AuthenticAs Top & Back

AuthenticAs was created with purpose. Eight years ago, Simon and Emma looked at what was missing... not just from the tourism sector, but from people's lives. The connection to place. The slower pace. The chance to move out of the office and into te taiao, the natural world. That need hasn't diminished. If anything, the years have only made it more so. Private, photography-led adventures for couples, families, and solo travellers who want something personal, unhurried, and beautifully documented. These aren't marketing photographs. No models, no staging... actual images from actual days out with actual people, our manuhiri, captured as it happened. Simon is the principal guide, photographer, and astronomer. He's lived in this region for 21 years, long enough to know he'll never be a true local, but long enough to have been shaped by it completely. He arrived with a BSc (Hons) in Astrophysics, an MSc in Manufacturing, and a career as one of the first web designers in the professional sports world. Twelve years in Wānaka followed, facilitating Zero Waste and Enviroschools programmes alongside teachers, young people, and community - and being drawn, through that work, into a Māori way of seeing the world. That learning continues. Right now it means Kā Taka o te Marama and Tātai Aroraki - the Māori lunar calendar and Māori astronomy. Not as a credential. As a practice. The day trips are about connection between people and place. Slowed down, let in. Energy transferred. And running through all of it, a photography experience that clients consistently tell us was the most fun photoshoot they've ever been on. Candid, professional, slightly directed... chasing dramatic light without ever making it feel laboured. Every image is edited by hand. The nights go further. A private immersion in astronomy that leaves people understanding their place in the universe like never before, with the photographs to prove it actually happened. Emma holds the other half together. With a background in emergency nursing, she’s behind our health & safety practices, our delicious seasonal kai, also a photographer, qualified astroguide and the reason everything is as safe as it is considered. Currently studying on a te reo journey she too offers an understanding to our manuhiri of te ao Māori. Every AuthenticAs experience includes a professionally edited album. Not a handful of snapshots... a real body of work, crafted by hand. Simon is guiding and facilitating the entire time, which means he's also watching. Reading the light. Reading the people. Noticing the moment just before the moment. The photographs that emerge from that aren't posed records of a tour... they're a story. Your story. A day in the southern lakes, a night under its stars, a connection to a place that has been shaping people for longer than any of us have been here. Edited with care, delivered with intention. Something you'll return to long after the feeling fades. With a wealth of five star reviews to show for our commitment to our craft we are excited to meet you.