Tourist hiker lost his life in Tongariro Crossing

"Do you know how many people do that crossing and have a safe and enjoyable experience, foreign and national? It's an inherently risky activity. There are physical and environmental risks that can be out of our control. This is part of the joy of doing these activities as well as enjoying the natural beauty, the comrades of others and the sense of achievement." I might of taken that out of context but this is as much the problem as the solution. 1000s of people do it safely and post on social media and their "friends" see it and think "I can do that" Then they look the place up and see its only 18 km or whatever and then they look at all the pictures of people doing the track in perfect conditions. About then lots of them stop reading just before all the warnings and some of them are going to get in trouble. The question is How do you get people to read the warnings. When you have 2.5 million tourists every year you are going have accidents. Really the question could come down to. There is half the population every year as tourists and x number get hurt etc. How many locals got hurt the same way? I suspect the answer could make tourist look very risk averse.

I think you hit the nail on the head geeves when you said I might have taken that out of context. But this is the nature of these types of events. You see stats can be a really misleading thing and they can be used to promote certain ideas or agendas in many ways. How many nationals do the crossing and how many foreigners do? What do you guys want from tourists? That they come here for two years prior to having the trip of a lifetime. Join a tramping club, spend six months learning about the ropes to tramping here. Experience every season? It's ridiculous. What do you think Sherpa say about us when we naively strut into the khumbu. Or the locals in huaraz say when we roll into town to down the Huayhuash circuit. Or the patagonians when we turn up to do the Torres del Paine. They are here to do bucket list things. To have the experience of a lifetime. It's as much our responsibility to look after them as it is theirs. It's an industry and one that makes us a lot of money as a country. I'm so over reading about dumb tourists dying on our tracks. But the local who blows his knees out on the trip down from jumbo hut, Or the duo caught out on dundas in a storm, etc etc get minor notice. For crying out loud a guy came from half way across the world with his family for the trip of a lifetime and died and he's just a stat. I'm doing a pretty hairy trip with my missus in Greenland next year. It's a remote place the likes you can't find anywhere else in the world anymore. It's a heck of a lot more to bite off than the tongariro crossing so we will be doing a lot more homework. But heaven forbid something bad happens to us. I would sure as heck hope the locals would show me a little more compassion and respect than what is shown to people that come a cropper do on here.

I was worried you might of seen my quote as out of context but we are most definitely thinking the same way

No I get what your saying. You are basically agreeing. But it's just a chance for me to reiterate my point. Because there is so much tourist bashing on here. I'm kind of over it.

Thanks for bringing up this point Gaiters. I consider my self a tourist too even if I feel like NZ is my second home now. I'm Italian living in Sydney but I came in NZ once at year in the last 6 years or so. I have to say(as I mentioned just before in one of my reply)that every time I come for hiking around NZ I do study a lot in your DOC website(which is very well done I have to say)plus every time I put my step in the wild rugged kiwi country I feel quite scared and something inside me come up and say in my mind:Be responsible,be respectful,be careful. I haven't met lots of kiwis while I do my hike around but every time I go inside a DOC office in Wanaka or Queenstown they are very gentle and always available to explain everything that I need to know. There is always a point which is very important. Homework nowdays is very easy to do...go online and there is always plenty of info to find around and should've be that hard. Unfortunately these things happens all the time and everywhere around the world and we can always hope that adjustment can be done to advise tourist of the dangers ahead of them. Perhaps Sign with different languages ?

Im not actually blaming the tourists. Im blaming the promoters of the crossing who are sending them on the crossing when they dont understand the environment. Tourists are as much victimms here.

Police and Doc are asking Kiwis to check in with tourists when we observe they are inadequately prepared or underresourced for the conditions. https://www.wildernessmag.co.nz/call-kiwis-quiz-tourists-tramping-safety/ I have so many thoughts on this request. Ray Goldring warned a family party that they were underdressed for a trip through Cave Stream on a cold day. They ignored him and the mother succumbed to hypothermia in the cave with the children witnessing this horrible turn of events. Ray was the head ranger of the forest park back in the day as well as being one of the most experienced outdoors instructors! From what I know of his character and manner, he wouldn't have had an alienating officious manner, just kindly concern. But there ya go. I've always thought taking a inexperienced person through the cave in those conditions and underdressed, would be an ingenious way to kill someone... Another thought. I can just envisage people seeing me tramping in my sandals and then having something to say!

@Honora, I agree, crazy request, as nobody can tell us it would have helped in this case. How many Kiwis did they talk to about their plans? How many could have said anything, but didn't? Probably zero. TAC is perfectly fine, except when it rains. Why people want to do this when it's storming and raining, is beyond me. It's very doubtful anybody could stop them.

tourists often don't listen, are we expected to tell the hundreds and thousands who do the crossing each day how under dressed they are? they just walk past the warning signs anyway. people get lulled into a false sense of safety when there's lots of other people around dressed the same as they are

200000 people a year do that trip and social media is chocka block with pictures of people on the track in all manner of summer clothing but very few of people all rugged up in bad weather. Of course very few people stop to take selfies in those conditions but the result is a trail that social media depicts as a walk in the park. How to fix? Dont know but maybe we should be posting pictures of the ugly days but would we even go on those days? You can pretty much bet that someone started the trail today in street clothes. Hopefully they turn back.