New Zealand
is a place of rare and challenging beauty and tramping here has developed a
unique character and style, even its own language. In this fascinating, highly
readable and superbly illustrated book, experienced trampers and backcountry
authors Shaun Barnett and Chris Maclean tell, for the first time, how this
essentially Kiwi recreation evolved in such a distinctive way.
Tramping – A New Zealand history begins by
looking at how Maori and early Europeans lived in and reacted to the landscape,
and how the pragmatic walking of the nineteenth century laid the foundations
for recreational tramping during the twentieth. The book describes how the
first recreational tracks and huts were built for tourists flocking to Maoriland
in the 1890s, most notably to walk the Milford Track. Then came the tramping
boom of the 1920s and 1930s, when clubs were formed and thousands of city
people were encouraged to spend weekends and holidays in the unspoilt outdoors.
The growth of an extensive hut and track network in the next two decades,
combined with increasing outdoor tourism in the 1980s and 1990s, made New
Zealand one of the world’s most popular tramping destinations. Also revealed in
this approachable history is the surprisingly strong influence of American
ideas, and the seminal role of the state, which has created one of the finest
networks of national parks on the planet.
But, as the
authors well know, tramping is also a highly personal pursuit, with the
potential to create lasting friendships and change lives. Tramping – A New Zealand history will strike
a deep chord with the countless New Zealanders, and overseas visitors, who
treasure the experience of pulling on their boots, putting a pack on their back
and heading into the bush or the mountains in search of inspiration,
rejuvenation and peace.
Published
by Craig Potton Publishing, Tramping
– A New Zealand history is available from bookshops and
libraries nationwide
Since
beginning to tramp as a teenager in the Kaweka and Ruahine ranges, SHAUN
BARNETT has tramped the length and breadth of New Zealand. After first
working for the Department of Conservation, he turned to writing and
photography, and co-wrote with Rob Brown the Montana Award-winning Classic
Tramping in New Zealand. Shaun has written several other
best-selling guidebooks, edited Wilderness magazine
between 1999 and 2003, and is currently the editor of the Federated Mountain
Clubs’ Bulletin. His most recent book (with Rob Brown and
Geoff Spearpoint) is Shelter from the Storm: The story of
New Zealand’s backcountry huts, which won the New Zealand Booksellers’
Choice Award in 2013.
CHRIS
MACLEAN is a Wellington historian, writer, photographer and publisher,
with a keen interest in the outdoors. He has written a number of acclaimed
books, including Tararua: The story of a mountain range, Wellington:
Telling tales, and Kapiti, which won
the Montana Award for History and Biography in 2000. Chris has also written two
biographies, John Pascoe and Stag Spooner: Wild man from the
bush. He is the great-grandson of George Whitcombe, founder of
Whitcombe & Tombs, and keeps the family tradition alive through his own
publishing imprint, The Whitcombe Press.
RRP:
$69.99 - 265
x 215 mm, 370 pp, hardback PLC with dustjacket, maps and colour illustrations
throughout. ISBN:
9781927213230
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