The muesli ticket to ride

Cereal king, foe of wilding pines and ex-Auckland mayor Dick Hubbard and wife Diana have motorbiked the equivalent of six times around the world

- SHARON STEPHENSON

'It's a bit like a game of snakes and ladders - sometimes you go two steps forward, only to slide back down again."

Dick Hubbard is talking about eradicating wilding pines, the exotic trees he's been at war with for the past few years. A member of the Whakatipu Wilding Control Group (WCG), Hubbard often volunteers with those who spray and chainsaw the Douglas fir trees near his Queenstown home.

"Wilding-pine spread, where the wind blows the pine seeds across the ground, can totally change the landscape, robbing the region of its colourful seasonal leaves and tussock, using up valuable water and increasing fire risk," he says, grimacing at the introduced species.

"Imagine the iconic face of the Remarkables covered in green forest. Imagine never being able to see the light fall on the tussock-covered slopes of Cecil Peak. That could be the case within the next 30 years. I couldn't sit back and let those views be denied future generations without doing something to help."

It's unusual for the 76-year-old to get into such a lather. Niceness is, after all, intrinsic to the Hubbard brand, particularly the range of breakfast cereals that still bears his name.

The former mayor of Auckland sold the company in 2018, two years after he and wife Diana, 74, moved to Queenstown and threw themselves into philanthropic work, from the WCG to charities such as the First Foundation, which helps students from socially disadvantaged areas attend university.

Outward Bound, with which the couple have both completed courses, is another charity to benefit from their largesse.

Wilding pines aside, Hubbard is in good form, recounting yarn after yarn from his hilltop home, which most days boasts gob-smacking views over Lake Wakatipu and the snow-quilted Remarkables. Today is not that day, with torrential rain obscuring the vista.