Days 7-8: Ohakune, Whanganui & the Road to Wellington

Amelia Mazloom

May 7

5 min read

The Skinny if you're just here for the highlights: After finally admitting defeat on the Tongariro Crossing thanks to weather and questionable forecast clarity, we pivoted south toward Wellington. Along the way we squeezed in a hike to an old viaduct in Ohakune, spent the night in New Zealand's lovely little artsy city, Whanganui, and broke up the drive to Wellington with beaches, cliffside hikes, suspension bridges, the 'staircase to heaven', and increasingly dramatic coastal views. We wrapped our North Island whirlwind with oysters, pasta, beers, and wandering around what might be our new favorite city-- New Zealand’s San Francisco: Wellington.

Scroll down for pictures.

More Ohakune

The next morning we woke up in Ohakune, had breakfast, used the sauna, and decided to do a 4.5 mile out and back hike near town while we waited for a weather update. Old Coach Road trek is part of a much larger point to point hike, but you can also start just outside of town to hike to a neat viaduct and then turn around. We had views of more lush forests and picturesque rolling hills that looked like a green screen.

Plan B

Back in town, it was time to make a final decision on the crossing. It was honestly pretty difficult to get a straight answer on the weather. Both the national park visitor centers in Tongariro and in Ohakune had no clue what was going on, and we called around to several carpark/ shuttle companies-- they couldn't seem to give us a straight answer either. But as we were pretty far from home and not equipped with all the proper gear, we chose to err on the side of caution, finally bail on the crossing, and pivot to plan B, which was beginning the longer journey south to Wellington.

Another potential alternative plan: Waikanae and Kapiti Island

If we hadn't wanted to wait out the weather one more night in Ohakune, we would have driven to Waikanae, which was 3.5 hours from Tongariro, but just under and hour north of Wellington, on the coast. From here, there is a short ferry available to Kapiti Island-- a supposed birdwatcher's paradise as they got rid of all predators on the island. More interestingly, there is a lot of great hiking. The ferry leaves you there for 5 hours, but after seeing the island on our way to Wellington, we thought we would easily have been able to spend that time hiking around.

Whanganui

Having not left Ohakune until after 4 pm, it made more sense to drive the shorter 1.5 hours to Whanganui for the night. Whanganui is the most artsy city of New Zealand. Unfortunately we did not have the time to explore much of this scene, but they boast loads of museums, cool shops, galleries, it felt like how I would picture Amsterdam... though I have never been there and hardly spent any time in Wanganui.

The main part of town is set back from the ocean and is near but not right on the river. There were loads of cute bookstores and cafes. We had an amazing dinner at Frank Bar & Eatery, and we stayed at the Smith House-- a lovely little with the cleanest, crispest sheets. The Inn is run by a cool guy named Rory whose kids actually grew up in Salt Lake.

Road to Wellington!

With a 2.5 hour drive and three planned stops between us and Wellington, we woke up, had a quick breakfast at Mischief Cafe and headed south. After knocking out about 2 hours of the drive, we arrived at our first pitstop:

Pitstop # 1: Queen Elizabeth Park, Waikanae.

This was a pretty basic beach & walking trails carpark, but it was a good place to stretch our legs. We went for a mile walk on the very expansive beach where we had great views of Kapiti Island

Pitstop # 2: Escarpment Track

About 20 mins down the road we arrived at the traditional end point of the Escarpment Track through hike. You can start on either end, though it seems most people start in Paekakariki and end in Pukerua. There is a train that runs between the two and has stops right near each trailhead so it would be really easy to park your car and do the whole point to point trek, which is about 11.6 miles and 2,385 vertical feet, but with our time constraint we parked at the Pukerua trail head, hiked the last two miles, and turned around. This was an incredible stretch. It covered both of the track's suspension bridges, climbed loads of wooden steps with spectacular views (giving it its nickname 'stairway to heaven') and had plenty of benches for a quick break or snack. It would be really great to do the whole track, but with limited time, the last two miles were the best bit.

Pitstop 3: Whitireia Park

Another 20 minutes down the road, we pulled into the local park of this really neat Wellington suburb. After the escarpment track, it was hard to be impressed, but this was barely out of the way and afforded us another short walk with cool views of Mana Island and, surprisingly, the South Island as well.

25 minutes later, we pulled into Wellington.

Wellington

As we were driving in, I immediately got the sense that this was, in the best way, New Zealand's San Francisco. We checked into the Ibis Hotel (which has limited parking and requires a phone ahead to reserve a spot, so we managed to get street parking for the night nearby). The Ibis was in a perfect location right by the harbor. Wellington is super walkable, which we took full advantage of. We walked all over-- along the harbor (where we spotted a climbing gym that also rents kayaks), past the library, and up to the Beehive (parliamentary building). We thought the parliamentary building and library next to the hive were gorgeous, but relatively humble, in a really lovely, practical way that in my opinion speaks to the orienting values of the country. We popped into The Old Bailey bar (shoutout Steve and Piper) which has been around since 1875 for a couple of beers before walking back to the harbor for an dinner at Shed 5. I can not wait to recreate this prawn and guanciale carbonara dish we had. We also finally got our hands on some oysters! On the walk back to our hotel, we took a detour and stumbled upon some (not too good) fire dancers practicing in a small amphitheater.