Backcountry Hut Fees
In my last article titled Using Tramping Huts Properly I gave essential tips considering different aspects of using New Zealand’s backcountry huts. But I didn’t mention one important thing – the Hut fees. For each night you stay in the hut you have to pay in advance. Huts come in different categories and therefore the hut fees vary according to the hut category.
The hut categories are as follows:
- Basic hut / Bivvy
- Standard hut
- Serviced hut /Serviced Alpine hut
- Great Walk hut
For the Basic hut you don’t have to pay anything, while for standard hut the fee is $5 NZD, for serviced hut $15 and for Serviced Alpine huts and Great Walk huts prices vary. The prices I wrote here are for an adult, per night per person. For youth the prices are cheaper.
There are two DOC brochures released this month (August 2008) with very detailed list of huts and their prices. One brochure is for North Island backcountry huts and the other is for South Island backcountry huts. You can download brochures here:
You can also purchase a backcountry hut pass (which is also described in these brochures) which is valid for a year from date of purchase and costs $90. If you tramp a lot it is well worth it, but remember that this pass is not valid for all the huts. For example it is not valid for Great Walk huts during the peak season. If you decide to buy a backcountry hut pass, read carefully the list of huts which are not covered by this pass. This list is also described in the brochures above.
I use the backcountry hut pass since most of my tramps are not on great walks. I usually tend to find myself a remote tracks which not many people know and use, so I get a more of “wilderness” experience.
On some of my tramps in New Zealand I met people (not many though) who used huts without paying the hut fees. I would really recommend and ask everyone NOT to do that. Please pay the hut fees. This money is used for maintaining these huts in good condition and building a new ones when and where necessary. If everyone acts responsibly, we will continue having clean ecology and beautiful nature for years to come!
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August 22nd, 2008 at 5:11 am
[...] P.S. In this article I didn’t covered one very important aspect of hut use. I fixed this in my second post titled Backcountry Hut Fees [...]