Pegasus Post: January 17, 2017

6
Tuesday January 17 2017
Our People
PEGASUS POST
Geoff Harrow
Love of nature and adventure
HONOURED: Geoff Harrow received a Maori cloak when he retired
from the Shearwater Trust.
PHOTO: GEOFF SLOAN
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From climbing with Sir Edmund Hillary to walking on his own
to the South Pole, Geoff Harrow spoke to Caitlin Miles about his
achievements and receiving a Queen’s Service Medal
Firstly Geoff,
congratulations on receiving
your medal.
I was quite astonished, it was
quite a surprise.
Really? Did you know that
you had been nominated for
it?
I was told someone had
nominated me at the end of
October. I’m not sure who it is
but I was a little embarrassed
because, while I had worked
hard for mountaineering and
conservation and skiing, so
have a hell of a lot of other
people. There should be a couple
of thousand other people
that I know of that should
deserve it just as much or more
than me.
How did you get started in
conservation work?
Well, I was always a bit of a
wanderer. We lived in Upper
Riccarton near the airport
and we would go up around
the countryside setting rabbit
snares and collecting, dear
I say it, terrible things like
collecting bird eggs! I even
HELPING US,
HELPS THE
COMMUNITY
Drop off or buy
collected bird eggs from the
main runway at Christchurch
Airport. I’ve always been
interested in birds. I started off
making a birds’ egg collection,
which is a terrible no-no these
days, but a lot of kids did when
I was at Riccarton School. I’ve
always looked at the Port Hills
and tried to get my brothers
and sisters to take me there
and they rarely would but, as
I got older, I went with school
friends and I could see the
mountains way out to the west.
We had a school trip to the
West Coast and we came right
through Arthur’s Pass and I
saw snow up on the mountains
and glaciers and thought, oh,
isn’t that amazing and that I’d
love to get up in that country,
but I was a bit small to do that
at that stage. So I had an interest
from a very early age, but
I’ve been a member of Forest
& Bird since 1938, and I’m 90
now so 79 years.
You’ve also been interested
in the mountains for a long
time?
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I climbed Mt Oxford when
I was about 12 and when
I got to high school, I met
up with other like-minded
kids interested in tramping
and one of them, his father,
was a member of the
mountaineering club and we
went up to the Waimakariri
in the third form (year 9) and
we were right up there and it
was quite something. We saw
these back country huts so
they were places to stay and
the people that owned the huts
said you kids should belong
to the club because you’re
using our facilities and very
shortly after that I joined the
mountaineering club, in 1945 I
think it was.
Did you work in the
conservation sector?
No. This was purely just a
hobby. I worked for medical
supplies’ companies. The
whole of my life was spent
in the marketing of research
medicines to doctors and
chemists. I’ve been retired for
32 years now.
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