Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park
Template:Short description Template:Good article Template:Use dmy dates Template:Use New Zealand English Template:Infobox protected area
Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park is a national park located in the Canterbury Region in the central-west of the South Island of New Zealand. It was established in October 1953 and takes its name from the highest mountain in New Zealand, Aoraki / Mount Cook. The area of the park is Template:Convert, and it shares a border with Westland Tai Poutini National Park along the Main Divide of the Southern Alps. The national park consists of reserves that were established as early as 1885 to protect the area's significant landscape and vegetation. Glaciers cover 40% of the park, including the country's largest glacier, Haupapa / Tasman Glacier. In 1990, the park was included in the area designated as the Te Wāhipounamu World Heritage Site. The park is managed by the Department of Conservation (DOC) alongside Ngāi Tahu, the iwi who are Template:Lang in the region.
At the end of the most recent ice age approximately 13000 years ago, numerous glaciers in the park were tributaries of a much larger glacier covering all of Hooker Valley and Tasman Valley in hundreds of metres of ice. This glacier reached beyond the southern end of today's Lake Pukaki, up to Template:Convert south of Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park. As it retreated, it filled the hollowed-out valleys, leaving behind the U-shaped valleys seen today in the national park. Early European surveyors and explorers ventured into the alpine region surrounding Aoraki / Mount Cook from the 1850s. Many of the geographical features in the national park were named by or after them. The Ngāi Tahu Claims Settlement Act passed in October 1998 recognised the original names of some geographical features, establishing dual English / Māori names.
Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park is home to more than four hundred species of plants, including more than one hundred introduced species. There are about thirty-five species of birds in the park, most notably the rare black stilt and pīwauwau. The only road access into the park is via State Highway 80 which starts Template:Convert away near Twizel, the closest town, and leads directly to Mount Cook Village along the western shore of Lake Pukaki. Mount Cook Aerodrome is a small airfield located Template:Convert southeast of Mount Cook Village within the national park.
Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park is a popular tourist destination. There are numerous walking tracks, the most popular being the Hooker Valley Track, a relatively short track that takes around three hours to complete. The park is also popular with astrophotographers and star-gazers because of the low levels of light pollution. An area including Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park and the Mackenzie Basin was designated as the Aoraki Mackenzie International Dark Sky Reserve in June 2012. The national park has been used as a filming location for numerous films.
History
Early Māori history
In Māori mythology, Aoraki was one of the sons of Raki the Sky Father. One version of the legend states that Aoraki came down from heaven in a canoe with three of his brothers, Rakiroa, Rakirua and Rārakiroa, to visit his father Raki's new wife Papatūānuku, but the waka (canoe) overturned. The brothers climbed on to the overturned canoe, becoming the mountains Aoraki / Mount Cook, Rakiroa (Mount Dampier), Rakirua (Mount Teichelmann) and Rārakiroa (Mount Tasman). The waka itself became the Southern Alps (Kā Tiritiri o te Moana).<ref name=":0">Template:Cite book</ref>Template:Rp
Although there is no evidence of permanent or temporary Māori settlement within the national park, some artefacts and evidence of burnt vegetation have been found in the nearby Mackenzie Basin.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>Template:Rp These may be related to nomadic parties who would spend months here hunting moa or fighting other parties. Māori would burn tōtara forests to assist them with their hunting of moa and gathering food, mostly weka, eels and kiore, before heading to the West Coast in search of pounamu.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref name=":0" />Template:Rp<ref name=":1">Template:Cite book</ref>Template:Rp<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
In 1896, mountaineer Arthur Harper wrote that Māori had a deep-seated fear of the mountains and preferred to stay lower down in the valleys.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> However, Māori did have knowledge of the various features of high alpine areas, with special words for different types of ice and snow.<ref name=":1" />Template:Rp Historian Johannes Carl Andersen believed it was possible that Māori had travelled over the Main Divide, which is at the northern boundary of Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park, to trade pounamu.<ref name=":1" /><ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>
Later history
