I can’t remember how long of a drive it was to Egmont National Park, but we got to the visitor center well after dark. The 2518-metre-high mountain Mt. Taranaki, also known as Mt. Egmont, is one of the most symmetrical volcanic cones in the world. It is also the main reason people come to this park. Some of you may recognize this peak, as its close resemblance to Mount Fiji was depicted in the movie The Last Samurai.

Waking up the next morning, I had an idea of where I wanted to shoot from, but had no idea of how to get there. Once the visitor centre opened up I asked around and looked into some brochures on where I could find the reflecting tarns that I had seen in so many photographs. As it turns out, the hike to the tarns was longer from the visitor center then it was if you were to drive around to the north end of the park, so we decided to go from there.

Along the drive, I spotted this view of the mountain from a farmers field and decided to pull over and set up for a shot here. I was told that very rarely do you get a chance to see the peak of Mt. Taranaki, so I wasn’t going to miss this opportunity. I took three photos @ -1, 0, and +1 EV to get the exposures I wanted. Instead of using Photomatix for this one, I layered the images in Photoshop and hand blended the exposures for the image you see here.

For the record, Anna and I did end up doing the hike to the tarns for sunset and were sorely disappointed when the whole mountain was wrapped in cloud cover. I sure was glad that I pulled over for those 5 minutes and took this shot.

“Mt. Taranaki”, Taranaki Region, New Zealand.