Pete Holmes - Alpine Aficionado

Pete's life has been defined by teaching, leading and guiding in the alpine environments of this planet. He is happiest on cross country skis, whether skating the tracks or carving a few tele turns in the back country on a blue bird powder day.  So you could easily assume that in this conversation he regals the listeners with epic tales of blizzards, frozen extremities and punctured thermarests. Conversely he speaks of beautiful relationships, the power of outdoor learning and the difficulties of managing clients/students in extreme environments. Most recently Pete's snow based adventures have taken him to northern Italy where he guides clients on bespoke cross country ski adventures.  

Enjoy  the chat 

Bridget and Pete 

Pete's Guiding Company  

https://nordicskiadventures.com/

Contact Bridget and Pete 

Email: 2roampodcast@gmail.com 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:07

Greetings and salutations, fellow roamers, and welcome to episode 8, where we have the pleasure and the privilege of talking to the one and only Pete Holmes, a person who has spent his life working, recreating, and playing in the snow country. The creators of this podcast would like to recognize the traditional owners of the land that we call Australia and further acknowledge that this is the oldest living culture. We further pay our respects to the Jinaburra and Cubby Cubby, Gubby Gubby people, the mobs on which this podcast is being made. Greetings and salutations and welcome to another episode of the Two Roam Podcast, where we're talking very luckily to the very interesting and inspiring Pete Holmes.

SPEAKER_00 1:01

Hi Pete, hi Bridget.

SPEAKER_02 1:03

How's it going?

SPEAKER_00 1:05

It's a bit cool down here in Victoria.

SPEAKER_01 1:07

Yes, I can tell by the fact that you're clad and we're looking like we're sitting in the tropics here in uh sunny Queensland. Um I guess first off, uh Pete, could you perhaps share with the listening audience how you uh first got into uh the outdoors and what what took you down that path, I guess, first?

SPEAKER_00 1:32

Uh look, I think it was uh quite uh a roundabout way, really, because um, you know, I grew up in Sydney, uh very um quite urban in the in the 70s, and it was, I think, just fortuitous or luck that uh you know the scouting movement was still um uh quite big in those days and uh uh got involved in that without even realizing having a um uh a connection, I certainly wouldn't have been able to vocalize those words like having a connection to uh to nature through the scouting movement, but that enabled me to have to feel comfortable sleeping, like literally in those days, sleeping on the ground um and uh uh sleeping um in a flawless tent like on the dirt. Um uh so when you're at 12 years old, those things didn't hurt. So I think it actually started from there, uh, from those really early days. And I didn't but I think my real love started when I was um uh came back from uh living in the States and uh moving to Melbourne and finding that um uh just simply going walking in the bush on overnight trips with um young people really uh aided that sense of for me it was sense of um connected to people, connecting to uh and relationships with with each other um to form some kind of uh you know community uh that I thought that we was missing in the and a group of young people I was working with at the time.

SPEAKER_01 3:18

And uh were you working uh when you referred to uh being in the States, were you working in the outdoors then or were you involved?

SPEAKER_00 3:26

Uh no, like I I moved um moved there um because I I'm a an American citizen as well. And for for me, but I just happened to move into a group of people who love the outdoors, and they just reminded me of uh uh of the beauty of you know living in uh in New England at that time. And uh the sun has come out here all of a sudden in my beauty, and it's very bright. So uh yeah, but yeah, that's kind of maybe reignited my my love of um the outdoors by um just being in a like-minded group in the in the States.

SPEAKER_01 4:05

Yeah. Seems like you almost need to go to sunglasses now, Pete. It's so bright in that room. Yeah, yeah, it's really cool.

SPEAKER_02 4:14

So basically through connecting with each other, I guess you've you've even had an even deeper connection to the outdoors as well.

SPEAKER_00 4:22

Yeah. So um uh like uh I'm a youth worker by training, and uh and so uh so working with uh disadvantaged young people was where um I took my outdoors uh love. So uh working in Melbourne and working in a fairly disadvantaged area of um the north northeast part of um Melbourne, uh inner Melbourne, uh and wanting to work with uh uh young people who had a difficult start in life. Uh it was how I um felt like you know, being in a peaceful uh and beautiful place in the outdoors helped you know um people who are on the wrong side of the judicial system or who are homeless or other uh yeah things going on for their lives. We we um through the uh Department of Health and uh in those days and um Drugs Victoria using that as a therapy uh program uh with the outdoors, you know, being in, you know, said peaceful places, beautiful places, and um uh and one yeah, not being able to buy um uh what they need what they really wanted to buy or what they really wanted to steal, time to um ref possibly reflect on their lives.

