Meet the Trustees
Margaret Fyfe - Trust Patron
Margaret is Tūpiki Trust patron and an esteemed kaumatua in the New Zealand climbing community. Margaret was NZAC President 1977-79. She has a distinguished climbing record including the first winter traverse of Pinnacles Ridge on Mt Ruapehu and first ascent of SE face of Mt Castor. She was the first woman to climb all New Zealand 3000m peaks. Margaret became an NZAC Life Member during the club’s centenary in 1991.
Ross Cullen - Trust Chair
Ross was President of the NZAC from 1991-1993 after time as Otago Section chair 1984-85. During his 43 year engagement with the club he has held numerous roles including HQ committee chair 1997-2001, two stints as Publications convenor 2003-2007, 2016-2022, two terms as Board member. During his period of engagement with the NZAC administration he has attended numerous Club Committee meetings and talked to many of the sections around the country. Ross was appointed a Life Member of NZAC in 2002 in recognition of his sustained contribution to the club.
Ross has climbed and scrambled on eight continents, focused particularly on the Ohau- Landsborough region and authored the first two editions of the guidebook to that region.
In his professional life he is an emeritus professor of resource economics at Lincoln University, and worked for 35 years in academia, teaching and researching on a wide range of environmental and resource issues. In his retirement Ross volunteers on numerous conservation and outdoor recreation projects in Te Tau Ihu region.
Dave Bamford - Trustee
Dave has a life centred around mountaineering, protected areas and sustainable tourism in developing countries and regions. He has climbed extensively in New Zealand. Ascents include all the 3,000 metre peaks in New Zealand including several first ascents. He has climbed overseas in the Himalayas, South America, Europe and Antarctica. He is a past president (2003-2005) and a life member of NZAC.
Dave worked in New Zealand’s National Park Service with a focus on visitor use. In 1986 with a business partner he founded Tourism Resource Consultants. The firm had a 30-year history promoting sustainable tourism in more than 40 countries. In his current capacity as an independent tourism advisor, Dave focuses on providing strategic advice and input on a range of tourism and conservation projects.
Dave attended and contributed to Sustainable Summits conferences 2014, 2016, 2018, 2020 and was the 2021 recipient of The Sir Jack Newman Award for Outstanding Industry Leadership in tourism. He is a board member for the Timber Trail Lodge, Kāpiti Nature Lodge and the board of Te Urewera, New Zealand’s first large protected area that is jointly managed by Tuhoe and Crown nominees.
Geoff Gabites - Trustee
Geoff has considerable business experience linked to outdoor recreation including manufacturing, retail, support services. Geoff is owner-director and Chief Executive Officer at Cycle Journeys based in Christchurch. Geoff made a major contribution to New Zealand climbing, focused particularly on the Darran Mountains, leading the development with partners of winter ice climbing in that region. He participated in a number of expeditions to Himalayan peaks including the first ascent of Molamenqing.
Geoff was NZAC President 1989-91 and in a variety of roles provided almost thirty-year period of leadership in the Club. Geoff, with insight and expertise honed by involvement in several outdoor recreation businesses, was a significant force in the growth and evolution of NZAC during the last thirty years. In 1999 he met key Banff Mountain Film Festival players and established the relationship that enables NZAC to screen Banff movies each year.
Geoff is a Life Member of NZAC. In 2015 he was awarded Skills Active Supreme Award and Sport New Zealand Volunteer Award for his outstanding contributions in the outdoors.
Sam Newton - Trustee
Sam holds a Bachelor of Commerce, a Bachelor of Arts with Honours, and has been a recipient of the Sir Winston Churchill Memorial Trust Fellowship. He has worked in a variety of high-profile roles including as a Parliamentary Advisor, and has held a number of Board appointments, including as Chair of the Canterbury Aoraki Conservation Board, Deputy Chair of the New Zealand Mountain Safety Council and as Trustee of ACAT.
Sam is passionate about active recreation in the outdoors and has a wide variety of interests including rock climbing, mountaineering, ski touring, packrafting, and tramping. He also serves as an Officer in the New Zealand Army Reserve.
Shelley Hersey - Trustee
Shelley has been an active member of the New Zealand Alpine Club for more than 25 years. She has climbed extensively throughout Aotearoa, including multiple first ascents, and has taken part in expeditions to the Indian Himalaya, east Nepal, west Nepal and South America.
Shelley has been the recipient of several grants, including the Sport New Zealand Hillary Expedition Grant and the North Face Expedition Grant.
Shelley has worked as an educator, writer and videographer. Engaging with a diverse range of stakeholders, she has been able to share her passion for the outdoors and environment through teaching, online education programmes, books and videos.
Shelley is especially motivated to inspire and empower rangatahi to undertake their own adventures and conservation projects
Martin Hunter - Trustee
Martin (or Marty as he is often referred to) has climbed in New Zealand and has been a member of a number of expeditions to Himalayan peaks in Nepal, India, and Tibet, including a first ascent of Syao Kang in the Kangchenjunga region in Eastern Nepal. He has climbed in Alaska, Peru and Europe, making the most of a seven year stint living in the UK.
His professional background is in law, and he has held a variety of executive roles in financial services companies including banking, risk management, HR, funds management, strategy and operations.
He has a particular interest in the role that the outdoors and adventure play in the education and development of young people. He is a trustee of Hillary Outdoors, and has been a member of the NZAC for many years starting off in the Wellington section and now in the Auckland section.
Stephen Hunt - Trustee
NZAC President Stephen Hunt represents the New Zealand Alpine Club on the Board of the Tūpiki Trust. Stephen started climbing at 18 and it remains his life passion.
Originally from Dunedin he has lived and climbed extensively overseas. He enjoys big multi-pitch trad climbing, alpine mountaineering and instructing. In particular, Stephen enjoys introducing new climbers to the sport and helping them progress to climb independently and confidently in the high alpine environment.
Over the years he has climbed in the European Alps, Yosemite, the Karakorum and Nepal Himalaya on a number of routes including the West Ridge Hornbein Couloir route on Everest, and the first ascent by a New Zealander of Gasherbrum 1 (8086m).
Stephen has primarily worked in aviation and aerospace and has held directorships in an airline and NFPs. He was the Chair of the Wellington Section 2018-19, lives in Wellington. He was the Chief Executive of MetService until September 2025 and currently works in governance and strategic advisory roles, as well as consulting
Lindsay Smith - Trust Adminstrator
Lindsay ended his term as a founding Tūpiki Trustee and is now in the role of Trust Administrator, aiming to relieve the Trustees of many of their operational responsibilities. Lindsay has many years of leadership in creating and implementing strategic changes across a diverse range of significant businesses and community organisations in New Zealand and overseas, from a background in media and public relations.
He was an NZAC board member and was President of New Zealand Alpine Club 2019-2021, following twenty years’ service to Otago Section. Indeed, the family connection to the section continues with his son Riley being elected Otago Section Chair as a 17-year-old.
Although he rated himself at best a mediocre rock climber and mountaineer in his day, that in no way diminishes his passion for climbing in all its forms..