Over yet another saddle, and I got my first glimpse of Mt Taranaki, with its distinctive cone. Reminds you of another mountain, a famous one in Japan perhaps? Well you’re not the only one as the producers of The Last Samurai thought exactly the same thing and hence shot most of that distinctly Japanese film in the Taranaki region. I stopped for a late lunch at a hilltop cafe not far from this point, where Mr Cruise and family apparently helicoptered in for afternoon tea one day. Such Hollywood excess.