Scene change for outdoors instructor

Press, 27 April 1989, Page 4

Scene change for outdoors instructor

By

NANCY CAWLEY

A man for all seasons. Yorkshire-born Mick Hopkinson, the retiring director of the St Andrew’s College Castle Hill Outdoor Centre, is an internationally regarded whitewater kayaker, mountaineer and caver. After years introducing groups to "teamwork and interaction,” tramping, rock-climbing and rafting, of sleeping in snow-caves and under limestone boulders, he will leave at the end of this school term to become the director of Outdoor Pursuits Centre — the North Island centre on the Turangi side, of Mount Ruapehu. He replaces Ms Jo Straker, who will leave after 12 years. According to Mr Hopkinson, Outdoor Pursuits Centre, established by the adventurer, Graeme Dingle, in 1973, is “the top outdoor centre in New Zealand,” teaching more “all-round skills” than any other similar establishment in the country. It provides instruction for business people, sports clubs, schools, the disadvantaged and those on probation. Staff are also learning. “Many professional outdoor instructors, both local and from overseas,

have learnt their group management skills at 0.P.C.,” he said. Mr Hopkinson felt that a similar outdoor centre in the South Island would be desirable. With a colourful background that includes participation in television adventure films in New Zealand and America, and the first kayak descent of the Blue Nile in Africa (1972) and the Karnall River in Nepal (1987), 39-year-old Mr Hopkinson is looking forward to heading a group of 10 to 15 instructors, where the director may be the driving force but where policy decisions are voted on by staff and director. At the Castle Hill Centre he has been “four committees away from the people who make the changes.” Nevertheless, he and his two assistant instructors, Marty Sinclair and Ellen Sagmyr, have seen to the extensive renovation of the 25-year-old lodge and the establishment of a wide-rang-ing outdoor skills programme. Mr Hopkinson will start at O.P.C. on June 1. Before that, he will take a month-long busman’s holiday in Australia — rockclimbing in the Blue Mountains and on Frog’s Buttress, near Brisbane.