SPEAKER_02 5:41

Yeah, I had a very similar experience when I was working with uh the Juvie department and taking students into the outdoors and uh it was it was really beautiful times doing the most simplistic activities like skipping stones into a river, just to have them be children instead of focusing on what they had to escape in their home lives and all that sort of stuff.

SPEAKER_00 6:04

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:06

Me too.

SPEAKER_00 6:07

But I don't think the young people really refer sorry, Pete.

SPEAKER_01 6:10

Yeah, me too. I was just gonna confer with both of you. I've had similar experiences working with uh, shall we call them, disadvantaged young people in the outdoors? Yeah. Do you think that uh if could you talk a little bit about the working with those people that were the initial part of your career? What did the what was the I guess the unique thing that the outdoors gave that allowed those people to potentially uh grow and change and be, shall we say, better humans than they were before they had experience with you?

SPEAKER_00 6:57

Look, I think it's a really complex um uh and question you're asking, and the answer has to be quite nuanced because you know, like, you know, uh and I was doing that in the 90s, and the you know, there was research coming out from you know outward bound from the States particularly. And um, but you know, as we know, over the last 20, 30 years, we've tried to um well not you know, the greater royal we uh tried to understand what goes on on a journey in the outdoors for a number of days. And um when I look back on just my uh as you said, Bridget, just being doing simple things in the outdoors, I think is a really important thing of of everyone's experience, or you know, not everyone, because not everyone does it, but like it's it is a beautiful thing just being in um a a place of serenity uh where the young people aren't uh being overstimulated by uh what they feel like they need to be doing, whether it's alcohol or drugs or offending or all three. And um, but it's um maybe I could sum it up with uh one of my co-workers at the time, uh Jeff said, you know, growing up, you know, you know, you know, if you know when you're being in a supported family and supported environments, you have lots of positive experiences, and the sum of those positive experiences usually give you a positive start in life and give you the the the wherewithal. Um, but when you don't have those positive experiences of being you know going camping with the family in the outdoors and you have a lot of negative experiences, life just goes to shit. So it may be that we are going providing these uh young men, mostly young men, uh if it was you know, like a up to about a two-week experience in the outdoors, it just gives them another positive experience to build on, like just simply providing many positive experiences in their lives. We're just one of them to try and um in in nature as one step in a long chain of hopefully positive experiences. Hopefully. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:20

Yeah. And I think sometimes with that as well, like to have it especially for two weeks or so, it's a it's a version of giving them another home away from home, like that they can actually start to feel at home within the outdoors and have it as a place that they can go into, as you said, for that uh serenity and retreat away from everything. And I think sometimes, even as you're speaking, I was just thinking even about the simplicity part of it too, is that when you're uh in these high adrenaline environments like there stealing cars and drugs and all sorts of things like that, to be able to come in and ground. And then also sometimes for outdoor instructors who have been doing extreme adventure stuff. I've had to reteach myself to come into nature in the last few years and actually just enjoy it in the way that you can have that, you know, serenity and peace and just that pure joy of just being again, instead of what am I doing and what am I getting from this?

SPEAKER_00 10:23

Um it's um and I still think that's um in outdoor ed uh more from my experience, like I still work as a uh an outdoor educator after what must be my 30 in my 35 odd years, and I still think that's still the same dilemma in out currently in outdoor ed um versus um what is practiced in uh secondary colleges compared to what's um written in uh academic papers. There is to me is still a disconnect around um what academics write and what um uh schools provide. And you see, school like I don't want to be too hard on outdoor educators because it comes back from what mum and dads want. You know like what are they expecting? What are the school principals expecting? It's um is it just being um that adrenaline rush going whitewater rafting down some river, or is it about um uh being you know uh reflecting on the banks of that snowy river? Yeah, because it's such a difficult thing to uh to weave something well together.

SPEAKER_02 11:34

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:37

Um it's come up in the podcast before. Um so I just want to ask the question how important do you think the length of the experience in the outdoors is Pete as we seem to move into a world where the experience is shorter and shorter?

