Meet The Team

Hi I'm Shelly Warwick.  Chair of NZEAN.

I live in Otaki on the Kapiti Coast, Lower North Island.  I have 4 children, 3 horses and 10 acres.

I have ridden horses since I was about 10, my Dad told me it would be a seven day wonder back then when I announced i wanted a horse ........ 40+ years later!!!!!  I am a happy hacker and ride for pleasure.  My favourite place to ride is on our beautiful beach.

I got involved in local politics in 2016 and became part of the Kapiti Coast District council's Cycleway Walkway Bridleway committee.  Even though our council had a horse friendly strategy it was still difficult to get access to certain places for no good reason at all.  This is when some local Kapiti riders formed the Kapiti Equestrian Advocacy group (KEAG), of which i was a founding member and am still the Chair. We realised that we had to collect the horse riding community together to engage in the local government process to have any real effect. With this came the realization that there is no legislation on a local or central government level to ensure our recreational and safety needs are considered, no funding, no requirement to plan for us,  and often no will by local authorities or government departments such as Waka Kotahi.  Also was the realization that this was happening all over the country.  

There have been 3 petitions to central government since 2013, the last was the' Ride for our future' by NZEAN and there has been no change.  But we can change this.  There are many of us, we need to be collective and support each other all over the country. Local councils work on numbers, numbers of submissions, numbers of dollars spent, we just have not been very good at letting them know we are here, and that there are many of us.  

This frustration on a local level lead to a meeting between Kapiti and Manawatu horse riders, both dealing with Waka Kotahi and their complete lack of engagement with the horse riding community, and we committed to making a change.  Thus NZEAN was born and I am proud to be a founding member and Co-chair.  Changing the dial in New Zealand for horse riders will take time.  But if we do nothing we will just keep losing our access till only those with land or wealth will beable to have a horse, but then with nowhere to ride.  The ability for a kiwi kid to have a horse will be a thing of the past and we will have no rights and no access anywhere.  We need to do this not just for the future generations of children but the future generations of horses.  

These things move very slowly, but like the tortoise we will win the race in the end if we stick together.

Hi I’m John Burrill - NZEAN Deputy Chair

I haven't ridden since a I was a child although life got in the way in my 20s, I got back into it in my mid 40s in Sth Auckland and started trekking all over the country. I really enjoyed North Canterbury area so moved south to Hanmer Springs a couple of years ago.

Access for riding throughout NZ has progressively got more difficult in my lifetime and although I now have the St James on my doorstep I’m committed to campaigning for more public horse riding/driving access on Public Conservation Land and Public spaces, and road safety and road user education with regard to safety around horse activities on roads and public spaces.

My Partner Lee and I are very active in Hanmer Springs and surrounding areas. We led our local Vulnerable Road User community awareness rides, we are constantly doing volunteer track work in St James and are active and vocal in our local and regional horse access lobby groups, Hanmer Springs Horse Riders Group and Horse Trails South Trust (Trustees).

I want my grandchildren to be able to ride safely on roads and reserves and have access to Public Conservation Lands as i have in my lifetime.

Hi I'm Anne Steven - I have lived in Wanaka the last 25 years. I am a landscape architect with some 35 years of professional work behind me. My husband Guy is a lawyer and we have two sons approaching age 30, and one granddaughter! 

I was horse-mad and had ponies and horses to ride from pre-school age until my early twenties in the late 1980s, as my home was a sheep station on the road to Aoraki Mt Cook. Then 30 years or more went by and, being based in Wanaka, in 2018 I decided I wanted to do the Otago Goldfields Cavalcade. So I had to start from scratch - find a horse, find some grazing to lease, get all the gear, find horsey riding buddies, and get training. I also had a lot to learn - about every aspect of horsemanship. Luckily there is so much information available now and clinics to go to and I opted to follow Natural Horsemanship. I know so much more now but never stop learning. I have done three cavalcades and the rest of my year I trail ride with the occasional clinic.  There are amazing places to ride in the southern lakes and Central Otago area. I tried hunting once and have done two novice CTRs (loved that, want to do more). Sadly I lost my lovely little highly dependable and safe black SB gelding Dusky at the end of 2024 due to an mystery paddock incident/illness and am starting again on a lovely little dark brown SB gelding I have named Toby.

I want to preserve our access to the wonderful riding places and trails we have and to make it even better. I would like to see a network of connected trails including opening up new links, and ensure there are safe and spacious parking areas that conveniently access our riding places. I want to encourage and advocate for overnight horse camping so more equestrians can come and enjoy our area.

Hi, I'm Jacqui. I’ve had a horse obsession since I was two, much to the disdain of my un-horsey, city-dwelling family.

I finally achieved horse ownership in my mid 40’s when my own children were old enough to be left to their own devices and now have two horses which I’m lucky enough to keep in the southern suburbs of Wellington City.

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I ride for pleasure everywhere between the South coast and the city centre and occasionally muster the courage to transport them further afield.

I’ve been a familiar presence at council submission hearings advocating for horse access in the Wellington region for many years and am a founding member of NZEAN.

I am Andrew from near Timaru in South Canterbury. I have been riding motorbikes since I was around 3 years old, however around 10 years ago my wife suggested she would like to get a horse as she used to ride.

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Initially I wanted nothing to do with it apart from helping to pick up the poo, I had never been on a horse before. However one day, I plucked up the courage to get on. I was rather perturbed by the fact there was no brakes.

