The 2023 Walking Festival started on Friday and runs to Sunday, November 19.
Writing the Walk
One of the few sedentary events in the 10-day Wairarapa Walking Festival was in Carterton on Sunday afternoon when Frank Goldingham, veteran newspaper publisher and personal computing pioneer, gave a talk entitled ‘Writing the Walk’.
Goldingham’s latest venture in publishing, the monthly Walking NZ Magazine, began in June 1996; more than 300 issues have appeared to date.
The session, that included questions from the small, attentive audience, was chaired by Celia Wade-Brown, founder of Wairarapa’s Walking Festival.
There was discussion about the booming interest in serious walking, often supported by local councils, with walking tracks, sometimes in conjunction with cycling, sprouting up around the country.
While several of the major nationally-known walks, like the iconic Tongariro Alpine Crossing and Milford Track, have become very crowded there are an increasing number of tracks linking parts of cities and towns and in the surrounding countryside. In the Wairarapa alone there are numerous town, farm, coastal and country walks that combine the health-boosting advantages of exercise in natural surroundings.
Each issue of Walking NZ Magazine contains descriptions of walks all over the country, written by enthusiasts who have walked them, as well as the latest news about walking and cycling from around the world.
Although most of the walks are free, registration is essential to secure your place. For more information, see cartertonec.co.nz/walking
