Tramping in the great outdoors

A Shropshire woman who abandoned corporate life in London to walk New Zealand’s nine Great Walks is returning to her home county next week for a signing session of a book about her experiences.

Gillian Orrell, who now lives in Hexham but hails from Admaston - and returns there regularly - will be holding the signing at Pengwern Books in Princess Street, Shrewsbury, on Wednesday at 6.30pm. It will include a talk and slide show of her adventures.

Her book “New Boots in New Zealand” has also been published in that country, and Gillian has given interviews to several radio stations both there and in Australia.

Gillian, who is 33, was educated at Charlton School and New College in Wellington before going to Oxford University in 1991. She qualified as a chartered accountant with Coopers and Lybrand, which in turn became Price Waterhouse.

The work she was doing was transferred to IBM and she is still employed by them as a management consultant.

It was while working in London that she decided to take a break and travel to New Zealand, to go “tramping”, as it is dubbed by the locals.

“The basic principle of tramping is to head into ‘the bush’ for hours, days, or weeks at a time, carrying everything you need. Many trampers carry tents and camp in remote spots, but New Zealanders have also built a network of basic huts across much of the land,” she writes in the book.

Gillian had never “tramped” before, but refused to believed that she had become a city wimp.

Her father Alan Orrell, a retired bank manager from Admaston, said her book initially went to first place in the Travel Holiday category when it was placed on Amazon.com, and achieved 13th place overall.

“She has always had an interest in writing, and for a thesis wrote about prostitution in Shrewsbury in the 19th Century. This is still held at Shrewsbury library.

“In this book she tells you what she has done, what you can expect, and the people she has met. I would hazard a guess that the nearest style of writing to this is that of Bill Bryson.”