We are delighted to welcome Crystal Brindle from Te Anau as a new member of our Executive. Originally from the United States, Crystal is a passionate tramper and mountain runner, and has quickly taken to exploring some of the remotest corners of our country.
Crystal is our youngest Exec member, but has plenty of experience working in the backcountry, since she was first employed by the National Park Service as a teenager. She has worked both in the Recreation and in the Biodiversity sectors of DoC. You can read more about her history here.
Crystal is also an excellent landscape photographer. She was the overall winner of FMC’s photo competition in 2016 with the image below. Her website is full of mouth-watering images of landscapes in New Zealand and overseas.
Campsite near Lake Barra, by Crystal Brindle
Here is what Crystal writes about herself, and her involvement with FMC:
I first joined FMC as an overseas individual member in 2015 while living in Alaska because I couldn’t stand spending five months without access to information about the New Zealand outdoors. I now live in New Zealand full-time and immerse myself in the mountains as a ranger for the Department of Conservation (DOC), a landscape photographer, an avid tramper, and a keen trail runner. After five seasons of work with DOC, I have experienced life in the hills as a hut warden, biodiversity ranger, and most recently as a research assistant in alpine Fiordland.
I am excited to work with the FMC executive toward more effective engagement of young people in the outdoors through trialing social media campaigns using high quality photos and multi-media story telling. I want to create a toolbox for encouraging involvement specifically for a younger audience. I know how to target this group because I’m a part of it myself and I want to see more people my age involved with FMC.
As I look to the future I see myself beginning to use my voice not only for the conservation of nature in New Zealand but also for bringing people together by pulling on the common thread that leads us all into outdoor spaces. I want to do this specifically through the FMC executive because I believe FMC is the place where that common thread lives.
Crystal Brindle
