Overland Track trek in Tasmania
How this holiday makes a difference
Environment
The Overland Track trek is our flagship walk that follows our strict Leave No Trace principles. Camping on raised platforms, staying on the graded trail and travelling as a self sufficient group, our travellers are briefed before the tour on ways to help us minimise our overall impact on this very fragile and beautiful landscape.
Our company is privileged to operate in some of the most pristine landscapes on earth, many of them exclusively. The Tasmanian environment boasts some of the world’s freshest air, ancient forests, some of the earth’s oldest trees and rivers you can still drink from. These regions, such as the Walls of Jerusalem and the South West World Heritage wilderness, see very few travellers. We are committed to assisting travellers to experience and understand these precious environments and to help protect and maintain them at the same time.
Our entire team shares a deep commitment to maintaining the integrity of the Tasmanian wilderness. Accordingly we have established an operation that follows a Leave No Trace philosophy and are proud of the fact that we have effectively left no human trace behind over two decades of operating in Tasmania’s most delicate environs. The places we take our travellers remain in the same excellent and pristine condition as when we first found them.
Our leaders encourage and promote an understanding to our travellers of local conservation, including:
Stay on track: If no track, fan out and do not follow in each other's footsteps. On beaches, walk below the high-tide mark.
Use of fuel stoves: Take care to place your stove and any hot pots on hard surfaces. Some vegetation does not easily recover from the heat of stoves.
Pack it in - pack it out: Take all of your rubbish out with you! Collect any other bushwalkers' garbage off the track!
Campsite etiquette: Pitch your tent on an established site rather than creating a new one. Once camp is established minimise movements, i.e collect your water once for the evening.
Flora/Fauna: Don’t disturb or feed nesting birds or browsing animals. Avoid introducing weeds or seeds into new areas by thoroughly cleaning boots tents and other equipment before and after each trip.
The root rot fungus Phytophthora cinnamomi is present in Tasmania help stop the spread we ensure our travellers clean their gear including boots, tent pegs, gaiters and tent floor, before, during and after a trek.
Water: One of the rare pleasures one can have in Tasmania is to dip ones cup into the stream and drink directly from it. We advise travellers on how to keep the water sources unpolluted by taking washing water 100m away from a water source to only use bio-degradable soap.
Human Food drops: - Some areas we visit are so remote that food drops are required to assist our travellers. To minimize impact our food drops have changed location and are rotated from sites to enable rainforest to regenerate. Careful planning and judgement reduces the amount of times food drops have to be delivered. Today, 95% of our trips employ locals to make food drops rather than utilize helicopters – thus also reducing carbon emissions.
We were delighted that our efforts were nominated by our travellers and subsequently long listed for the Responsible Travel Awards 2011.
Community
We operate this trip in accordance with National Park policies and park fees raised from the tour are used towards maintaining this trek as one of Australia's most iconic walks.
From local transport providers, to leaders and even office staff, we employ and utilise local services wherever possible.
We take Youth Groups to visit the Devils at Cradle Sanctuary to learn about the important work being done to help save this endangered Australian animal. We also provide the opportunity to support this park and their work on our shorter treks to the summit of Cradle Mountain.
As part of our operations manual we make it very clear that resources, where and when possible, should be purchased from local sources. We have a food policy, whereby it states that the produce on trips should be both Tasmanian owned and produced. If both are not possible it should then be either produced or owned locally before even considering any mainland or overseas alternatives.
All guides and support staff are locally employed.
We employ people to do our food drops – rather than helicopters.
All vehicles are maintained frequently locally in Launceston.
As a pioneer and leader in the Tasmanian adventure industry, we help to bring together smaller operators and include some of their experiences in our multi-activity packages so they benefit from our marketing activities as well.
There is a check of local gear and equipment before every tour at a local gear shop. If a client is deemed lacking essential equipment we have obtained favourable rates for them to purchase the gear from the locally owned outdoor shop.
Each year we run at least one charity fundraising trek which benefits a Tasmanian charity financially as well as through raising their profile through the marketing activities we undertake to promote the trek.
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