SPEAKER_00 11:54

Yeah. Look, um, I feel like everything's so compromised. Um, you know, uh, you know, you know, Pete, when we were working together and at OEG, you know, predominantly the the programs for the uh the school kids was five days, and now we know that um, you know, many of them are now three days, and it's all about economics. Um and it feels like uh it is a uh like I'm I'm working on a three-day program in September for uh at a school in Bendigo. Uh and it's so it's it's so compromised that really it's we call it out directly, it's good for marketing, it's good for um uh teacher outcomes or educational outcomes, but really it's just a one-day recreational event. Um, because there's no time for reflection. Um the question has to be asked, is it really about being in a natural place or is it really just about going canoeing or rock climbing or a day hike? You know, I'm being very um uh well, I'm giving you my opinion and it's uh it's uh uh but yeah uh yeah, maybe the teacher might argue differently and something's better than nothing. I'm also um um aware of that as well, but any time outdoors is is good, but it's been so compromised over the years. Um but we have to try and justify ourselves, don't we?

SPEAKER_02 13:30

Yeah. And Pete, is there any remarkable outdoor moments, any great memories that you can share with the podcast today?

SPEAKER_00 13:41

Um I once um back in the early 90s, um um I I loved skiing, uh any kind of um um um particularly backcountry uh or cross-country skiing, and uh I had a dream, uh it sounds a bit like Martin Luther King, but uh I had an idea of taking um um uh disadvantaged young people to uh ski from um along the Upland walking track for it about a 90-day um journey, and we broke it down because that was unrealistic, uh, into like some ski um some legs. We would journey for about two weeks, then pass a bat on across, and we would you know make it make a statement with homeless young uh men and women uh skiing back in 95 it was. And um I was we were skiing up the what's called the long spur from uh the Omera Highway uh to summit over Mount Bogon and then to Falls Creek, and uh uh it was a big year of snow, and uh it snowed every day. Not and um uh and it was dry, it was cold. And one of the young women, um, she was about 21 at the time, she said to uh, we're just skiing along, and you know, we're about halfway through, and it was hard. It was you know, took days. I mean, I've walked up Longsburg, it takes you know, it took me you know like half a day. We we spent days ascending Longsbur. I mean, we had people you know, young women with uh who'd never skied before, whose their working life was really uh you know, uh being uh a uh I forgot, I forget the PC term, a prostitute, we're drug addicts, we you know, it was a whole gamut of uh that group of people. And uh the woman said to me, um, because she's a heroin addict, she said, you really must tell the person who organized trip, she just simply said, It's too hard. But I can always remember that experience because I organized it. And she went went on to be very successful. It's like she went back to WA, um, got her degree, and then since then I've I've I've lost touch with her. And uh, but that journey, uh, you know, we had a you know, like it it really is quite powerful because I I know a number of those women have died um you know from overdose, car accidents. Uh I've met some of the women um now living um in Victoria, single mum, doing really well. So it's a was a really powerful fortnight of ski touring across the Bogon High Plains, and uh um and it was yeah, it would that kind of program would have a no hope in hell to get up these days because it was just it was so out there, but it was very, very powerful. Um and it just gave it people who are you know uh w working women in that in inverted commas a chance to no longer have to sell their bodies to make a quid, you know, they get two weeks just to be themselves.

SPEAKER_01 16:42

Yeah. Do you think that sort of experience builds self-sufficiency in people? And that's that's sort of sum of the power.

SPEAKER_00 16:51

Um one young man said to me around the fire around Middle Gundi on the banks of the Middle River. He said to me, uh, I won't get the quite right, what I won't get it verbatim now, but in essence, like we walked for six days across the high plains in in uh uh again some pretty horrendous conditions. And um so we walked from Harakore over Feather Top across the High Plains and down to the Middle Middle River, and he said to me something like around the fire, a bit of a chat. He said to her, um, well, I've pushed so hard through the snow and blizzards and whatever. Now I'm I just realize I'm capable of so much more. So yes, resilient, but I think he was interpreting it. I'm capable of so much more uh of uh things that probably are are illegal to to do. And uh um so I thought, oh, I don't think I've quite uh um uh taken this the right way. Yeah, sure. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:54

That's a great story. Thank you for sharing it. Um perhaps you could uh enlighten the listening audience with another remarkable outdoor adventure moment of your diverse and checkered career.

