Coronet Peak 75th storytelling – How it all began: The Wigley family

FESCH.TV INFORMIERT:

The fourth story in our series of five very special stories produced for Coronet Peaks 75th celebrations.

Led by Sir Henry Wigley and his family’s business, the Mount Cook and Southern Lakes Tourist Company, Coronet Peak opened in July 1947, becoming New Zealand’s first commercial ski area.

A qualified commercial pilot who flew in WWII, Sir Henry had a passion for skiing and the outdoors. He grew the Mount Cook Group into the country’s largest privately owned travel organisation, with skiing at Coronet Peak changing not only Queenstown’s tourism landscape forever, but New Zealand’s too.

Sir Henry and his wife Isla had five children, Sally, Brian, Jo, Annabel and Paddy, who inherited their father’s love of skiing, spending their childhood winters on the mountain at Coronet Peak with some of their earliest memories being learning to ski wearing boys football boots.