Come behind the scenes and into the jobs, the challenges, the highlights, and the personalities of the people who work at the Department of Conservation (DOC).

Today we profile Brien Barret, Ranger – Visitor Information

Name: Brien Barrett

Position: Ranger (Visitor Information/ i-Site, Franz Josef Area Office).

Enjoying a sunny day at Franz Josef

At work…

What kind of things do you do in your role?

We provide a massive amount of information on local treks, Great Walks, hunting areas, and bookings for Great Walks and huts (for a start). Also, because we are an i-Site, we make bookings for lodging, transportation, guided walks (both on and off the glaciers), helicopter flights, skydives, and a variety of other adventures both locally here on the West Coast and throughout the rest of the country.

What is the best part about your job?

I love meeting and interacting with people from all over the world, and I’ve really grown to love the variety of problem solving that the job requires. If a visitor comes into the office and has only a general idea of what they want to do in a certain area, we sit down with them and try to hammer out an itinerary. I love calling a wide variety of operators and trying to find the right fit for the right person, and seeing the looks on people’s faces when you solve what they think is unsolvable is priceless. In general, 99.9% of people are very happy that we are here to help them.

What is the hardest part about your job?

The limited exposure to sunlight.

The very, very beautiful Mt. Brown Hut

What led you to your role in DOC?

I grew up in a family that cherished time spent outdoors, and Madison, Wisconsin opened my eyes to the power of conservation. For the past three years, I have been working seasonally as a Park Ranger in Yosemite National Park, California, and I try to have a different adventure in my time off from work during the US’s winter months. One of my best friends from university spent quite a bit of time in New Zealand after he completed his degree, and the photos he took of this country completely blew my mind into bits.

I have always wanted more experience working on conservation abroad, and figured New Zealand is just about the coolest place on Earth to do so. Applications were sent out, conversations happened, and here I am living in one of the most beautiful places on Earth and exploring every bit of it.

What was your highlight from the month just gone?

Waking up at 3 a.m. to climb a bit up Mt Barff and watching the Milky Way float above me. It was one of the first times in the past two months that I’ve lived here that I’ve been able to see a cloud-less and moon-less view of the southern hemisphere night sky. It was just magical.

The Milky Way floating over Liverpool Hut above the Matukituki Valley

The rule of 3…

3 loves

(This week’s three loves brought to you by the letter “M”)

1. Mountains.
2. Music.
3. My fam and friends.

3 pet peeves

1. Intolerance.
2. Loud, audible breathing.
3. Sandflies that bite my feet while I’m driving.

3 foods

1. Broccoli.
2. Thai Red Curry.
3. Greasy, grimey, and spicy Mexican food.

3 favourite places in New Zealand

1. Matukituki Valley.
2. Isthmus Peak in between Lakes Hawea and Wanaka.
3. The Mt. Brown Hut (awesome, awesome project).

Favourite movie, album, book

• Movie: The Motorcycle Diaries (I dare you to watch this and not develop wanderlust.)
• Music: Tie between Phish “The Story of a Ghost” and Bon Iver “Bon Iver” (Bon Iver for when I want to sink into my couch and Phish for when I need to get up and get funky)
• Book: Aldo Leopold “A Sand County Almanac” or anything by Jon Krakauer

Mt Conness, one of my favourite parts of Yosemite National Park

Deep and meaningful…

What piece of advice would you tell your 18 year old self?

Don’t worry about the small stuff – bigger, more important adventures are going to wash those worries away. Also, don’t study Arabic during your first semester of university. Ugh.

Who or what inspires you and why?

• What: Wildness
• Who: I’m inspired by people who have an infectious passion for their work. I was always told growing up that if I loved my work, that I’d never work a day in my life. I was brought up in a family full of passionate and driven people, and nearly all of my friends have so far sacrificed a life of monetary wealth and possessions so they could live to protect some of the most beautiful places on Earth. The more I live, the more I’ve realise it’s important to be inspired by those closest to you.

Aside from that, Paul Farmer is a really cool dude.

When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?

Batman or a film director. Those dreams didn’t quite pan out.

And now, if you weren’t working at DOC, what would you want to be?

I would want to be working in the developing world. One of my best friends helped develop a project in Guatemala where she was building schools using plastic soda bottles filled with trash as bricks. The ability to simultaneously beautify an area while teaching the community about small scale conservation makes that one of the coolest projects I’ve ever heard of. I’d love to try to spread something like that to more places.

What sustainability tip would you like to pass on?

Grow a garden! You save money, carbon, and planting a variety of veggies can force you to eat outside your typical routine.

Which green behaviour would you like to adopt this year—at home? At work?

In Yosemite, we can’t have gardens, as they attract bears (and you really don’t want bears around your home for a variety of reasons), and I’m very excited to take advantage of a bear-free garden space. My flatmates and I did a bunch of weed-pulling and planting in our yard the other day. I’m eager to save more money on food.

Sitting on a ledge on El Capitan, (900 metre drop), getting ready to try out the “porch swing”

If you could be any New Zealand native species for a day, what would you be and why?

It always amazes me how the massive New Zealand pigeons are able to land on the smallest of branches in my yard and not break them. I would like to know their secrets to defying the laws of physics.

What piece of advice or message would you want to give to New Zealanders when it comes to conservation?

I think when we get used to having easy access to beautiful areas that we can take it for granted and not utilize these areas as much as we could. New Zealanders live in a very, very magical place, and I hope they are out exploring as much of it as possible. With that, I hope that more folks from the North Island are finding ways to visit the South Island and folks from down here are getting up there!