Day 159 Wanganui, Wanganui River Road, Ohakune

Our destination is the town of Ohakune and the gateway to the Tongariro Park.  It was a nice day, cool, but quickly getting warmer and very clear.  A great day for sightseeing and picture taking.   Our first stop was the I Site as we wanted to inquire about the highway and the touristy things we had to see.  They suggested that we detour off the main highway and take the “Wanganui River Road”.  It is a secondary highway with some gravel but a much more picturesque drive.    They also suggested  we drive  to see the  memorial on the other side of the river.  Along with the memorial is an elevator which goes 213 meters below ground and meets up with a tunnel that is 65 meters in length.  The tunnel  goes to the bridge that crosses the Wanganui River.  The elevator and tunnel were built in the early 1900’s to assist in developing the east side of the river. 

We left the memorial and started following the river north which had us passing by the campsite we stayed at last night.  We got a view of it from across the river.

The drive today had us following the Wanganui River for 64 miles from Wanganui to Pipiriki before turning east towards Ohakune.  With a length of 290 km, the Wanganui is the country's third longest river.  Much of the land to either side of the river’s upper reaches is part of the Wanganui National Park, though the river itself is not part of the park.

One of the areas mentioned in the guide books was the Oyster Cliffs.  Around 2.5 million years ago, this area was a gigantic sea bed.  During this time the oysters seem to have grown on top of each other or on dead shells.  The result can be seen buried into the walls of the cliff.  It was pretty amazing.

 

We also were privileged during our drive to see some pretty amazing scenery that didn’t involve just the river.  This made it a slow drive but fortunately the traffic was very light.  It almost seemed that we had the road to ourselves.

 

The light traffic was a very good thing as the road left a little to be desired in certain spots.  You didn’t want to be going a little too fast and meet someone coming the other way.



We reached Pipiriki in the early afternoon where the highway turned east heading to Ohakune.  A short time down the road we started to climb and when we reached the top we were greeted with a fantastic vista.  Not only did we get a phenomenal view of the valley, but also our first look at the three mountains.  Ruapehu, Ngauruhoe and Tongariro.

Mount Ruapehu



Tongariro on left, Ngauruhoe on right.



We stuck with our earlier decision to spend the night in Ohakune so when we arrived we found the holiday park and checked in.  Once we got settled we walked downtown for a look and to pick up a few things.  We learned on our short walk that Ohakune is more of a winter town and caters to and depends more on ski crowd as opposed to the summer tourist trade.  We were also able to get some closer up shots of the Ruapehu.