SPEAKER_00 18:12

Um well, um a much more recent one, and I think it just in um very different, um completely different. So um so I now uh guide people on um uh look compared to what I was doing there back in '95, you have to say, uh quite luxurious, uh taking people in Italy and Austria on um uh guided cross-country ski trips. Um not it's not mountaineering, it's not backcountry, it's uh day trips staying coming back to the uh the lodge or refugio or whatever. Um but uh like um so but it still comes back to the same principles of guiding groups and dealing with expectations and managing your own or managing my my own anxiety of the expectations of people. You know, it's a group, and the group has these expectations, whether it's camping on a thermorist or um I expect uh good snow, um, reliable cars and um great hotels, and I don't want to pay too much. Um, that formula and uh uh like uh the car we're traveling, uh so um I do this overnight um uh ski in, ski out of uh refugio. But you can go there on skinny Nordic cross-country skis. It's all groomed, it's beautiful, it's about two at altitude, about 2,000 meters. Um, but um uh my vehicle uh was uh it was not reliable. It uh um it was a snowstorm coming in. The group were quite um uh old, like in the late 60s, early 70s, not great skiers, and it was gonna be a snowstorm coming out, even though it's groomed. You know, skiing in a snowstorm when you're 70 the oldest person was 74 is just probably hard work. And and um uh so I canned there were ski in and ski out, and uh so they lost a day skiing. My vehicle was so unreliable, I had to put them up somewhere in another uh you know, less than good hotel. And so what I'm trying to say is pain, like these people's expectations, um, you know, uh some of them were quite wealthy uh skiing life skiing trip of a lifetime, were really quite disappointed, and you could feel um um their disappointment, but they weren't willing to say it. And I'd check in, and I've never heard from a couple of these people ever since. But then again, other people, the 74-year-old, she was so grateful and happy to not have to deal with that anxiety of being really cold, really wet, even though it's a it's a but you know, when you're 74, the expectations are different versus someone who's 45, healthy, um, but moves at a snail's pace. So I suppose I'm trying to paint the idea of it's always about dealing with people's expectations and what they're capable or not capable of and what they don't even realize they're capable of in a hostile environment. And uh for me, you know, it was a terrible time of having to try and deal with my own expectations of what the client or you know, I use the word client, but it could be you know a young person. But yeah, so it always comes back about, I don't know, I'm just trying to paint a picture of that. It's it's never easy whether you're dealing with kids in the bush or you know, a guided ski trip in Italy. It's um people are always it's one of the challenges of being an outdoor educator. I just wanted to ask.

SPEAKER_01 22:00

Can you perhaps enlighten the listening audience ways in your career that you have managed those expectations of young people, clients, um strategies you might use?

SPEAKER_00 22:17

Well, excuse me, I've got a a cold. Um look at like I told that little story earlier about being in Italy is because it's I think for me that managing groups is the hardest thing. I mean, like you know, sitting uh on the banks of the Mitchell River, even though you've had a really difficult group, and those peaceful moments with a cup of tea and just yourself to try and settle, you know, like just enjoy that moment. And we all know what's going on, even if you can't work it out. You try to try on trying to you know settle your own self, have some a moment in a seven-day trip to yourself to enjoy uh uh uh being on the river. Um, because when you come, well, we you know, when I go back to the group and it's dinner time, and it's you know, for me, it's always been manic, you know, trying to have a healthy meal, a good meal, um, and you know, dinner times are probably you know yeah, they're busier time, and we also know from the stats, well, the most dangerous thing we do is probably you know, cooking dinner with sharp knives and open fires or tranches or whatever. We all know that's where the accidents often occur. They're only minor, but shh um, you know, you have to be fully engaged. Um, so managing, I think for me, managing people and their expectations. Um look, uh, my strategy is being trying to be transparent, trying to um my recent story with you know managing that group in a difficult group of six uh uh you know, six people traveling across northern Italy uh in a snowstorm and managing their experts, it's just trying to be open, trying not to um saying I'm looking after your welfare, uh that we all have a positive experience because we're not just six or seven individuals here, we are a group, so everything is to be mindful about those things. Open communication before a trip occurs, so people know what to expect, whether it's a learning outcomes or um uh what they trying to understand what they want and building a really strong relationship, having that it's not just uh a client or a young person going on a trip and me, it's about um we're we're gonna join this together as people in a small, small community.

