Pete and Papa Smurf in the Mangawhero River, on the hunt for Bergersen’s Hut/ Photo: Hazel Phillips

Secret huts on Ruapehu’s southern slopes

May 2025

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May 2025

Two men built huts on Ruapehu to avoid conscription during World War Two. Could their huts be found, nearly 80 years later, near a tangled and trickling mountain stream?

Norwegian Les Bergersen was many things – a shearer and a wrestler, to name two – but most of all, he was a talented carpenter. Les used a broadaxe to craft a hut near Mangawhero River on the southern slopes of Ruapehu. Made from cleanly hewn kaikawaka, the hut was capped with a corrugated-iron roof […]
May 2025

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May 2025

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