The Next Great Peak

Reflecting on Taranaki The mountain also known as Egmont looms over the North Island

THE NEXT GREAT

PEAK

New Zealand is famed for its ‘Great Walks’ – with all the epic scenery of its rivals, and none of the crowds, expect the Pouakai Crossing to arrive on that list soon

WORDS BY SARA-JANE STILLWELL

One thousand meters up the mountain, at the very start of the trail, my guide Jeremy indicated for me to pause. He began to speak a blessing in Maori. The very sound of this unfamiliar, musical tongue made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

It was my official induction to the Pouakai Crossing. Located on the western side of New Zealand’s North Island, it’s an 11.8-mile circuit traversing ridges, wetlands and forests, and skirting the precipitous twin peaks of a volcano, Mount Taranaki. Sometimes seen smeared in snow, Taranaki is so sacred to the Maori, they prefer that you don’t stand on its summit.

Egmont National Park, which contains Mount Taranaki and the Pouakai Crossing, is situated close to the town of New Plymouth. I’d already spent a couple of days exploring the area, which offers a lot more besides its headline hike. As well

as being a popular surf spot among locals, you can stroll along the town’s coastal boardwalk with its public art (don’t miss the ‘Wind Wand’ by New Zealand movement artist Len Lye), explore its boutiques and art galleries, or even sample the local speciality, botanical gin.

NATURAL DRAMA

In terms of scenic spectacle, the walk is being pitched as the rival to the North Island’s better-known Tongariro Alpine Crossing, an eight-to-nine-hour hike across a blasted volcanic landscape that takes you right into the shadow of Mount Ngauruhoe (it famously served as a double for Mount Doom in Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy). The Tongariro Alpine Crossing is often hailed as ‘the world’s best day hike’. How would the Pouakai fare?

As we started walking, Jeremy recounted the complex story of the terrain I was treading (never try telling a Maori that Taranaki is ‘just a mountain’). No, Maori creation-myth transforms New Zealand’s volcanic geography into the stuff of epic, almost Wagnerian melodrama.

“It all began with a love triangle,” explained Jeremy. “Mount Taranaki got into a fight with Mount Tongariro and ended up retreating with his tail between his legs. It was all over a girl – the feminine Mount Pihanga.

“But it ended well: Taranaki, withdrawing towards the Tasman Sea, came across the Pouakai mountain range and promptly fell in love with her instead.” And they all lived happily ever after – mostly. Captain Cook turned up in 1770 and renamed the area Mount Egmont, but in 1985 Maori locals successfully campaigned for the original name to be restored to their mountain.

SETTING OUT

The first hour and a half of the walk was spent climbing up a well-formed track through lush montane forest. We passed under endemic rimu and rata trees – some only saplings, some towering above us. I admired tightly curled fern fronds – called koru by the Maori, for whom they’re a powerful symbol of new life – and couldn’t help gasping every now and again when, through a gap in the trees, I got

North Island or Middle Earth? Taranaki’s rugged White Cliffs Beach at low tide; (right) the Goblin Forest

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NEW ZEALAND

a sudden glimpse of the national park spreading out below us.

Before long, the scenery began to change and we emerged from the forest into an area of subalpine scrub. The views up here were impressive, whether I looked down the forest slopes,or upwards to the near-symmetrical cone of the sleeping stratovolcano. The day was so clear, I could see all the way to the summits of Tongariro National Park. The vegetation was only knee-height, and speckled with buttercup-like plants.

The track leveled off as we made our way around the curve of the cone. Jeremy pointed out the Kokowai Stream running below us, its water reddened by manganese oxide flowing from the surrounding earth. We walked under huge, organ-pipe-like columns of solidified lava known as the

‘MY GUIDE PICKED THE LEAVES OF A PLANT CALLED HOROPITO (MOUNTAIN PEPPER TREE) – THE MAORI USE THEM TO ADD PIQUANCY TO THEIR COOKING’

Dieffenbach Cliffs and crossed the Boomerang Slip – appropriately named due to its peculiar shape when viewed from the air.

We continued towards our lunch stop at

Holly Hut, one of several basic refuges dotted along thetrack–huts provide a sheltered space to rest as well as fresh drinking water. We passed through paths lined with a shrub called tutu (coriaria), its leaves resembling laurels. But it’s more dangerous than it looks: the sap contains a neurotoxin, tutin, which is responsible for the largest percentage of livestock poisoning in New Zealand. Luckily, we weren’t planning on eating any, so passed through unscathed.

We soon rounded the cone onto the northern side of the mountain, and

came across a section of washed-away earth which showed the mille-feuille-like layers of ash, lava and stone laid down by the volcano during previous eruptions. Just below us, a forest of skeletal pahautea (mountain cedar) stretched grey fingers of dead branches out eerily above the surrounding green scrub – Jeremy explained that it was likely a victim of the drying, salty sea breezes blowing in from the nearby Tasman Sea.

He also picked the leaves of a plant called horopito (mountain pepper tree) and gave me them to chew. They left a chilli-like heat on my tongue, so it was no surprise when Jeremy revealed that the Maori use them to add piquancy to their cooking.

Beyond the emaciated, bleached-looking pahautea, we had our first glimpse of the Ahukawakawa Swamp, a notorious section of the trail. From up here, the swamp looked more like a grazed paddock, not a fertile wetland.

Jeremy took me along a side path for a well-earned packed lunch, where we met some other ‘trampers’ (hikers in New Zealand English). “It’s busy,” said Jeremy,

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Crossing into a new world Mount Taranaki framed with Te Rewa Rewa Bridge; (right) the trail through Pouakai Crossing’s swampland

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