Is it time to ban alcohol at DOC huts?

@bernieq: "However, if you have identities and witneses, you might at least generate a police visit to the culprits." Also, doesn't nearly everyone carry around a portable digital video and audio recording device these days? Not that it excuses abhorrent behaviour, and I'm sure people who feel threatened might also not be comfortable pulling out a camera and filming stuff when they might be about to have to spend a whole night closed in a box with these people. Nevertheless without verifiable evidence it's often very difficult for DOC or Police to do something about it.

alcohol is usually at the root of most of the worst behaviour in huts... at issue are the people who bring large volumes of alcohol and an alcohol ban is going to reduce the problem of that happening as for people taking a hip flask, they are less likely to be an issue and if they are going to have a quiet tipple, i dont think people will stop them, they are at the other end of the scale of what people want to stop... with an alcohol ban its hard to hide the larger volumes of alcohol, and youre far more likely to be sprung at a road end, or if you run into a ranger even before you get it to a hut, its more likely to force people to be more discreet and quiet in their behaviour rather than blatantly flaunt alcohol around and behave as badly as they like

You know, someone new on here could be forgiven for coming to the conclusion that all backcountry experiences are crap, inevitably ruined on every occasion by weather, sandflies, bogan Kiwis, irresponsible and useless foreigners. ;)

who reads the news and believes that its the entire reality of the world?

My mate Emma was forced to flee a hut when hunters showed up and began to get drunk. She found a comment they made to be unnerving and was outathere. In cooler weather, dousing the fire might be an effective way of breaking up the party. I was prepared to do this recently but fortunately the overseas group, who may be more civilised than we locals, 'got it' and toddled off to bed at 11pm. I guess it's either everyone gangs up on the troublemakers which could be tricky if they are belligerent drunks or just does what Emma did and camp away from the racket. In our case. we camped but it was on the verandah so still too close to the rowdiness. My heart sinks when I see people imbibing wine in back country huts because alcohol being a neurological depressant can cause people to snore. Our tramping club banned alcohol on club trips when the young president lugged in mulled wine on a trip which people spurned (velluto rosso) and then vomited in his sleep including over someone's open pack from the top bunk. Hilarious but he could have choked to death and we wouldn't have known. He woke in the morning and wondered why there was pasta in his sleeping bag!

It does happen, kreig, and it can be confronting - but, true, it's not a frequent experience - in my limited travels. Footage of individuals in action, as you say, izogi, might be difficult/risky to obtain but it would need to be quite clear to be of use for identification (and they would need to be known to the police as well) so not likely to be covert. Still, probably useful if you can get it. Corroborating witnesses would be at least as good. Honora, those stories are really disturbing - my worst experience is insignificant by comparison : I shared a hut with a couple of hunters, one of whom forcefully expressed a number of opinions including his contempt for people with degrees, Australians, DOC workers, Islanders, foreigners in general (I've cleaned this up a bit) whilst knocking back far too much alcohol. Of course, my primary concern was the snoring ;)

theres enough people here already who have recited incidents. it depends where you tramp, some places like the more accessible huts are more likely to have issues around drinkers. , if you're tramp more off the beaten track , you may not encounter them, but there are enough stories going around about incidents to make it an issue. sure most nights in huts arent bad experiences, but a night with boozers can be a pretty nasty experience and once can be more than enough,, its not like you're going to a pub where you know what to expect when you go there. you don't know how an evening is going to pan out when people break out the booze, universities can run some pretty boozy trips.

Certainly plenty of evidence something needs to be done. I dont know if that extends as far as a total ban though but if the powers that be decree it should go that far Im not going to object. It is another case of the 1% ruining it for the rest of us

It's not that difficult. I'm sure most of us do the same thing. I usually take something to drink with me. However, I don't bring it out unless it's the right environment. Either everyone else is enjoying a couple of drinks, or if I'm with a small group and we're the only ones there, enjoying a game of cards or something, I might offer to bring it out and share. But if there's multiple parties in the hut, I simply don't bother. The tramping is the real experience. A few drinks at the end of the day is a bonus, but not required. So I guess I'm saying I don't have TOO much of a problem if people are drinking, so long as it's the one party. In any other circumstance, nope. And that's what needs to be knocked on the head.

At the risk of suggesting a controversially blunt instrument, would it make any effective difference if DOC started writing alcohol restrictions into helicopter and other transport concession agreements? Or would that just cause more problems than it solved? People who walk in are at least restricted by how much they can reasonably carry, but people getting flown in don't really have those constraints.