Kia ora 4WD whānau,
It wasn’t long after moving to the South Island in the 1980s that I realised what a difference a 4WD makes to exploring its vastness. A couple of trips and I had the bug, and the truck. I teamed up with Ken Sibly in the 1990s on the first of a series of off-road guidebooks that set the bar for on-the-ground research, detailing every gate, culvert and boggy patch on about 200 different routes from Collingwood to Oreti Beach.
About 15 years ago, with those books out of print and many requests for a repeat, I set about resurveying the best 115 routes from the originals, revising and updating where necessary.
Roads don’t change much but phone numbers do, so a big part of revising the routes for the new book was checking contact and access details to make sure they are up to date. They are.
Three decades of exploring the backcountry of Te Waipounamu has given me a deep love for its beauty and a healthy respect for its perils. The book’s advice on what equipment to carry, safe off-roading and recovery techniques has come from first-hand experience, including as a commercial 4WD guide.
Over the years I have met so many people out on the trails who have thanked me for the books. Believe me, it’s been a pleasure. What’s not to like about having an excuse to explore an island with the geography of a continent.
Happy trails!
