Thread: Proposed new hut fee system.

as a ranger of 35 years experience booking a bunk no what if the person who books it is not there the old system of good old kiwis fitting in has worked for years why change it - I remember as a Ranger Te Urewera having a young tramper top and tail with me when the hut was full no problem - her feet were inside a sleeping bag - thats the kiwi way - no problem

These proposals get put forward because the people in charge feel they are good ideas. Look for them to at least partially happen.

My concern is how it affects the hunting community, as we use these places a bit different to the average, and when it comes to decision making, we are not often considered.

At worst case scenario, 57 bucks a night is an additional 350-400 dollars for a week in the mountains hunting per person.

The booking system is absolute crap for us. Most of the bookable huts now are booked out well in advance, meaning you have no option to consider the weather.

And even when I don't intend to use the hut, I do rely on it as being there in case of bad weather. Ive had really mixed results from hut wardens when Ive shown up too a hut because the weather on the tops has been shit and or there's a storm coming. Over half have been really good when I explain. but some have been prepared to read me the riot act, even when I say Im happy to sleep on the floor.

Trying to work out even 2 weeks in advance, what nights you will be in the hut, and what nights you will be out and away camping etc is near on impossible if you are making the best of a trip.

I'm all for some sort of payment, although the reality is doc have no budget and 3rd party groups do a lot of the work on these basic huts / bivs
(back country trust, nzda, fmc, even 4x4 groups, sika foundation, fiordland wapiti foundation, tramping groups etc...)

I have done volunteer for the back country trust in the kawekas and doc's involvement financially was zero, although they did have supply a staff member

Maybe a pass for like $40 a year that gives access to all basic huts / bivs?
Bookings would be a cluster 100%

Originally Posted by Barry the hunter

as a ranger of 35 years experience booking a bunk no what if the person who books it is not there the old system of good old kiwis fitting in has worked for years why change it - I remember as a Ranger Te Urewera having a young tramper top and tail with me when the hut was full no problem - her feet were inside a sleeping bag - thats the kiwi way - no problem

I was once in a 6 bunk with 13 people and two dogs inside, 20 camping outside when someone turned up looking for a place to sleep. The idea of there being no room was already well past being disregarded so we ended up with 14. The 14th was a foreign student without much english and ostensibly not much understanding of hut etiquette. In the sense that he didn't seem to understand that he had as much right to the hut as anyone else that had shoehorned their way in.

He spent the entire night sitting in the corner like a dog that is not normally allowed in the house, so on the rare occasion it is, it is anything but boisterous lest it be sent back outside.
When I got up early to go for a hunt, I tried to give him the 1/2 of the mattress I had been using, he wasn't keen, it was as if he didn't want to be seen to take advantage.

Originally Posted by whanahuia

These proposals get put forward because the people in charge feel they are good ideas. Look for them to at least partially happen.

My concern is how it affects the hunting community, as we use these places a bit different to the average, and when it comes to decision making, we are not often considered.

At worst case scenario, 57 bucks a night is an additional 350-400 dollars for a week in the mountains hunting per person.

The booking system is absolute crap for us. Most of the bookable huts now are booked out well in advance, meaning you have no option to consider the weather.

And even when I don't intend to use the hut, I do rely on it as being there in case of bad weather. Ive had really mixed results from hut wardens when Ive shown up too a hut because the weather on the tops has been shit and or there's a storm coming. Over half have been really good when I explain. but some have been prepared to read me the riot act, even when I say Im happy to sleep on the floor.

Trying to work out even 2 weeks in advance, what nights you will be in the hut, and what nights you will be out and away camping etc is near on impossible if you are making the best of a trip.

Yes, and also on the big trips, a lot of the fun is trying to guess how many will be at the hut, and talking to others on the track where the first or second conversational is about how many were at xyz hut last night, or how many are heading in that direction etc, and also treating the sleeping on the floor scenario as par for the course.
That is a unique and special part of back country culture that would be lost were all huts to become bookable. I can imagine in short time, it would become not the done thing to stop in to a hut for lunch if you weren't booked for the night.

