Ruapehu Mile Higher Club

This route will take you from Whakapapa Village to summits of Ruapehu. It is a combination of alpine valley trail, parts of Bruce Road between Whakapapa and Iwikau villages, marked trail from Iwikau to near the top of Whakapapa Skifield, and unmarked trail to the summits. The recommended route direction puts more of the road running on downhill meaning less time on the road and more time on the trails! The track entrance is opposite the Fire Station, a couple of hundred metres up the road from The Chateau. Head west on Lower Silica Rapids Track you before a large bridge crossing of Waikare Stream. Here Silica Rapids Upper Track, which you’ll be returning down much later in the day, is on your left.

Continue ahead on Whakapapiti Valley Track out onto boardwalk at the edge of a plateau from where you get the first stunning views of Ruapehu above you and continue into Whakapapaiti Valley. A continuous but gentle climb takes you up the valley, with one crossing of the Whakapapaiti Stream – this should be about knee height in summer but can be higher after rain. Eventually you will arrive at Whakapapaiti Hut, where there are basic toilet facilities – although the water here is not recommended for drinking.

Passing Whakapapaiti Hut you quickly reach the Round the Mountain Track which you will take to your left and onto a zig-zag climb to plateau where the track will then lead you to Bruce Road. Follow Bruce Road up to the ski village. There is the potential for a toilet and water stop here, if you have access to one of the Ski Lodges – a potential summer accommodation option! Continue onto the marked trails alongside the skifield pylons to just below the top gondola station, also a good place to refill water and use the facilities.

As the Ruapehu summit plateau is wide and circled with a number of summits, there are a couple of options at this point. You can continue to follow the marked trail below the gondola house to Tukino peak as per the GPX and map, this starts along the path that Ruapehu Alpine Lifts have signposted as “Sky Walk”. This is the most direct climb. An alternate route to Dome Summit starts above the gondola and is described in one of the links included. This will take you to a more central position above the summit plateau and crater lake.

Note that the final part of the GPX trace is a straight line that approximates the approach to Tukino Peak but shouldn’t be followed precisely. The trail from the upper Gondola house is initially marked with orange blazed steel poles for much of the climb. Eventually the marked trail runs out and you are following a rough trail towards the peaks you can now see above you. Leftmost and above is Te Heu Heu and to the right slightly Tukino. Take care to follow the trail outline and other’s footprints where possible. Some of our group made the mistake of approaching Te Heu Heu directly and ended up rock climbing but followed carefully the trail naturally angles across on a simple hike up to Tukino – and then you emerge on top of the world at 2700 metres!

Head back down carefully to follow the track as it’s easy to run the wrong way down a ridgeline and face a long climb back up. Other than that you are retracing your steps back down to Bruce Road.

Continue down Bruce Road until you reach the Silica Rapids track on your left, then follow that back to your starting point.