According to log entries made by explorer Abel Tasman, it is likely that he and his crew sighted the Southern Alps in December 1642 from the Tasman Sea near Barrytown.<ref name=":1" /><ref>Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref> In 1770 Captain James Cook sailed along the West Coast of the South Island. He sighted and named the Southern Alps but probably did not sight Aoraki. Aoraki was given the name Mount Cook by Captain Stokes of the survey ship HMS Acheron in 1851, to honour James Cook's circumnavigation of New Zealand.<ref name=":1" /><ref name="Cook_journal">Template:Cite book</ref> In 1998, the Ngāi Tahu Claims Settlement Act officially recognised the original names of the geographical features of Ngāi Tahu's takiwā (tribal area), establishing dual English and Māori names such as Kirikirikatata / Mount Cook Range and Haupapa / Tasman Glacier.<ref name="Ngai_Tahu2">Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:LINZ</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Europeans have had interest in the national park since the 1850s;<ref name=":0" />Template:Rp public appreciation of the alpine regions surrounding Aoraki / Mount Cook grew with the maps and reports produced by early European surveyors and explorers. Julius von Haast explored the area at the head of Lakes Tekapo, Pukaki and Ōhau in 1862, collecting specimens, making maps and writing comprehensive reports on his observations, and, starting in 1867, surveyor Edward Sealy explored many glaciers. Many of the peaks, glaciers and other geographical features of the region were named by or for these early explorers, such as the Sealy Tarns track being named after Edward Sealy and the Mueller Glacier named after Ferdinand von Mueller.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
Public appreciation of the mountains also grew as images of the area began to circulate. Artists painted pictures, and from 1867–1870 Sealy photographed the Mount Cook region.<ref name=":1" /><ref>Template:Cite book</ref> In 1873 the then Governor of New Zealand, Sir George Bowen, visited the Mount Cook region, thereby further raising the profile of the area.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Parts of Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park were first set aside as a recreation reserve in 1885, and the national park was established in October 1953.<ref name=":0" />Template:Rp<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
In 1990, the park (along with Westland Tai Poutini, Mount Aspiring and Fiordland National Parks) became part of the Te Wahipounamu World Heritage Site, the first place in New Zealand to attain World Heritage Status.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref> Following the settlement between Ngāi Tahu and the Crown in October 1998, a number of South Island place names were amended by the Ngāi Tahu Claims Settlement Act 1998 to incorporate their Māori names. The name of the mountain village and national park were officially changed from Mount Cook to Aoraki / Mount Cook.<ref name="Ngai_Tahu">Template:Cite web</ref>
Establishment as a national park
Efforts to protect the alpine environment began in the 19th century. A petition addressed to James Sutter, a member of Parliament, was circulated in November 1884, requesting that the Government protect the alpine region around Aoraki / Mount Cook. Petitioners were concerned that stock grazing and burn-offs were destroying the native bush and vegetation of the area. The petitioners suggested that Frank Huddleston, who had recently bought land at the base of the Mueller Glacier and was building the Hermitage, be appointed as a ranger to oversee the area.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
In January 1885 the Hooker and Mueller Valleys were gazetted as the Hooker Glacier Recreation Reserve. In 1887 the Government permanently reserved an area of 97,800 acres of the Tasman Valley above the Mueller Valley confluence, which was known as the Tasman Recreation Reserve or Tasman Park.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> The Hooker Glacier reserve was expanded in 1890, becoming the 38,000-acre Aorangi Domain.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref name=":03">Template:Cite book</ref>
In 1953, Tasman Park and Aorangi Domain became the Mount Cook National Park. The park as established covered Template:Convert of the Southern Alps, including the Mueller, Hooker, and Tasman glaciers and the eastern slopes of Aoraki / Mount Cook and Mount Tasman.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> The park is managed by the Department Of Conservation and Ngāi Tahu, the iwi who hold mana whenua status of the land.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>Template:Rp<ref name=":0"/>Template:Rp
Geography
Topography
The park stretches for about Template:Convert along the southwest–northeast direction of the Southern Alps, covering Template:Convert on the south-eastern side of the main spine of the Alps.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Of New Zealand's 20 peaks over Template:Convert, all except Mount Aspiring / Tititea lie within the park.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> These include New Zealand's highest mountain, Aoraki / Mount Cook, at Template:Convert.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Other prominent peaks in or nearby the national park include Mount Tasman, Mount Hicks, Mount Sefton and Mount Elie de Beaumont.
