Midnight - Moonlight - Sunrise on 'The Crossing'

Yes, long race, short sleep! Lets hope there is moonlight to light our way and sun to sunbathe in. If the weather was too bad for the night trip we would be looking at tramping somewhere on Sunday, maybe a trip around to the Ohakune side to the Cascades, Mangaturuturu Hut for lunch, Lake Surprise?

Just had a text from fruitbat and the other intrepid explorers. They got up at 1am and walked up the Mangatepopo Valley in the moonlight. Got as far as the bottom of the staircase and it was windy and the fog rolled in. They were back in bed by 4am. the weather there is apparently really grotty this morning. That was a good try, but looks like this expedition will have to wait for another moonlit morn. Next full moon is 28 Feb.

I hear applepie went up the night before. How did it go?

It was great! 3 of us were really lucky that night, it was clear all the way until sunrise! We waited for sunrise near the top of Ngauruhoe (too tired and sunrise caught us there). Then spended a great deal of time counting heads flowing up the staircase and endjoyed a cozy breakfast. After driving down from AKL straight after work, then night walk, I was really tired driving back to AKL though, lol. Really appreciated you guys' recommendation! Hope fruitbat make it again with better luck next time. So did the race during the day go well?

The race went well, bit hot but didn't rain til later in the day. Gutted that the best night for the climb was before the race. As above,5 of us decided to ignore the weather forecast, which was for cold,increasing cloud, poor visibility, and high winds. At the carpark there was a lovely full moon, which disappeared behind the only bit of black cloud in the sky never to be seen again. We got up to the Soda Springs, where funnily enough the weather was, cold, windy, cloudy with poor visibility. Went to loo there which was smell free and no queue, then returned. A long way to go for a pee at 3am! At least it wasn't raining!