Rocks and hard places.
“This can’t be the way.”
I emerge, scratched and panting, onto a blessed patch of open tussock. I’m in the middle of Fiordland, painstakingly extracting myself from the alpine scrub that’s had me hemmed in on all sides. The toothy, snow-draped peaks of the Darran Mountains tower over the lush valley I’m traversing. Every inch of bare skin has been scoured by bush lawyer. I’m lucky to still have eyeballs. I feel like it’s taken ten hours to move a hundred metres.
More disturbing than the physical discomfort of this Type 2 fun, however, is the creeping concern that this can’t be right. Surely no one has been this way before, no one would subject themselves to this. There must be something we’ve missed. We can’t be on the right path, which means we may not make our destination on schedule or, worst case, at all.
“A cairn!”
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On a break of clear dirt, the short stack of flattish rocks is a welcome sight. Some likeminded tramper has considered this a good point to let people know that this treacherous ground has been trodden before. The way ahead is the way forward.
The topo map has not made it obvious which way is most direct, or least painful. But now, thanks to a message from a friend, we know we’re on the right track.
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The word cairn has its root in the Gaelic “carn”, meaning “heap of stones”. It first cropped up in use by the Lowland Scots in the 1500s, and it’s represented in the Celtic languages, Old Irish and Welsh. However, human-made piles of rock are found all over the world, from the inuksuk in the Arctic to the “stone johnnies” of Montana and Colorado, to the “tower tombs” of Jordan, and they’ve enjoyed a variety of uses outside of marking trails.
Evidence exists of burial cairns and monuments dating back to the Neolithic Period and Early Bronze Age. Rock towers have been used to mark boundaries, to store food, and as sites for ceremonies and rituals. They have even served as lighthouses and have formed labyrinths. Stacking stones is still a popular pastime today, acknowledged for aesthetic and not just practical reasons. Some folk view rock stacking as a harmless, fun activity, simply for the joy of making something balance. Or creating something Instagram-able – modern cairns are often concocted to star in photographs.
Throughout history, they have been recognised as culturally significant, useful and ornamental. But not everyone is equally as enamoured of them as I was when we emerged from the scrub that day. What’s the problem? Why the haters? And why are there places where cairns are banned?
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When I reach the top of Corner Peak in Hāwea Conservation Park, I’m greeted by something I hesitate to call a cairn. Slabs of schist stand boldly upright, laid deliberately against one another; the top of the central pillar piece is flat and square, forming a table. On top of this alter, in its own miniature stone shelter, sits the skull of a small mammal (a mouse, perhaps).
It is at once a celebration and a triumph of engineering, a flag that screams, “we were here!” It is also mildly disturbing, a creepy tableau that makes you wonder what may have taken place in this remote spot.
My first reaction is amusement. And, to be honest, I’m impressed someone has taken the time and expended the effort to erect it, after what can only be described as an arduous hike to get here. But also, I ask myself, is this appropriate? It is sort of art. Perhaps it is fitting that the remains of an invasive wingless species adorn the megalith, symbolic of the fact it was left by another invasive wingless species. In our case, it seems we can’t help but make our mark.
There have been other cairns along the journey, less ostensibly artwork, more guideposts. Not a large number, but perhaps proliferation—or just familiarity—leads to permission. This would seem to be the case in spots such as the Gertrude Valley, where in places it seems every available flat surface of granite is adorned with a collection of loosely conical towers. If you’ve headed off for a hike to immerse yourself in naked nature and get away from manmade structures, you’ve been foiled.
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Towards the end of 2018, a national tourism campaign was launched asking visitors to Aotearoa to honour the “Tiaki Promise”. It doesn’t quite translate to English, but in te reo Māori, tiaki means something close to “to care for” and “to protect”, and it touches on the interrelatedness between humans and the environment. The idea of the campaign was to integrate this concept into the ecosystem of tourism, which is why you’ll often see the “Tiaki Promise” associated with businesses and experiences aimed at international audiences; the message is to “care for land, sea and nature, treading lightly and leaving no trace”.
