Freedom Camping & Backpacking

It boils down to R E S P E C T.





Respect for mother nature and the environment and respect for New Zealand and the people who live there.


If you decide to take a pee, or worse, rustle up a number 2, just outside your campervan or behind your tent, you may think nothing of it. I mean, it will wash away with the rain, perhaps even bio-degrade or melt away. Its human waste, surely it will erode into the organic waste that makes up your surroundings....





Well sadly no. Think about the collective actions of the next 63 people who camp in that exact spot over the next 2 weeks. If they all emptied their bowels into the same spot there would exist a pile of human feces or a small river of yellow pee enough to fill a couple of buckets. Empty those buckets into the soil, which leads to the river. Game over clean water.






The Department of Conservation do a great job in supplying long drop toilet facilities and even running water. All for a measly $6NZ. To blatantly ignore the good work that goes into allowing the tens of thousands of campers who visit the same areas we all do, would be a slap in the face for yourself.


One of the key things you quickly learn when out on the road traveling, is that you rely on the local environment and local people to keep it the way it is. Perhaps 10,000 people will stand in the very spot you happened to stand in and take that beautiful photo you have on your desktop. Before you drop that candy wrapper from your pocket, or take a quick pee besides those bushes, imagine for a second if even half of those 10,000 travelers who will visit that exact spot, did the same. It wouldnt be the same. The flies buzzing around that mould of human poo behind the rock would get in the photo. It wouldnt be the same for your friend who visited the year after you.





Its a messy one. The dropping of number 1’s and 2’s has become a national problem.


But there is a simple philosophy being mooted at the moment throughout the country. It seems to be one of the most logical steps towards making freedom camping work. The notion is that every campervan should have a toilet that captures waste that can be emptied at designated spots all over NZ roads.



New Zealand Tourism Website www.camping.org.nz


Its feasible. If you dont posses the means to take your pee pee and poo poo with you, then you cant camp wherever you want.


If you do, then camp where you want and enjoy one of the great aspects of traveling in New Zealand. The freedom to camp.
A clean camper is a good camper.
Camp New Zealands’ way, not your way.





Travel with a collective conscience and enjoy the freedom of camping.


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This story is funny, well kinda....


http://www.stuff.co.nz/nelson-mail/4519468/Couple-left-to-cower-during-machete-attack

Worlds worst place to backpack #6

Syria - Whats with the freaky dude and all his posters?


Dont be distracted by the hotness of his wife beneath that warm fuzzy coat.  Does this mans face scare you?!





He scares me. Everytime he flashes before my eyes, I see an evil man, a man with a nasty side. His power yield certainly displays a nasty side. 
His loyal and well paid military and security forces have beaten, killed and tortured the Syrians every single time they have tried to voice their opinions publicly.





Its atrocious whats going on. It reminds me of an olde quote of Noam Chomskys, the acts of state terrorism are far worse than acts of individual terrorism.





This man is a terrorist in all sense of the word. Over 11,000 people have gone missing or are simply dead. Bells must be rung, sirens must go off. The alarm is beeping and the world pressed snooze.






Syria is a country where 22 million people live....the country has been living under a military republic since 1963. I thought those days past with the 50's and 60's but seems not.


Life is tough under the regime. Take your own laptop flashpackers as every comment anyone posts in any type of forum in a public internet domain, is recorded and viewed by authorities. Sounds like a very scared authority. One afraid of the implications social media and the internet in general can have upon a society.


Travel is restricted and watched under a close eye. Jimmy Foreigner has personal assistants, although sometimes Jimmy doesnt know about them.





Your average Syrian is lovely. Nice people with moderate standards of living in relative terms. Billy the backpacker would love wandering the old city of Damascus, the Roman ruins of Apamea and the layrinith mystery of Aleppo.


Unfortunately the people of Syria no longer use facebook. The authorities have out smarted them and are one step in front. People dont even use cell phones to send messages. Happy to say however, for those backpackers that do venture, Skype does work and is widely used as a safe channel of communication.






So Syria, with its daunting security presence and its dominating heavy handed authorities comes in at #6 on the worlds worst places to backpack.


Dont stop asking questions where those 11,000 people went......