Writes Hill Press: Fair Weather Trampers

MEDIA RELEASE

WRITES HILL PRESS Launches
its first publication

Fair Weather Trampers: in the NZ bush with
the Cock & Bull Tramping Club

by Julia Millen with sketches by Barbara O’Reilly

Tuesday 29 November 2011; 5.45-7.15pm
Otari/Wilton’s Bush Visitor Centre, 160 Wilton Rd, Wellington

One summer morning a group of drinking mates set out for a short walk. Twelve hours later, exhausted and footsore, they straggle on to Makara Beach. So begins the story of the Cock & Bull Tramping Club.

Inspired by their guiding spirit The Compleat Tramper the Cock & Bull trampers embark on a series of adventures (and disasters). Fair Weather Trampers relates: sitting next to a dead sheep, too exhausted to move; battling a snow storm on Tongariro; being attacked by native falcons in the Nelson Lakes; a night spent clinging to tree roots above the Waihone Gorge; slogging through the swamps of Stewart Island,nude sunbathing in the Abel Tasman, swatting sandflies while wallowing in the hot pools at Welcome Flat; coping with blisters and broken pack straps; sleeping under the Southern Cross in the Ruahines.

Meet The Compleat Tramper: Indigenous species guru, a tramper of the old school, he regards primuses as an invention of the devil and is appalled at the idea of buying new gear for tramping. He especially hates synthetic fabrics believing that ‘wool is warm when wet’. His battered lidless billy has a handle of no. 8 wire and appears to be a relic of Shackleton’s party marooned on Elephant Island. When bush camping the Cock & Bulls produce blow-up mattresses to lie on; The Compleat Tramper arranges his rather mildewed sleeping bag on top of some wet bracken and a couple of old hob-nailed boots.

ENDS

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