Cairns might not fit in this “leave no trace” framework. It could be argued the stones in these towers aren’t being introduced where they don’t belong; instead, their form and placement is being altered. But they also go from being a part of the landscape to becoming a stamp upon it. And moving rocks around can both impact fragile ecosystems and contribute to erosion.
Some overseas communities have taken an official stance against cairns. In 2023, Yosemite National Park actively encouraged visitors to knock over the cairn collections arising there. The park rangers in Iceland have been actively unstacking them too. Meanwhile, in Aotearoa, the Department of Conservation have in the past undertaken cairn-dismantling efforts on popular hiking trails such as the Tongariro Crossing, even while acknowledging their use as markers above the bushline in more remote spots like Arthur’s Pass and on advanced tramping tracks and routes.
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I work at the Te Anau Glowworm Caves, which are nestled at the base of the Murchison Mountains. When we disembark the boat one morning, we discover a cairn on the stony beach beside the walkway leading to the caves. A stray customer must have built it after their tour the day before.
One of my colleagues has an immediate response: “I’m going down there to knock that down”. I’m intrigued. Here’s some of the vitriol I know is associated with cairns, in the flesh. The sight of the pile of rocks doesn’t offend me the way a pile of litter would, but for some people it’s almost as bad.
“I’ve certainly used them and left them before on full backcountry missions to mark paths,” says local climber Andrew Boere, when I pick his brain on the subject, “but on tourist trails, like Gertrude Saddle, I’m certainly against them. There are way too many and they’re an eyesore.” He also cautions against using them indiscriminately as markers. “If people can’t navigate down a simple valley on a well-formed track,” Andrew concludes, “they shouldn’t be going hiking.”
Even on not-so-simple terrain, there are those who point out it can be risky, even dangerous, to blindly follow where someone else has gone before. Fiordland-based adventurer Fi Lee agrees. “I don’t love them,” she says. “They can be useful. But they can also stop you from thinking for yourself in a wilderness situation. You can rely on them when you shouldn’t.”
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When I bring up cairns with landscape photographer and avid hiker Crystal Brindle, she reflects on her experience in America, where she first came across strong views on them. “It is not considered acceptable to place cairns in wilderness as it is a visible intrusion of something man-made in a place that is supposed to be free of such influences,” she observes. But while Crystal says she appreciates the sentiment, especially given the pressure on the American wilderness due to the size of the country’s population, time has seen her develop a more pragmatic view due to her own experience, which resonates with mine.
“Early on in my solo backcountry exploits, I realised that I valued cairns,” Crystal says. “I’d see one and feel instantly grateful for the guide in an otherwise challenging situation. To me, it seemed that if I felt this way naturally every single time, that I couldn’t in good faith hold that purist view of disdain for cairns in wild places as a matter of principle because, as a matter of fact, I appreciated them.”
The question remains: Should we be kicking cairns over, or do they have a legitimate role in remote areas of the backcountry, where their placement is prompted by people feeling a duty of care not just to the land, but towards one another? Like Andrew, Crystal draws a distinction I find noteworthy: between cairns erected sparingly in the backcountry and a proliferation in front-country settings.
For many, it’s all simply the rocky equivalent of graffiti or of carving your name into a tree. In Aotearoa, building cairns for fun or for selfies feels representative of a colonial worldview over an indigenous one. I came, I saw, I cairned. More broadly, these rocky markers might reflect an anthropocentric perspective over an eco-centric one, where everything is considered to exist in relation to humanity first, rather than acknowledging the land exists on its own terms.
In the end, for me a cairn’s intended purpose makes a difference. And I know this: next time I’m hours’ deep in difficult terrain, hoping I’m on the right track, I don’t think I’d turn down a message from a friend.
Words and photos : Sara Litchfield
