Chris Long has left Gorge River, but his remote upbringing has shaped his life and helped him become a gifted storyteller. 

Working in Antarctica, sailing the Northwest Passage, writing an autobiography – a serious adventurer might add these to their bucket list. Thirty-year-old Chris Long, the oldest child of New Zealand’s remotest family, has already ticked them off.

Long’s book The Boy from Gorge River was published recently by HarperCollins NZ. The third in the Gorge River trilogy, it’s his account of growing up in isolation – off-grid on the South Westland coast, 42km from the nearest road – and of how those experiences shaped him. 

Long learned resilience at a young age. There was an airstrip in front of his family’s shack, but they could seldom afford to fly. It was a five-day walk to the road, and his family did it just twice a year. From the age of three-and-a-half, Long walked the whole way. By then his sister Robin had come along and his folks couldn’t carry them both.  

Living in such a remote place, he says, “you learn to make your own fun. You also learn to fix your own problems, because there’s no one else. And if you’re in a wild environment – rough oceans, heavy rain, sandflies – you learn to put up with that. It doesn’t mean you enjoy it, but you know how to deal with it.” 

Take, for example, seasickness. Despite suffering it, Long keeps sailing. “Boats are amazing ways to get to really cool places,” he laughs. “The ocean is a very dynamic environment, constantly changing.” 

That elemental change is something Gorge River taught him too, and it has made him flexible. 

The second half of the book examines where all these skills have taken Long since the age of 17, when he headed to Wānaka to study outdoor education. Since then he has spent a decade working at adventure jobs around the globe: teaching survival skills in Antarctica, crewing on a Russian ice-breaker and training sledge dogs in Norway. 

He was in Norway when Covid hit, and stayed for another year before returning to New Zealand. Being settled in one place again (Wānaka, where he’s working in a climbing gym and ski-patrolling) has been “an interesting experience”. There is a garden and chickens, which he hasn’t had since leaving Gorge River. There’s been the purchase of a yacht.

Since coming home, he’s recognised the need for a higher qualification. Long is learning to fly and will move to Motueka to get his pilot’s licence. “One of my earliest memories is of flying my little driftwood aeroplane around the house … I’ve always wanted to fly.” It would be a dream, he says, “to land a plane on that airstrip at Gorge River”. 

His book is inspirational. Long is a gifted storyteller, generous with his recollections and grateful for his unconventional family. These days, it’s just Mum and Dad living at Gorge River – his sister Robin is in Christchurch, studying for a master’s in wildlife management. He hopes she too will one day write a book.

He also hopes more people will visit the place he still calls home. “In South Westland, the most amazing thing we have in a day is a visitor.” 

Long says the number of trampers calling into Gorge River has diminished. 

“South Westland is an incredible place to put a backpack on and go hiking. There’s no road between the mountains and the sea, and yes, you’ve got to get the rivers and the weather forecast right, but I think it’s really special to get off the beaten track and explore those places … We loved to have people coming through.”

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