Glaciers
At the end of the most recent ice age around 13,000 years ago,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> numerous glaciers were tributaries of a much larger glacier covering all of Hooker Tasman Valleys in hundreds of metres of ice. This glacier was about Template:Convert long and reached beyond the southern end of today's Lake Pukaki,<ref name=":1" /> up to Template:Convert south of Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park. As the glacier retreated, it filled the hollowed-out valleys with rocks and gravel, leaving behind the flat-bottomed U-shaped valleys seen today.<ref>Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref> Moraines left behind by the glacier's retreat can be seen in the valleys.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
Glaciers cover 40% of the park area, notably the Tasman Glacier in the Tasman Valley east of Aoraki / Mount Cook which is the largest glacier in New Zealand.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="doc">Template:Cite web</ref> A majority of glaciers in New Zealand lie within Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park, such as the Tasman Glacier, Hooker Glacier, Murchison Glacier and Mueller Glacier, while further north in the park lie the Godley Glacier, Classen Glacier, Grey Glacier and Maud Glacier. All of these glaciers terminate at proglacial lakes formed in recent decades due to a sustained period of shrinking.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Tasman Lake and Hooker Lake are easily accessible via walking tracks and are the only two of these lakes that have official names. Tasman Lake is the largest of the proglacial lakes. Taking a boat tour among the icebergs on the Tasman Lake is a popular tourist activity.<ref name="temple">Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Climate
Temperatures in Mount Cook Village range between extremes of Template:Convert to Template:Convert, and typically fall just over Template:Cvt for every Template:Convert of additional altitude.<ref name="doc2pg8">Template:Cite web</ref>
Rainfall is similarly variable, with the driest months receiving around Template:Convert precipitation, but recorded maxima are Template:Convert in one day and Template:Convert in a single month. Snow falls on about 21 days per year.<ref name="doc2pg8" />
During the coldest months of the year, Mueller Glacier Lake, Hooker Lake, and Tasman Lake usually freeze over, at least partially.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The weather conditions in the park, in particular at higher altitudes, can be unpredictable and change rapidly.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="MHR">Template:Cite web</ref>
Geology
The Southern Alps lie along a geological plate boundary, with the Pacific Plate to the southeast pushing westward and colliding with the northward-moving Indo-Australian Plate to the northwest.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Aoraki / Mount Cook lies in the centre of the Alpine Fault, a Template:Convert long active fault formed by the plate boundary, which has ruptured four times in the last 900 years.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Over the last 45 million years, the collision of the two tectonic plates has pushed up a 25 km thickness of rocks on the Pacific Plate to form the Southern Alps.<ref name="doc2pg72">Template:Cite web</ref> Extreme temperatures and high precipitation work to shatter surface rock, leading to erosion down the steep slopes. In December 1991, an avalanche of 10 million cubic metres of snow and rock caused 10 metres to be lost off the top of Aoraki / Mount Cook.<ref name="Landslide122">. The landslide carried with it another 40 million cubic metres of rock and ice.The impact caused an earth quake of 3.9 on the Richter scale. <P207 in search of Ancient NZ.Campball and Hutching.GNS science/Penguin.2011.> Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="Landslide222">Template:Cite web</ref> Two decades of erosion of the ice cap exposed after this collapse reduced the height by another 30 m to 3,724 m, as revealed by GPS data from a University of Otago climbing expedition in November 2013.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
There are two main rock types in the Southern Alps: sedimentary sandstones and metamorphic schists. The sandstones are greywacke and argillite, mostly to the east of the Main Divide, whereas the schists are mostly to the west of the Main Divide. Rock along the Alpine Fault has been warped and folded into complex layers with much shearing and fracturing.<ref>Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref> Very few fossils have been found in the rocks of the national park. Parts of the Malte Brun range can be dated to the Permian Period by fossils found there in red argillite.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>
Ecology
Flora
More than 400 species of plants are found in Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park, including more than 100 introduced plant species such as the colourful Russell lupin, wild cherry, snowberries, and wilding pines.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Most parts of the national park are either at higher altitude or in the proglacial valleys such as the Hooker Valley and Tasman Valley, where the soil of the valley floors and moraine walls do not support forest growth. As a result, the only pockets of forest and native bush, such as silver beech and tōtara trees, can be found in the park are along the southern edge of the Hooker Valley and the lower slopes of Sealy Range.<ref name="docnc">Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
