5am our alarm went off! Way too early. But we had a bus picking us up at 5.40am to take us to the mountains. Too early for breakfast, so just made sure we had enough food packed for later.

We arrived at the start of the Tongariro Alpine Crossing at about 7.30am and set off on our 8 hour hike up through the mountains! There were loads of people doing the hike. It's supposed to be rated as one of the best walks in the world.

A lot of this area was used in the Lord of the Rings films. We recognised a lot of it too. The first part was pretty easy and fairly flat and there were big boulders and rocks from the volcano dotted around - that's something I recognised from the films too. There was Mt Doom in front of us which is also from the film. It was cold and cloudy this morning, which was quite fitting for Mt Doom. It wouldn't have looked right in the sun.
To the left of Mt Doom was the Tongariro mountain summit. And behind us were some more snow-capped mountains. Fantastic scenery.

I made a quick detour to see the Soda Springs, then we set to it on the Devils Staircase. I'm sure you can imagine why. Steps all the way up that were a killer. It took a while to get up there, like an hour or maybe more, then we finally got to the flat South Crater. There was a sign there telling us what to do if we hear rumbling from the volcano...
We got a closer look at Mt Doom (the volcano) as well from there. It's optional to climb up Mt Doom, which I really wanted to do, but it adds over two hours to the walk because it's so difficult to climb up. The ground is really loose, so for every 2 steps, you go back one. We skipped that anyway and carried on up. Oh, and the volcano hasn't erupted for about 35 years I think.

The view was absolutely spectacular from there and we could finally see over the other side of the mountain range. The wind was really, really strong though. Then we started our climb up a much smaller and narrower section. It got pretty cold and windy up there. It was worth it though, as we got to the top and could see the Emerald Pools. Turquoise and bright blue pools. Also, the Red Crater is up there. The views behind us of Mt Doom were really awesome. Cloud had actually started to cover most of the top part of it too, so glad we didn't bother climbing it because we wouldn't have been able to see anything.

Then it was time to walk down the other side. That wasn't easy as the ground was really loose and we just kept getting loads of stones and dust all in our trainers. We just about made it to the bottom and found some shelter out of the wind with a nice view of the Emerald Pools. Not a bad place to have a lunch break! Stunning to see. And we had clear blue skies by that time. The sun warmed us up after the cold walk up.

We had a 30 minute lunch stop and set off again across the Central Crater. It's a vast open space at the top of the mountain. This lead to the Blue Lake. It was weird to see a beautiful blue lake at the top like that.

And then one of the best parts was the absolutely amazing views out over Lake Taupo and some smaller lakes dotted around.

From their it was a really really long walk to the car park. About 3 hours long! The path was really windy all the way down and seemed never ending. Obviously we had the amazing views though. Our feet were crippled. Then we got into the forest. It was like a never ending forest. We kept thinking we must be lost. We'd go down hill in the forest and then it would go flat, then we'd start going flipping up hill again!

Finally we made it out, 7 hours and 40 minutes later! So we finished at 3.10pm. It was a fantastic walk that was really really worth it for the incredible views, but we were shattered.

We had to wait for our transfer bus until 3.30pm - good job we didn't try hike up Mt Doom either as we wouldn't have made it back in time!
I was so tired I just couldn't keep my eyes open on the mini bus and kept feeling my head falling. In fact, at one point I head-butted Therese with my sunglasses on, not that I knew anything about it!

Within 15 minutes we arrived at our accommodation, The Park Traveller's Lodge. Lovely place. It had a a really nice feel to it and was like a ski resort wooden lodge, with a nice bar and a restaurant that smelt gorgeous. We were in a 6-bed dorm for $26 (£13) each per night and booked in for two. We're not with the Stray bus today. We made our own way here as there's no bus today and we didn't want to leave it until tomorrow as the weather isn't supposed to be as good. Glad we did because the guy at reception said the place was dead tonight due to no tour groups being in.

The best bit about this place though...the Jacuzzi!! We practically jumped straight in there. We had a glass (plastic cup) each of our £3.50 Rosé (diluted with 7UP to make it last longer!) and kicked back in the Jacuzzi. It was like heaven after all that walking. We stuck the massage setting on which was perfect for our aching joints and feet. The sun was still out too. Bliss.

We were too tired out and really couldn't cook, so got a special Stray customer meal deal - a very fancy open chicken sandwich with fries and a beer for $15 (£7.50). It was lovely as well and a good value deal really. We went a bit overboard though and shared a creme brûlée cheesecake. Wasn't very nice either. Still ate it all though, apart from a dodgy crusty end bit.

Then we kicked-back in the TV area to watch The Imaginarium Of Dr Parnassus. I laid on a huge bean bag on the floor. Very comfortable - could've gone to sleep as the film was rubbish, although Therese thought it was good.

Didn't get to sleep until nearly midnight. We were absolutely shattered! We'd been up 19 hours. At least we had the full 6-bed dorm to ourselves though as no more people checked-in, so nobody snoring or waking us up early in the morning - sweet as!!