Links
- Permolat Facebook
- Permolat Southland website and Facebook page.
- Some of the Canterbury projects can be viewed at Canterbury Remote Basic Hut Restorations,
- The Ruahine User Group is a volunteer network dedicated to promoting and maintaining back-country huts and tracks in the central North Island
- The GWBN | Greater Wellington Backcountry Network formerly TARHC, supports the backcountry hut track network and promotes recreational use in the in the Tararua, Aorangi and Remutaka Forest Parks.
- The Department of Conservation (DOC) website
- The Backcountry Trust website (updates on projects and funding application forms). You can keep astride of the Trust's work and some of the public feedback around it on the Huts And Tracks Facebook Page.
- Each of the hut pages on the site has a small, embedded map. If you click on this you'll go directly to the area that it's located on the NZ Topomap website.
- If you have Google Earth on you can download an overlay of all the DOC tracks and hut sites from Mediafire.
- Other Facebook pages of interest are the Ex NZFS Page, which focuses on historical aspects, and the group's current hut maintenance activities.
- Hair-splitters and hut baggers and oglers will probably enjoy Hugh van Noorden's Best Hut Ever page.
- Frank King of Christchurch has a Tramping Blog that includes some of the huts on this website.
- A more comprehensive website that covers most of the Huts and tracks around the country, including many on the remote Huts site is the New Zealand Tramper Website.
- There is a website for the Arthur's Pass National Park area which has webcams, a gallery of photos of the huts in the Park, weather, climbing, hut, bridge and track information, and Search And Rescue (SAR) reports.
- Geoff Aitken has a website that publishes topomaps to assist people to get out in the hills. New Topo NZ has a new map of the Westland side of the Arthurs Pass area that folk may find useful.
- The Palmerston North Tramping and Mountaineering Club's Website covers Huts in the Ruahine and Tararua ranges.
- The Victoria University Tramping Club Website.
- Kea Database have an online sighting platform that allows people to record sightings, report and follow individual banded kea or record non-sightings in areas they would normally expect to see birds.
Relevant Publications
- Shelter From the Storm: (Craig Potton Publishing): Shaun Barnet, Rob Brown and Geoff Spearpoint: A doorstopper of a book chock full of photos and a detailed history of high-country huts in New Zealand. Many of the huts on the website are mentioned with plenty of detail on their history and construction. In 2016 the boys released a sequel called, A Bunk for the Night: A Guide To New Zealand’s Best Backcountry Huts: which is published by Potton and Burton.
- South Island Weekend Tramps: Nick Groves: A bit dated now but a few of the huts on this site are included in this collection
- Tramping in New Zealand: 40 Great Tramping Trips: By Shaun Barnett and the larger and more recent Tramping co-authored with Chris Maclean. The latter is a comprehensive history of tramping in New Zealand and traces its origins from Maori and early European times to the present. This is also a Potton and Burton publication.
- The Canterbury Westland Alps: A Climbing And Transalpine Guide: Yvonne Cook And Geoff Spearpoint: This one covers the Central Southern Alps and is for the more serious alpinists.
- The Great Unknown: By Geoff Spearpoint is a compendium of some of the epic transalpine trips he's done between the early 1970's and 2019. The usual eye watering photography along with his accounts. Published by Potton and Burton.
- Bushcraft: A Publication by the new Zealand Mountain Safety Council. Essential preparatory reading for aspiring remote hutters.
- Classic Tramps (Revised Edition): Shaun Barnett: The Frews - Toaroha circuit has been added to this edition.
- Gone Bush: Paul Kilgour. A well written autobiographical account from a veteran hutbagger and Permolat member (Harper/ Collins)
Health and safety
- For volunteer projects being carried out on public conservation land. DOC will usually ask to be provided with Health and Safety Plan. The legality of this requirement is dubious as we are not DOC employees, and mostly not working on DOC projects however it isn't hugely onerous and helps maintain the good relationships we have with DOC field staff with whom we mostly work. We've attached our template for this. Feel free to download and adapt it to suit your needs. We are happy to help you with it if you are not confident to tackle it on your own.
| doc_h_s_plan_template.docx |
DOC-Permolat Schedule of Work
- Permolat now has formal general agreement with DOC that covers the huts and tracks in Westland, that are unmaintained or only minimally maintained. Anyone thinking of carrying out a project on one of these can contact us. They will also need to identify and liaise with the key DOC person in the area concerned.
| general_agreement__-_appendix_1_schedule_pt_2_-_doc-2617779.pdf |