The plant life in the majority of the park consists mostly of alpine plants. Between Template:Convert and in the valleys, the vegetation is predominantly snow tussock grassland, as well as golden speargrass, large mountain daisies (tikumu) (Celmisia semicordata, Celmisia coriacea), and Mount Cook lily, (Ranunculus lyallii), the largest buttercup in the world.<ref name="doc" /> All of these plants flower in the warmer months from November to February – early in the season in the valley floors, and later at higher altitudes. At the highest rocks of Aoraki / Mount Cook, around 14 species of lichen have been found.<ref name="doc2pg17">Template:Cite web</ref>
The native vegetation continues to be under threat by introduced plant species ranging from non-native trees through to lupins, broom and non-native grasses. These are mostly contained in the valley floors of the Tasman and Hooker Valley, since they are the most accessible parts of the park.<ref name="docmgmtplan">Template:Cite web</ref>
Tutu, a poisonous plant, flourishes throughout the Hooker Valley during summer.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Tutu is considered taonga by Ngāi Tahu.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Fauna
There are about 35 species of birds in the park including the kea, the only alpine parrot, Australasian Harrier (kāhu), silvereye (tauhou), a small omnivorous passerine bird, New Zealand falcon (kārearea), and the pipit (pīhoihoi).<ref name="doc2pg18">Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The tiny New Zealand rock wren (pīwauwau), a threatened species, is the only permanent alpine bird in New Zealand.<ref name="doc2pg18" /><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Small insectivores such as the rifleman (tītipounamu) and the fantail (pīwakawaka) live in the low forest and scrub, along with small numbers of two larger birds, the kererū and morepork (ruru). Introduced species such as finches and sparrows live throughout the bush near Mount Cook Village. The black stilt (kakī), the rarest wading bird in the world, primarily lives in the braided riverbed of the Tasman Valley.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="doc" /> In 2019, young black stilts raised in a hatchery were released near the Cass River and Godley River.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> European explorer Julius von Haast reported seeing kākā and piopio in the national park in 1862, however the piopio later became extinct.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>Template:Rp
The park is home to many invertebrates, including large dragonflies, crickets, grasshoppers, 223 recorded moth species and 7 native butterflies.<ref name="doc2pg19">Template:Cite web</ref> The black alpine wētā, also known as the Mount Cook flea, is found above the snowline. The jewelled gecko lives in the park but is rarely seen.<ref name="doc" />
Human interaction
Access
By land
Access to the national park began as a rough track from Twizel along the western shore of Lake Pukaki to the Hermitage.<ref name=":0" />Template:Rp The road, now known as State Highway 80, was improved over time. In the 1960s a major hydroelectric scheme was underway in the Mackenzie Basin. This required Lake Pukaki to be raised by Template:Convert, which would submerge parts of the gravel road to the Hermitage, so a new sealed road was built and completed in 1975.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The highway ends at Mount Cook Village, with a connecting road leading to the White Horse Hill camping ground. Another small road leads to a car park near Tasman Lake, the start of a short walking track and the Ball Hut Route.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> A pedestrian swing bridge was built over the Hooker River in the Hooker Valley in 1911, providing easier access to climbing routes.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
Rodolph Wigley's Mount Cook Motor Co was formed in 1906 to provide passenger and mail services to the Hermitage from the railhead at Fairlie.<ref name="on the2">John McCrystal On the Buses in New Zealand: from charabancs to the coaches of today, Grantham House, Wellington, 2007</ref><ref>Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref> The first coaches held between five and nine passengers and the journey from Fairlie to the Hermitage took around seven hours, not including a meal break.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The service evolved into Mount Cook Landlines, which transported visitors to Mount Cook Village from Queenstown and Christchurch until 1989.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In 1989, the new owner of Mount Cook Landlines, Tourism Holdings Limited, scrapped the coach services and the Mount Cook brand.<ref name="on the2" /> In recent years, coach services to Mount Cook Village are run by InterCity and other smaller operators.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
By air
