Skateventure through Chile and Peru

Yes it was actually, my friend Troy who also came on this trip had previously done a crazy trip from the top of Thailand to Singapore and I saw the great experiences he had, meeting amazing people, dodging elephants, past snakes and I thought that would be an amazing adventure to do. That really inspired me to get involved and I had heard many great things about Chile and Peru thought it would be a great place to explore.

Yes well somewhat, sustainability is probably not as front of mind for people in South America as it is from where I come from. In saying that we received positive support for our goals and what the trip was about. In terms of what people can do, try to incorporate activities that don’t require using vehciles or burning of fossil fuels. Obviously though flights and other transport are hard to avoid, so perhaps look at ways to offset the emissions from your flights through verified carbon credits.

We received a bit of sponsorship for equipment which helped us a lot, and the equipment was great and held up well considering it got battered around so much! We basically have a website and facebook following and approached a couple of cool companies to see if they would support our cause.

Yes, we have actually all moved up to Auckland since the earthquakes. But all experienced the earthquakes in Christchurch. We didn’t see any noticeable effects Chile, but in saying that we didn’t have an appreciation of what places may have looked like before the Earthquake happened so I couldn’t really say.

That’s the next question right?! Well to be honest I haven’t looked into it yet. Guy reckons something crazy like Antarctica could be the go, but we would have to create some sort of ridiculous board or wheels to do that. Do you have any suggestions?

When I was at university I learnt to longboard, as it was a great way to get around the place. I had many other friends who did the same and I guess it just became a fun hobbieof mine. In NZ longboarding seems to be growing rapidly, with groups starting to form and even some downhill competitions are starting I believe. So it’s great to see.

7. Tell us some more about the carboNZero programme and your role in that

Well we help companies in around the world to measure, reduce and offset their greenhouse gas emissions (carbon footprint) with credibility. My role is to help businesses communicate the great initiatives they are implementing to reduce their impact on the environment and also to help raise awareness of what we do at carboNZero. So a cool job, with a company doing great things!

Yes for sure, the people were great, the roads were really good and the scenery was amazing. Chile was a great place for what we were doing.

Well one of the boys got attacked and bitten by a large pack off wild dogs near Tocopilla, we had to not go off the side of the road for 15kms when we crossed the Peru/Chile boarder because off rogue landmines…But really the one thing we didn’t really plan for was the crazy reponses we had from people passing us by or people we met in villages. Some people treated us like aliens, others high fived us and others just tooted their horns angrily and wondered why three crazy guys were in their town on Skateboards! We also had to survive on biscuits for a few days, as in a few planned out villages we arrived at bad times and food access wasn’t good etc so that was hard, and we actually ran out of sunblock one day and ended up having to rub dirt on our arms etc to stop getting burnt haha. A few desperate times you might say…

There has been some good coverage here in NZ and Australia, I guess because it is a rather unusual story! But the support has been great, and we are stoked to be able to make a few people smile!

Great, I guess that overall it was a hard trip, we had some hill climbs that lasted over 25kms but the people, the scenery and adventure that we had made it all worthwhile