The Hillary Expeditions are supported by Sport New Zealand, which provides partial funding for each. Every second year Sport NZ receives expedition applications from trampers, mountaineers, rock climbers, cross-country skiers, kayakers, mountain bikers, sailors and others.
From these applications we select expeditions that we think will most inspire Kiwis to get into the outdoors. Encouraging greater public participation in the outdoors is a key aim of the expeditions.
The seven 2013-2014 expedition teams will embark on world-first outdoor challenges that will test their skill, courage and physical limitations in some of the world’s most difficult and sometimes unexplored terrain.
Sport NZ chief executive Peter Miskimmin calls the expedition teams the "high performance athletes of the outdoor sector".
The 2013-2014 expedition teams
The expeditions below are listed chronologically. Links go to the Hillary Expeditions website.
Cook to Cook (January 2013)
Sarah Wilson aims to to climb Mount Cook with Bridget Janse, cycle to Picton with with Bronwyn Ward, and paddle across Cook Strait in a double sea kayak with Luke Wilson.
21 Peaks in 21 Days (February 2013)
Brothers Nathan and Nigel Watson will set out to climb the 21 named peaks above 2,000 metres of the Nelson Lakes National Park – all within 21 days.
Gradient and Water (April 2013)
A team of Kiwi kayakers wants to be the first to paddle the canyons of the Chimbu River in Papua New Guinea, one of the most challenging wilderness runs in the world.
New Zealand Anidesha Chuli – The White Wave (April-May 2013)
Rob Frost, Ben Dare, Andrei van Dusschoten and Scott Blackford Scheele aim to summit the unclimbed 6800m peak of Anidesha Chuli, or White Wave, in the Kanchenjunga Himalaya, north-east Nepal.
The Nose, Yosemite (May 2013)
Big wall climber Mayan Smith-Gobat is returning to what many call the Mecca of rock climbing – the Yosemite Valley in California. There she will test herself three ways: free climb the Nose on El Capitan, free climb a link-up of El Capitan and Half Dome, and break the speed record on the Nose.
New Zealand Gasherbrums (June-August 2013)
Mountain climber Christine Burke is attempting to become the first New Zealand woman to reach the summit of both the Gasherbrum 1 (G1) and the Gasherbrum 2 (G2) mountains on the Pakistan-China border.
Limitless with Support (November 2013)
Limitless with Support will see Neelusha Memon attempt to become the first blind woman to climb seven summits on seven continents. Her Hillary expedition covers the first of these summits, the 6960m Aconcagua in Argentina. Aconcagua is the highest mountain on the American Continent.