Damon Tighe: New Zealand Travel Essay (2004.07.23)

Heaphy Track, Persey Saddle, South Island, NZ

Light breaks to the west over a ridge of rimu trees, their silhouetted twisting trunks baring the labor of many epiphytes and above them, still closer to the sky a few snow dappled peaks tear into the violet morning air. The ground outside breaks beneath our heavy feet and a few rays, who have danced their way from heaven, fall upon the vegetation to illuminate a myriad of icicles covering snow grasses and mountain nei-nei. It is July and winter in Aotearoa (New Zealand), the Land of the Long Cloud. The cold keeps many tourists away, which has made the escape even more inviting to Nick Sylva and I.

The taste of a coal fire still resonates in my mouth and mingles with the freeze-dried coffee Nick picked up our first day in Auckland I never imagined backpacking in New Zealand would mean sleeping in a hut every night, decked out with propane burners, sleeping mats, pots, pans, running water, and a wood/coal burning stove. Though I am not fond of the idea of luxury camping, the huts are a welcome feature to hiking in New Zealand, not because of the comfort, but because of the philosophy behind them. In the United States our areas of natural splendor are made accessible to the public by paving new roads, which not only brings in more visitors, but brings trash, pollution and fosters a distant relationship with the landscape. In New Zealand nature is made accessible by the Department of Conservation (DOC) hut system and by immaculately maintained trails. The huts allow for travelers to pack light, carrying only their food and maybe a sleeping roll, which still affords older tourists the ability to get into the back country and see amazing places. It also allows every traveler to walk with nature and be intimate with the landscape, something out national parks rarely encourage.

Preservation of the land is something rooted deep within the eco-consciousness of most Kiwis, but three forces threaten this unique land. The two visible threats that the DOC has taken action against are invasive species and eco-tourists. Both of these assailants from afar have the capability of loving the land to death. The third and possibly most destructive force covertly feeds these foreign threats and is the most difficult to remove from the land.

The Australian opossum is the most recognizable invasive species due to its adverse effects on the vegetation and bird life. Forest trees and ferns stripped clean to their stalks and deathly quiet forests are part of the opossum's wake. New Zealand does not have any native species of mammals, except for a bat, so the native plants and birds have not evolved the behaviors or characteristics that would keep them safe from the unyielding appetite of the opossum. The entire country is at war with these furry creatures. The DOC performs 1080 poison drops from helicopters, pubs in towns like Collingwood offer a free beer for every dead opossum you bring in and you can even buy opossum/wool blended clothes to encourage the removal of these animals. Other travelers I met assured me that the war on opossums had done much over the years to restore New Zealand forests.

Eco-tourists are like the opossum, drawn to the thick forests in hoards and synonymously the DOC has prepared a battle plan for this threat to the ecosystem. Poison isn't given to trampers, a far more crafty plan has assured that New Zealand natural wonders will not be loved to death. The DOC created the Great Walks Tracks, which are a series of nine trails with well maintained trails and huts. The Great Walks showcase the best New Zealand has to offer (or at least that is what the DOC tells you) and pulls most of the eco-tourists to these few locations. At these locations the DOC spends a large portion of their budget, maintaining the land, working on restoration projects, staffing the area so that the natural landscape doesn't get damaged and providing education materials. The DOC is then able to take the rest of their budget and simply hold large tracks of land that are essentially off limits, to let mother nature go about her way, a true form of conservation. This sacrificial approach to conservation is something we in the United States could learn from, instead of letting logging and mining go on in our public lands.

Though many of their conservation methods are novel and progressive, New Zealand still suffers from a third threat that unfortunately has the potential to undermine all of the good they have done. Riding a train through the vast land, one realizes that the major economic force in the country is agriculture. There are many progressive and organic vineyards, kiwi, and apples farms. However geographically these farms are a drop in the bucket compared to the large tracks of land cleared of native bush for sheep grazing and Pinus radiata (Monterey Pine) harvesting. Most of the soil is fertile enough only for two generations of pine growth and the constant disruption to the soil allows for invasive species of weeds such as the yellow flowering grose to gain an unbudgeable position in the environment. Sheep grazing reduces large tracks of once forested lands to grassy slopes, where new plants cannot gain a foothold because they are eaten immediately and the land itself has not support due to the missing root structures so large hillside begin slipping. The demand for New Zealand lamb especially by the American market is causing more and more land to be stripped of the native bush and made into land for sheep.

I do not know how all these threats will play out for New Zealand, if economy will force them into forsaking more and more of their beautiful land or if some turn of events will cause a conservation movement that prevents the spread of ecologically poor agriculture practices. I do know though that the land is beautiful, full of wonderful oddities such as the kiwi, glow worms, huge carnivorous land snails, kauri trees and many more. My only hope is that more Americans visit the Land of the Long Cloud, go on the Great Walks and participate in the on going conversation of conservation both in the states and abroad.