Wanaka guide Whitney Thurlow recently merged his seven-year-old business Wild Walks with Aspiring Guides and is now chief guide for the company, working from the Aspiring Guides office in Ardmore St.
The 55-year-old skier, climber and tramper was born and raised in the United States, began an annual snow season migration to New Zealand in the 1970s and eventually settled in Wanaka, where he now lives with partner Suzy Meyer, a GP, and their 17-year-old skateboarder son Beach.
A joint director in Aspiring Guides with Jeannie Clairmont, Marty Beare and Steve Bell since October, Mr Thurlow cannot imagine any other job he would rather do than take people into the Mt Aspiring National Park.
Mr Thurlow grew up on the east coast of the US and graduated with a political science and history degree from Maine University, while representing the university as a professional ski-racer.
He lived and worked in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, a big skiing and mountaineering centre, but after a few years of professional racing he realised he would never become rich from competition.
"In 1979, I came here to teach skiing and one thing led to another and I ended up head of Cardrona ski patrol in 1981. Those were exciting times when there was just one rope tow . . .
"In the first year, I think they had 7000 skiers. The next year they had 40,000 and the next year after that 60,000. It went up really fast and the ski patrol developed really quickly," Mr Thurlow said.
Mr Thurlow continued to work for Cardrona skifield pioneer John Lee after Mr Lee sold up and moved to the Pisa Range to set up the Snow Farm cross-country skiing area.
A veteran of 25 back-to-back winters in earlier days, Mr Thurlow is now a fan of summers and devoted to living in Wanaka and helping maintain its small-town, relaxed identity.
"I really liked it [winters] at the time and it was no problem. But once I started having summers, I discovered I really liked summer. I needed a summer job, so I did guide training," he said.
Much of his early mountain-guide training was with Aspiring Guides and Mr Thurlow is an experienced mountaineer and ice climber.
He has also worked for Harris Mountains Heli-Skiing company and was training officer for the New Zealand Mountain Guides Association for eight years.
He noticed New Zealand's "Great Walks" and alpine climbing were being enjoyed by many tourists and New Zealanders, but there was also a demand for something "in between" with a bit of "bush bashing", tracks over high valleys or glacier travel.
So he began Wild Walks, providing multi-day alpine tramps and treks into Rabbit Pass and the Young, Gillespie, Wilkin and Matukituki Valleys.
Mr Thurlow's eight-day trip between Makarora and the Matukituki Valley is the longest guided walk in New Zealand, and he and his staff also guide privately around the South Island but mostly in the Mt Aspiring National Park and Aoraki-Mt Cook National Park.
Group sizes range between two and five people and he employs between four and five seasonal guides, who all live in Wanaka and will continue to guide the tramps as required.
"They have all been working since the beginning and it is really nice to be able to have friends working for you . . . When you are sending people out on the trip, really the only important thing is how they get on with the guide," Mr Thurlow said.
When not tramping or climbing, Mr Thurlow enjoys kite-surfing.
And he's not ever likely to tire of Wanaka.
"If you ever think about getting sick of it, well, what else is there to do? There are no alternatives. Where else would I go? And this is kind of why I feel you have to look after Wanaka too.
"I've been down almost to the South Pole to find somewhere this nice," Mr Thurlow said.
