OUR GUIDES


Our guides are all experienced and passionate skiers and boarders who are chosen for their qualifications, experience, professionalism, and personality. Our guides are either trained or certified to international standards through the NZMGA training program or meet the requirements of the NZ Heli Operators group. Our safety programme is overseen by IFMGA qualified guides with years of experience in the Southern Lakes Region and overseas.

With a ratio of one guide per 4-5 guests, you won’t feel overcrowded, your personal guide is there to keep you safe and take you to the best powder snow our backcountry has to offer.

Guiding in New Zealand’s alpine environment is serious business, which is why we have chosen the best for our guests.

  • Lewis Ainsworth

    CHIEF GUIDE
    Lead Guide / IFMGA

    Lewis is an internationally qualified mountain and ski guide working between in New Zealand, Japan and Canada.

    Lewis has also spent many years on Alpine Rescue teams, Ski Patrolling, as a teacher and educator for avalanche education and producing public avalanche advisories for the Mountain Safety Council. He also currently holds the role of President of the NZMGA.

    In his spare time he enjoys ski touring and rock climbing, especially in the big mountains of Aoraki/Mt Cook and Aspiring regions

  • Tarn Pilkington

    DEPUTY CHIEF GUIDE
    Lead Guide / IFMGA

    Tarn has worked with us from 2005 and is back for his 19th season this year. He has had 30+ years ski patrolling, heliskiing and guiding experience in NZ, the USA ,Antarctica, Europe and Canada. He was also a Rescue Mountaineer at Aoraki/ Mt Cook National Park and has been involved with LANDSAR as a volunteer for the Alpine/Cliff Rescue Team in Queenstown since 1991. Tarn is actively involved in the Guiding Industry as a coordinating member of the NZ Heliski Operators group, an assessor on Avalanche courses and also for the NZMGA Mountain Guides training program. He has just returned from a season in Canada guiding at the Adamants Lodge for Canadian Mountain Holidays (CMH).

  • Mark Austin

    SNOW SAFETY OFFICER
    Lead Guide / IFMGA

    Mark is a Queenstown-based IFMGA Guide whose passion is skiing and ski mountaineering. He also gets out for rock climbing, mountain biking, and hiking, nowadays mostly sharing this with his kids. He has been working in the ski industry as a patroller and guide for seventeen years and loves everything about it. He has a self-imposed limit of three sets of skis and two sets of boots. This austerity does lead to ski envy.

    Mark is highly regarded in the NZ guiding industry as a guide, a mentor and an assessor/ trainer for the New Zealand Mountain Guides Association.

  • Phil Penney

    LEAD GUIDE
    Lead Guide / IFMGA

    Phil is one of our Wanaka Lead Guides with over 30 years of experience in the industry and the area. He has previously worked with Alpine Guides and other heliski operators in a lead guide , snow safety and operational roles. Phil is a respected alpinist and an all-around mountain guide. His personality is like his wild stock of blond hair-friendly and hard to suppress, he is also known as the ‘powder pig’. He is very modest about his international achievements and has succeeded in numerous alpine and ice ascents. His passion is surfing and summers see him gliding as an instructor at Omarama.

  • Janina Kuzma

    GUIDE
    Lead Guide / NZMGA

    Janina is a New Zealand 2 x Winter Olympian, ex-competitor on the Freeride World Tour. Janina is an NZMGA Mountain Ski Guide with more than 2 decades of experience in the snow sports industry and elite international sports. Completing her guiding ticket after her competitive Career, Janina has been working with Southern Lakes Heliski for the last winter season.
    Photo credit: Ross Mckay

  • Andy Cole

    LEAD GUIDE / OPERATIONS
    Lead Guide / IFMGA

    Andy has done various crazy jobs: Antarctic seal and penguin wrangler, rock blaster in post-earthquake Christchurch, World Bank Official investigating the Nigerian College of Aviation, Gulf War veteran, Special Forces ski touring instructor, Antarctic field training officer, Avalanche Safety trainer in Japan, Polar guide on Ski the Last Degree to the South Pole expedition.

    Between ski guiding winters in Hokkaido, Japan, New Zealand and Canada, Andy just loves getting out and skiing in the backcountry at every opportunity.

  • Roy Smith

    LEAD GUIDE
    Lead Guide / IFMGA

    Roy is a very experienced and respected mountain guide who guides both on skis and a snowboard!

    He has over 30 years experience in the NZ Ski Field and guiding industries and is currently based in Kingston in Otago. He has been a Lead Guide with Southern Lakes heliski since 2006 and was the Snow Safety Officer for 10 years.

    He also guides in Europe and is an assessor/trainer for the New Zealand Mountain Guides Association (NZMGA).

    A consummate snow scientist, Roy is very at home in the mountains whether on his “Old School” snowboard or new age ski’s.

  • Ian Wilkins

    LEAD GUIDE

    Ian has been with Southern Lakes as a guide for over 30 years. He is a former owner and has guided for so long that his knowledge of the terrain and snow is second to none. He is a former member of theQueenstown Search and Rescue team and worked as an avalanche forecaster on the Milford Road in the early 2000s.

    He has an excellent rapport with guests and seems to always sniff out some of the best snow on any given day.

  • Tom Willmott

    LEAD GUIDE
    Lead Guide / NZMGA

    Tom is an NZMGA Ski (Snowboard) Guide and has been heliski guiding in the Southern Lakes for the past 20 years. He loves to share his passion for our stunning local terrain with all those that join him. Tom is the Head Coach of New Zealand's Freeski and Snowboard Teams and has a professional doctorate in Elite Performance. He travels the globe supporting NZL athletes at various training camps and competitions including the X-Games and the Winter Olympics and also fits in helsiki guiding in India and Alaska.