SPEAKER_02 24:57

Yeah. And I I think like the way that you were describing it with um, you know, their age and going through the snowstorm and what it was like for them. Uh it reminds me of something one of my lecturers when I was at university said to us, and it's stuck with me ever since. Is that she took her mother, who was 90, I think at the time, uh, basically from a car park across because she was in a wheelchair to a toilet, but there was like all this sort of rainforest just on the way to the toilet. And her mother was like, Oh, we're really in the deep wilderness now, aren't we? And for her, that was such a deep wilderness experience. Just that hundred meters of trees around them. And for these people, you know, they might have had that experience at the time of being like, Whoa, this is very overwhelming in the snowstorm. But afterwards, like what the stories they would be telling about that, and just recognizing all the different depths of what an adventure is for people.

SPEAKER_00 25:56

We all have a different um um idea in our head, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 26:00

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:02

Different lens, perhaps.

SPEAKER_02 26:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:04

Um this has been fabulous, Pete. I've really enjoyed uh chatting to you about uh these things. And um is there does your uh your guided work in Italy, do you you have a website or something like that that I can put in the show notes so we can do a little bit of uh promotion of your organization?

SPEAKER_00 26:28

Sure. Um I can put it in the chat if you like, but it's just simply um Nordic SkiAdventures.com or one word, and uh um yeah, it's uh um it's a great place to ski and eat pizza and drink good red wine. Um course don't let's not forget the coffee as well, and um uh so um yeah, I just think the the adventure continues really. Um it's um and I do think that people uh like getting back to some of your earlier questions, Bridget, about um um nature and outdoors, I think it's a really and I think I've tried to explain it, but I think it's really complex. As simple as it is as skipping stones, absolutely I agree. Yeah, but I think it's um I maybe I don't understand, but young people like young boys just want to walk fast and far. And how do um how do you authentically slow them down and not just some contrived question or you know, like it or maybe we have to we have too many expectations, maybe it's just let's just acknowledge sitting around a campfire if we're allowed to have one, uh is probably a great thing, toasting marshmallows, maybe that's all we need to do, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:52

Yeah, yeah, and being able to read that that's what the boys need. Like if you need to bust them up a mountain, then yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:02

Can can I just ask one last comment? How how do you personally um with your long career, how do you remain motivated?

SPEAKER_00 28:14

Oh, Pete, that's a good question. I'd like to pull that apart with um yourselves as well, Pete, because you're you know, we're with similar vintage. Yeah, um uh it's uh I suppose um okay, so I said to a group, I still get asked to go on to lead a fair few groups, and I've said I will not go backcountry overnight ski touring with school kids anymore. Yeah, yeah, and that particular school was paying me a lot of money, and I said it's not about the money, it's about I'm not there enough for the young men. Uh sorry, young people. Yeah, I just I don't want to destroy something that I actually still enjoy doing. I I still actually enjoy going backcountry skiing. So um um how do I stay motivated? I think um coming back to as a youth worker, people, you know, and seeing the the change in people's lives. Uh I think that's what and the joy, the joy, the small things. Um yeah. Uh yeah, the the small changes, because I think it's small. I think there's small incremental things where people have a um can take something home um and and uh share with their mums and dads. Yeah, I'm trying to keep it really simple.

SPEAKER_01 29:41

No, no, I I think that's that that was a fabulous response.

SPEAKER_02 29:45

Yeah, I think that is the pure truth of it.

SPEAKER_01 29:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 29:48

People. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:51

I I'm I'm similar. I you know, people, well, now I'm working largely with university students. Um, people ask me the same question all the time. You know, and yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:04

And I didn't find work I don't know about you, Pete, but like, you know, we've both worked with so I don't know much about your history, Bridget, so I can't ask you this question, but you know, we've both worked with um uh secondary school kids, difficult young people, university students, adults. I find sometimes university students are no uh just as hard to motivate and engage in the outdoors as secondary school year 10 students.

SPEAKER_02 30:30

And sometimes harder, sometimes they have access to their phones and they're also technically adults, but maybe not acting as that.

SPEAKER_01 30:40

Yeah, I fully agree. I agree. Yeah. Uh many more things to chat about, uh, but uh because of my uh lack of uh wanting to spend money on uh expensive Zoom uh packages, uh we're about to agree. You have a fabulous uh day, uh either roller skiing or running with your students. And thank you. I I think it's been absolutely fabulous.

SPEAKER_02 31:06

Yeah, thank you so much, Pete.

SPEAKER_00 31:08

Great to uh meet you, Bridget, and uh great for thanks for reaching out, Pete. Um all the best, mate. No worries. Okay, see you enjoy sunny Queensland.