a person hiking up a mountain

We woke up at 5am to see the sunrise from Syme hut (1950m) where we spent the night. By 6 we were making our way up to Taranaki’s summit. The weather was perfect and the snow was firm, we couldn’t hope for a better day to do this. Up until half way the hike wasn’t particularly challenging but it was in the last 200m that I started to get intimidated by the hight and the icy and increasingly steep ascent, (the trick is probably not to look down). The last few meters before reaching the top are the hardest as you'd need to fully rely on your crampons and ice axe to push yourself up.