To SUMMIT or NOT TO summit?
Three years ago, the Department of Conservation advised visitors to no longer climb mountains in Tongariro National Park because they are sacred to local iwi. For many Maori, the mountains are their ancestors and the peaks are their ancestor’s heads – so to summit a mountain is to stand on the head.
In other parts of the country, climbers and trampers are asked simply to not stand on a mountain’s peak, while in parts of Northland there are very few restrictions on how and where to climb.
The closure of Australia’s Uluru to climbers in 2019 prompted a wide variety of reactions – but New Zealand’s outdoors community might have just as many mixed opinions on the topic.
Federated Mountain Clubs president Jan Finlayson says the discussion around standing on the summit is not just a cultural issue, but is about being generally respectful of nature, which goes “hand-in-hand” with the Leave No Trace ethos.
“It’s easy to stand off a few metres [from the summit],’’ she says. “I usually stand off to the side . . . [it] seems like the right