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In 1920, following his success running a bus service to Mount Cook Village, Rodolph Wigley raised the idea of providing flights from Timaru and Queenstown to Mount Cook.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> A test flight took place in May 1920, with a plane circling Aoraki / Mount Cook but not landing, but nothing came of the idea.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The first landing in the Mount Cook area took place on 4 December 1934. Squadron-Leader T. W. White and a passenger flew a Spartan from Timaru, landing at Birch Hill Flat, Template:Convert southeast of Mount Cook Village.<ref name=":02">Template:Cite news</ref> Wigley's Mount Cook Tourist Company then built a small airfield, Mount Cook Aerodrome, at Birch Hill Flat. The aerodrome opened on 3 May 1936.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref name=":02" /> There is also another airfield, Glentanner Aerodrome, which is Template:Convert from Mount Cook Village.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Mount Cook Airline began scheduled passenger flights to the area in 1961.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In December 2019, Mount Cook Airline was merged into Air New Zealand and ceased operations.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
The Mount Cook company developed retractable skis for small aircraft, providing direct access to snowfields for skiers and sightseers.<ref name="way2">Wigley, Harry The Mount Cook Way: The first fifty years of the Mount Cook Company Auckland: Collins, 1979</ref> The first ski plane flight using retractable skis took place in 1955.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Mount Cook Ski-Planes and Helicopters is now an independently operated company, offering landings on the Tasman Glacier. Helicopters also provide access to the mountains for hunters and climbers.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref name=":0" />Template:Rp Ski touring is also possible on the Tasman Glacier, the descent from the top to the bottom is about Template:Convert.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref name=":0" />Template:Rp
Settlement within the park
Mount Cook Village
The village contains a small visitor centre, housing and amenities for the staff of the hotel and motels and other support personnel.<ref name="LTCP">Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The village has a small public primary school, opened in 1960, which is the only school in New Zealand situated inside a national park.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
In 1884, Frank Huddleston opened accommodation he called 'The Hermitage' at a site near the Mueller Glacier, to cater for climbing parties visiting the area.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The hotel was later expanded, but was severely damaged by two floods in 1913.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
The Hermitage was rebuilt on a more elevated site, opening in 1914, but that building was destroyed by fire in 1957.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> It was rebuilt quickly, opening in 1958, and since then has been altered and expanded several times as tourism increased.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Tourism
A visitor centre in the village features interpretation exhibits about the area's natural environment and history as well as an artwork collection.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park attracted over one million tourists in 2019, a significant increase compared to the three hundred ninety-eight thousand people that visited in the 2016/2017 season. Tourism significantly decreased after the COVID-19 pandemic.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
The park is a popular location for day hikes, sightseeing flights, heliskiing, hunting, kayaking, mountaineering, ski touring and tramping.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The Department of Conservation, alongside Ngāi Tahu, administers all activities in the park, including the White Horse Hill camping ground.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>Template:Rp<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Recreational helicopter flights and sightseeing planes operate in the national park.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park also attracts astrophotographers and stargazers due to low light pollution in the park.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Mount Cook Village is the start of several walking tracks, such as the popular Hooker Valley track which is Template:Convert long (return) and typically takes three hours to complete.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> About 1800–2000 people a day walk the Hooker Valley track in the peak season.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Sealy Tarns is another popular track in the park. It is more challenging than the Hooker Valley track, and is nicknamed "The Stairway to Heaven" due to its steepness.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Guided walking tours are offered on some other tracks, and boat trips and kayaking tours for tourists take place on the Tasman Lake at the end of the glacier.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> The park contains 15 huts, mostly in alpine terrain. The huts range from basic shelters to serviced huts, with the most accessible being Mueller Hut, which can be reached from Mount Cook Village within four hours.<ref name="MHR" /> In February 2024, the Department of Conservation reported that 250 people per day were using the track to Mueller Hut, mostly as day-walkers. The large number of visitors led to the toilets at the hut nearing maximum capacity. The track was temporarily closed to day-walkers so that those with a hut booking could still access and use the hut.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park is the starting point of the Alps to Ocean Cycle Trail to Oamaru. The Template:Cvt cycle trail was constructed from 2010 onwards by the New Zealand Cycle Trail project. Template:As of the cycle trail still includes Template:Cvt along public roads.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Mountaineering