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The rest they say is history, I would sneak away for a ride when my wife was at work and with falling off and doing all sorts of things wrong, I learned to ride and eventually have become an effective, safe pleasure rider.

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Coming from England, where there are bridleways all over the place and local authorities who actually like to be proactive, I became increasingly frustrated with the lack of effective safe places to ride in New Zealand. There did not seems to be any joined up thinking either locally or nationally and when NZEAN formed, I jumped at the chance to become involved.

I was given the task of being the first treasurer, which is a role I continue today. For some reason, I keep getting voted into office!

Ride free my friends

Hi I'm Kelly Smith.  I’m a Chartered Accountant living on the Kāpiti Coast and a lifelong horse lover. After a 20-year break, I got back into riding in 2023 and haven’t looked back. I want to help out in any way I can to raise awareness of horses and riders so recently joined NZEAN.

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Hi, I'm Lynne Moore, I live in the Manawatu about 15 mins north of Foxton on 10 acres. I have 2 horses currently and have had horses on and off for most of my life. I grew up in the Pony Club world competing in Training level eventing and the usual variety of games, shows and training days before moving to the more sedate endeavours of endurance & CTR, which compliment my pleasure hacking and trekking around the region. I particularly love travelling by horseback, starting at one point and ending at another, and I'm keen to assist in any way I can to maintain and enhance on and off-road access and safety for equestrians. I'm part of the City to Sea Rail Trail Trust and am assisting with the Foxton Futures Community group meetings.

I’m Tina and currently NZEAN’s secretary and live in Te Horo, Kapiti Coast, Wellington

My first riding experience as a child was walking around an industrial estate in the Eastend of London. From this point on I was addicted!

I owned a horse for over 20yrs in the UK and loved riding the bridleways, lanes and open fields.

I moved to New Zealand in 2013 as I fell in love with the country, its wide-open spaces and natural beauty. I promised I wouldn’t get another horse so we would have the money to tour NZ and all the southern hemisphere countries, this lasted a year and then I got a horse

However, it became really clear early on that riding is so restricted here, unless you are luckily enough to graze at a farm or by the sea.

I then bought my own property backing onto a council managed forest, wow lots of riding. I was in heaven until I rode, having been harvested for pine all the tracks were now hard, rocky logging truck tracks, I ended up having to put boots over my boy’s shod feet.

So I joined NZEAN to find out why this country lacks bridleways and access off road riding and now I’m secretary

I now live in Kapiti where the council have included equestrians in their shared pathways and I’m in heaven with so many places to ride from my doorstep. So now as part of the NZEAN committee I want to help other riders to get the same, if not more, from their councils.

Hi I'm Josien

Despite coming from a non-horsey family living in a small town, I had my first ride when I was 6.

It was on Aafje, a fjord horse belonging to a local farmer, who used her as a carriage horse carting milking equipment to and from the paddock.

A friend and I would ride around on our bikes, this is in The Netherlands, looking for horses.

We would find our who owned them and asked whether we were allowed to ride them.

It was not until I was 11 that I started regular lessons at a riding school.

And I had to wait untill I was 21 and working, when I got my own first horse, a beautiful warmblood chestnut mare.

I rode her for 20 years and we did trekking and dressage.

Coming to New Zealand nearly 19 years ago, I was horseless for several years.

I missed the smell of horses, so I started volunteering for the Levin RDA until I found a fulltime job.

My first NZ horse was Moose, we had many adventures together until I retired him. He is now a happy 27 year old paddock ornament.

Connie, pictured here, arrived after Moose was retired, but after a few rides she was diagnosed with ataxia, not safe to ride and also retired to the paddock.

Last year I bought the beautiful Freya, who is sadly also unridable, but I  still have hopes for the future for her.

Noticing how few riding opportunities there are in New Zealand, I wrote my first submission to the local council in 2011, advocating for what now would be called  multi-use pathways.

And from 2016 the places where we used to ride in Foxton Beach were severly restricted by turning a forestry reserve into a mountain bike park and the developement of a "shared pathway" in the berm where we used to ride.

I have written many submissions to the local council and am one of the initial members of the Horowhenua Equestrian Advocacy Group and NZEAN.

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Kia ora,  I am Eileen Walker. I grew up in the Wellington region, and attended Tawa Pony Club as a teenager. My pony was grazed on a Lands & Survey farm 1/2 an hour from home, and we used to ride to all the shows, across the hills to Ohariu Valley, and North through Transmission Gully to Pāuatahanui.  To get to Pony Club we rode through the motorway underpass - imagine doing that now.

Roll on a few years and marriage followed, and 2 kids. My husband and I farmed at Te Horo on the Kāpiti Coast until 2001, when we moved to the bottom of the South Island, kids and cows in tow.     We now live in Central Otago, with a beautiful black mare and 2 elderly cats.  My mare and I do lots of trekking, and Working Equitation is our sport.  

I love the social aspect of trekking, and competition, we often get away for 3 or 4 night trips, and see such amazing country.   My husband sometimes rides his e-bike with us, gate opener and paparazzi all in one!  

In the time we have lived in Central Otago we have seen several riding trails ruled off limits for horses, ironic given that a lot of them started as Bridle Trails. You would think there was a clue in the name aye?  We have strong links with the Kāpiti Coast still, with family there and our Te Horo farm. We are working on a couple of projects at Te Horo, including a large wetland restoration, and a commitment to trails through the farm, for horses, bikes and walkers. 

I am wanting to work towards greater, and safer, access throughout New Zealand for the equestrian community.