Hmm, my bad team. I had read a different consultation doc: https://www.doc.govt.nz/get-involved...ervation-land/ . This one is about high use areas. That press article talks about how the other consultation hasn't been released to the public, so surely they legally have to do that at some stage.

The numbers and changes the Press article are talking about are ridiculous. And also super insulting to the NZDA, FMC, Permalot, Backcountry trust, and other charities which spend million's of donation money and volunteer hours maintaining those very same huts.

I've always quite liked this guys take on paying for huts: "When I started tramping in the mid-1960’s, all the huts were free. Or more correctly, you paid for them once in your taxes and there was no question of paying twice." https://www.wildernessmag.co.nz/worth-back-country-hut/

Most DOC centres don’t even sell hut tickets anymore, last time I tried to purchase some DOC Rangiora told me I’d have to go to a Macpac shop!

Some hut prices have already gone up before Xmas in Canterbury and other high use areas.
Back in the early 90's when hut tickets were 'invented', the funds were to go back into the up keep of these huts. I resisted this process initially but started seeing in the Kaweka and Kaimanawa's veranda's put in place, rifle racks, better lighting, covered door entry, new water tanks etc. To say that our taxes paid for the hut system is partially correct but like your home requires upkeep at some point which means spending $$. No rocket science required. So I started to buy hut tickets. What has been a bug bear last decade are tourist trampers that have an extremely cheap TA walkway system in place from Northland to Bluff and the past Govts refuses to address this issue. The small fee incurred at airports for visitor entry is but a drop in the bucket. The hut pass system is far too cheap for these tourist trampers with the exchange rate always in their favour and they know it - this is where DOC should address the issue. Us Kiwi hunters/trampers should be entitled to a good discount since the likes of the NZDA/Back Country Trust etc are the poor pricks rebuilding/overhauling these huts to a modern standard to satisfy these tourist pricks. Though current hut pass discount for clubs now does not cover serviced/bookable huts anymore. Lastly - at the moment there is no enforcement of these new rules using/booking huts in NZ which will be another saga for the future I suspect? Hut wardens may be busy running bush law trials!? Just an opinion of course.

I live 25km from Nelson city, all the huts I would be likely to visit do not involve me going into Nelson as its the wrong way, yet to buy hut tickets you have to go to Nelson as no shop in Richmond sells them.

Thankfully for Nelson you can get them on the day at the DOC centre IF you are there during shop hours.

I think buying an annual hut pass online works out good value that chasing hut tickets for each trip?

I'm starting to get pretty angry re DOC in this thread, a few times now I've bitten my tongue regarding what is paid to DOC for my wife's family hut that has been in the family for 50-60yrs!. And then what DOC attempted to propose approximately 12-15 months ago. The hut is on DOC land, no services, no plumbing, no rubbish, nothing provided by DOC other than manually checking annually ALL hut owners had not exceeded their hut footprint, have built extra out buildings, have not built up rubbish, have not planted fauna other than native type growth, have not added river protection against floods. For this...we pay $3000 per year directly to DOC, aside to that we (as in ALL hut owners on the West Coast) also incurr a concession fee every 10yrs of $10,000.

We just went through our last annual inspection maybe 4 months ago, had to get rid of hut debris as we'd replaced some roof iron recently...fair call. We also got pulled up on an outside farking bath - it's been there for over 10yrs and not once has it been brought up or mentioned in the last 10 annual inspections!!!. Maybe later when I calm down a bit I'll post up their last bright idea which thankfully a very switched on lawyer and a couple of hut owners down Haast way challenged DOC on and won. All hut owners rallied and put in $1000 towards lawyers and court costs, DOC was shut down from moving forward or implementing this latest brain wave...hopefully for the meantime!.

This shit is why I just carry a tent.

What a load of crap. We already pay tax on everything we do, so why should we pay extra?

All government departments make ill conceived proposals. Sometimes I suspect to make other bad ideas look good by comparison.