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Founding Alpha Team member interview: Kevin ‘007’ Smith
Words Julija Zivanovic Pics Kevin ‘007’ Smith
Do you love touring remote regions of Australia … and want to explore with purpose? Consider joining Australia’s leading community-driven exploration initiative.
Original Alpha Team member Kevin ‘007’ Smith in Cape York, Qld
With a country as huge as Australia to call home, it should come as no surprise that it takes a lot of time and effort to accurately map all the land that it covers — not to mention constantly keep all those maps up to date. We try our best here at Hema Maps, but with a country that is the world’s sixth largest (and the only one that takes up an entire continent), we sometimes need a little help. So, we initiated a community program called the Hema Maps Alpha Team.
Our Alpha Team is currently made up of 61 individual and couple teams who live and breathe the touring lifestyle — much like us! They work alongside our Map Patrol and offer genuine and trusted support for those navigating the vast Aussie outback.
We’re always looking to recruit more Alphas, and we want to show you just how far the program can take you. We had a very strong response to our first Alpha Team profile we did earlier in the year, where we interviewed Alpha Team #009: Isabelle Kranhold and Jeremy Wilson. If you missed that piece, you’re welcome to have a read here.
This time we’re covering one of our original Alphas, Alpha Team #007: Kevin Smith. I affectionately call Kevin ‘Kev Oh Sev’ and it was a pleasure getting to know him on the 40th anniversary expedition earlier this year.
Kev Oh Sev with his trusty LandCruiser marvelling at a massive boab tree on the Karunjie Track in WA
Originally from Coffs Harbour in New South Wales, Kev has always been a lover of the outdoors. This led him to pursue a career in four-wheel driving and camping which has spanned 40 successful years. Having worked for BCF (Coffs Harbour location) for almost a decade as both an assistant manager and head of four-wheel driving and camping, he is considered by many to be an expert in the outdoors/touring/camping space.
When the Alpha Program was first created in late 2019, Hema Maps approached several ‘experts’ to help champion the program and basically get it off its feet. So, Kev is one of our founding members who was emailed by one of our former reps and formally asked to become an Alpha Team member. His passion for the outdoors made his answer an easy one, and the rest is history!
We asked Kev what motivated him to choose this lifestyle of travelling Australia solo, mapping tracks and basically being a ‘professional’ camper. I quickly discovered it all comes down to his love of exploring and being outdoors. For someone who enjoys the serenity and sanctity of being alone in the outback for weeks and sometimes months on end, becoming an Alpha Team member was a no-brainer. He says Australia has so much to see and do and the people you meet along the way are so interesting — all with their own backgrounds and tales of travel — that you could never get bored of this job.
Kev Oh Sev’s 1991 Toyota LandCruiser 80 Series decked out for outback travel
So, with all this solo travel under his belt, we had to ask what he’s learnt in that time, and his main three pieces of advice are:
- You must always be prepared — for the known and the unknown!
- Follow your gut — if you’re in an area that gives you the heebie-jeebies then listen to your gut and don’t continue there.
- Self-awareness is extremely important — leave your ego at the door, for example: if you’ve come across a very hard 4WD track that looks concerning, ask yourself, can I actually do this myself? Or should I revisit with others or at another time?
Considering Kev has covered so much ground in Australia, we had to find out what his ultimate favourite location is. Without hesitation Kev answered, "the Top End!". As a nature lover, Kev can’t help but marvel at the beauty of the Top End of Australia. He says the whole area is so raw and isolated — and undisturbed by humans — that you can really see what nature has created over the years and it’s just incredible to experience it for yourself. As someone who has sadly never travelled to the Top End, his genuine passion when speaking about this region made me want to immediately start planning my trip there.
Kev Oh Sev and his epic rig taking in the serenity near Mackay, Queensland
Finally, as one of our original Alphas, we had to ask Kev for his advice for those thinking about joining. “Just do it!” was his emphatic answer. He says his work for Hema Maps as an Alpha Team member has taken him to some incredible places that he had never thought he’d visit. The people you meet in these remote locations and the stories they share about their lives and the way they travel is just inspiring, says Kev — and he loves being a part of it all!
If you’re interested in becoming a Hema Alpha Team member, go here. Or if you’d like to jump straight to our eligibility questionnaire, go here.
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Join the Hema Alpha Team and explore with purpose
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