along which the huts we staff are located) so looked like a good adventure. Most people take 4-5 days to complete the track, but after some map research I decided I could do it in 2. Long days, but totally doable.

So on Wednesday morning, I met Jimmy to hand in my radio, money, etc and let him know my plan. He was very skeptical, though, and managed to convince me that I was underestimating the track. So I accepted his offer of a ride to a trailhead about halfway around later that afternoon. I had 2 hours in Turangi, during which time I managed to shower, do laundry (line-dried even), visit the library, do all my grocery shopping for the following week, and pack everything for my 2-day hike as well as my next 5-day shift. Whew! I guess I did learn something on the PCT last summer...

Less than 30 min from the carpark, I was cruising along the trail when I suddenly found myself on all fours on the ground. There was a loud crunching noise, a sharp pain in my left ankle, and me shouting some choice words. I shortly determined that the crunching was the rocks underfoot not any bones, so picked myself up and carried on with a more careful stride. It was still sore in the evening, but didn't look swollen or anything so I figured it would be fine in a day. That was before I stepped off it another, oh, maybe 5 times the following day. So by the time I got to waihohonu on thursday afternoon, it was about twice the size of my right and had developed a nice purple shadow... although it's hard to distinguish bruising from dirt, quite frankly.

Anyway, the track was great and Jimmy was wrong. I ended up hardly hiking at all on Wednesday and still finished by 430p on Thursday. But it was a great track - started out in a forest, then spent lots of time in really barren rocky terrain. The weather left a little to be desired - clouds blocked my views, the wind quite literally blew me off my feet a few times and made a few of the swing bridges a big more adventurous than intended, and I was wet for more than half of the day thursday... but I didn't get swept away by a lahar (volcanic mudslide) and i got to see another side of the park.

mangatepopo: feb 17 - 22

i'm sure this is getting boring, but i had another FANTASTIC week. the best yet, hands down. in short, i can summarize to two reasons: the people i meet and the exploring i get to do...

exhibit 1: people
1a: saturday evening, i was rushing back to the hut for evening radio call after a long day out when i spotted a guy heading up the trail (towards the mountains and the top of the crossing) with only a daypack. so i stopped him to find out what his plans were and make sure he wasn't a walking disaster. quite the opposite, he was just out to enjoy the last couple hours of daylight. we chatted for a bit and i left him to it. a few hours later, just as the sun was setting, i heard someone on the front porch of the hut and poked my head out of the quarters. "hey. just who i was looking for... when do you leave nz?" "umm... the end of april" "from auckland?" "yeah..." "just what i thought" and then he proceeded to give me his contact details and insist that i get in touch with him so that i could stay at his home in auckland and he would give me a ride to the airport in the morning. so this guy just walked off the main track to the hut to find me, who he had met for no more than 10 min., and would now be walking back to his car in the dark. unbelievable.
1b: i climbed up the backside of the south crater rim and popped over onto the summit of tongariro, where i found one other person, a very friendly, spunky older woman. i took a summit photo for her and had a polite little chat... i was in a hurry but she was heading down as well so we set off on the track together, still chatting... about halfway down i learned that she has thru-hiked the appalachian trail (92) and the pacific crest trail (96), and she is nearly done with a section hike of the continental divide trail! we had LOADS to talk about but not nearly enough distance until we reached the junction and needed to proceed in opposite directions. so i said goodbye with a "see you on the trail in montana, curly!"

exhibit 2: exploring
4 days of off-track exploring - climbing peaks, walking along ridgetops, following river valleys... 2 mountain summits (including mt ruapehu, the highest peak on the north island), the bottom of a dormant volcanic crater, hissing sulfur vents, the emerald lakes, a shower in a waterfall...

i could ramble forever about all the details... but it wouldn't mean much. suffice it to say that i saw something new every day, found my own way off the paths and away from anyone else, and returned to the hut beat every night. where i visited with great people, watched the sun set, and crashed so i could do it all over again the next day...