Eat the Road

A 3,000 km walk across New Zealand, eating and recording 1,500 wild edible plants, the same territory experienced as body and as data.

Eat the Road was a botanical expedition along Te Araroa, crossing New Zealand on foot from north to south. Over 114 days Vincent walked approximately 3,000 kilometres while documenting wild edible plants encountered along the route.

Before the expedition Vincent developed a digital field collection system based on Open Data Kit. Botanical observations and GPS coordinates could be recorded in the field and transformed into a geographic dataset displayed through an online map. Approximately 1,500 botanical observations were documented during the journey, and the resulting database was intended to remain accessible and reusable by future travellers and hikers.

The project confronted two ways of experiencing the same territory: one physical and subjective, 114 days of walking, the other informational: coordinates, records and points on a map. What remains of a place when experience becomes data?