The peaks of the Aoraki / Mount Cook region have long attracted mountaineers. In 1882 Rev. William Spotswood Green made the first notable attempt to climb Aoraki / Mount Cook. Green travelled to New Zealand with two Swiss guides to make the climb, after seeing Sealy's photographs of the mountain at an exhibition in London.<ref name=":1" /> The three men got very close to the summit before being forced to turn back.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> At a dinner in his honour after the climb, Green noted that climbing would be easier if huts were built in the mountains, as the huts would provide shelter and a place to store provisions, lightening the load of climbers. He also suggested that New Zealand set up an Alpine Club,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> leading to establishment of the New Zealand Alpine Club in 1891.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
After several attempts, the first successful ascent of Aoraki / Mount Cook was made on Christmas Day 1894, by Tom Fyfe, Jack Clarke, and George Graham.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
In December 1910, Freda Du Faur became the first woman to climb Aoraki / Mount Cook,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and in 1913 her climbing party made the first ascents of the Footstool and Mount Sefton. Mountaineering on the Aoraki / Mount Cook massif is a hazardous activity.<ref>Aoraki/Mount Cook Expedition | Summer 2014/15 Template:Webarchive alpineguides.co.nz</ref> In 1982, Mark Inglis and his climbing partner were trapped in a snow cave for two weeks.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
Other mountaineering routes include crossing the Aroarokaehe Range via the Copland Pass,<ref name="Upper Copland">Template:Cite web</ref> and the Mount Cook Range via the Ball Pass.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
The area was the training ground for Sir Edmund Hillary.<ref>Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> On the opposite side of the Hooker Valley, Mount Ollivier was Sir Edmund Hillary's first major climb in 1939. Since the establishment of a tramping track to Mueller Hut, not far below the summit, Ollivier is now one of the most accessible mountains in the park.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Another mountain popular for mountaineers of intermediate skills is Sebastopol, the closest mountain to Mount Cook Village. At Template:Convert in height, it is only Template:Convert above Mount Cook Village, with the lower half of the ascent following the Red Tarns tramping track.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Sebastopol offers one of a few view points taking in both the Hooker Valley and the Tasman Valley.
There are 15 mountain huts in Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park for the use of climbers and hunters.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Twelve of these are managed by the Department of Conservation, two belong to the New Zealand Deerstalkers Association and one, Caroline Hut, is privately owned by an alpine guiding company.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Another hut—Red Stag Hut—sits just outside the national park in the adjoining Te Kahui Kaupeka Conservation Park.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Hooker Hut, built in 1910, is the oldest surviving hut in the national park. It has been moved three times as the Hooker Glacier receded, then was removed and restored before being reassembled in a new location in 2021.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The oldest hut still in its original location is Sefton Bivouac, built in 1917.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
International Dark Sky Reserve
Template:Main In June 2012, an area of Template:Convert including Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park and the Mackenzie Basin was designated as the Aoraki Mackenzie International Dark Sky Reserve by the DarkSky International. At the time of the designation in 2012, the reserve was the largest in the world, and the only reserve of its type in the Southern Hemisphere.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The night sky brightness in the reserve ranks at a level 2 on the nine-level Bortle scale.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Management and conservation
Management plan
In 2018 the Department of Conservation drafted a management plan for the park to consider how land, water, flora and fauna, aircraft and visitors to Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park could be managed over the following 10 years.<ref name=":04">Template:Cite web</ref> However, review of the plan stopped in February 2019 to consider the ramifications of a Supreme Court decision involving Ngāi Tai, an Auckland iwi, who argued that DOC should consider the Treaty of Waitangi when granting concessions for commercial activities on conservation land. The Supreme Court found that "decisions to grant concessions to third parties would need to include asking whether the concession opportunities should be preserved for the economic benefit of Ngāi Tai and whether there was any basis for the preferential grant of concessions to Ngāi Tai".<ref name=":04" /> DOC paused work on the management plan for Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park while it held discussions with Ngāi Tahu.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name=":04" />
The formation of the draft management plan occurred at the same time as the number of visitors to Aoraki / Mount Cook Park was increasing dramatically. Visitor numbers doubled between 2016 and 2019, reaching more than one million visits to Mount Cook Village, the gateway to the park. Proposals to manage the huge number of tourists included a booking system, a park entrance fee, and a 'park and ride' system to limit traffic in the village. A local Ngāi Tahu leader noted that Tourism New Zealand has been encouraging lots of people to come to the country without necessarily having the infrastructure in place".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The Department of Conservation had concerns about management of increasing quantities of human waste and litter in the village and in alpine huts, suggesting that visitors might be encouraged to take their litter away when they leave the park.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Threats from introduced animals
A wide range of introduced animals are present in the park or in surrounding regions. These include stoats, red deer, possums, tahr and chamois.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>Template:Rp<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Many of these animals pose significant threats to the flora and fauna of the park.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Tahr
In 1904, the Duke of Bedford gave five Himalayan tahr to the New Zealand Tourist Department. The South Canterbury Acclimatisation Society released the animals at Governor's Bush in Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park in December 1904.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In 1909, another eight tahr were released in the same area,<ref name=":12">Template:Cite web</ref> and the population increased. Tahr cause damage to alpine plants, leading to soil erosion, and from 1937 the government has attempted to control the spread and numbers of tahr.<ref name=":12" /> The Department of Conservation encourages hunting of tahr in Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>Template:Rp
Chamois
In 1907, the Emperor of Austria presented the New Zealand government with a herd of eight chamois. The animals were released in the Hooker valley near the Hermitage Hotel as protected game animals, and within a few years they had begun breeding and spreading along the length of the Southern Alps.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref name=":05">Template:Cite web</ref> By the 1930s chamois were acknowledged to be causing damage to the alpine environment, by eating native plants and by trampling vegetation and compacting the soil.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Protection was removed and control measures were created.<ref name=":05" /><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Today chamois can be hunted year-round in Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Lead toxicity to kea
Research on lead toxicity in kea living at Aoraki / Mount Cook in the 1990s found that of 38 live kea tested, all were found to have detectable blood lead levels, 26 considered dangerously high.<ref name="DOC_TSOP9">Template:Cite web</ref> Additional analysis of 15 dead kea sent to Massey University for diagnostic pathology between 1991 and 1997 found nine bodies to have lead blood levels consistent with causing death.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> After further testing in the 2000s found lead in kea, the Department of Conservation attempted to remove all sources of lead such as flashings and nail heads from buildings in Mount Cook Village.<ref name=":2">Template:Cite book</ref>Template:Rp The Kea Conservation Trust has continued this work with funding from DOC.<ref name=":2" /><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Other threats
After extensive filming took place in national parks including Aoraki / Mount Cook for the Lord of the Rings trilogy, concerns about the possible effects of such activities on the environment were raised at a workshop in 2002.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
In popular culture
Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park has been used as a filming location for numerous films, including Mulan (2020),<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Vertical Limit (2000),<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The Lord of the Rings film series (2001–2003), The Chronicles of Narnia film series (2005–2010), and A Wrinkle in Time (2018).<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Minas Tirith, the capital of Gondor in the fantasy adventure film series The Lord of the Rings, was filmed approximately Template:Convert away from Mount Cook Village.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
First Crossings, a reality show retracing early exploration in New Zealand, had two episodes relating to Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park: 'Fyfe and Graham', about the first ascent of Mount de la Beche in 1894,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and 'Miracle in the Southern Alps', about a 1948 rescue on La Perouse.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
See also
- Forest parks of New Zealand
- List of mountains of New Zealand by height
- National parks of New Zealand
- Protected areas of New Zealand
References
External links
Template:Commons category Template:Wikivoyage
- Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park
- Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park Education Resource 2010 (archived)
- Mt Cook: Does reaching summit outweigh risks?
Template:Aoraki / Mount Cook National Park Template:National Parks of New Zealand Template:Authority control