The Wanaka area branch of the Department of Conservation recently farewelled Mr Thorne and his wife Heather.
The pair are readying themselves for a six-month sojourn to Raoul Island, a remote piece of the Doc estate about 1000km northwest of Cape Reinga and the largest island in the Kermadec archipelago.
The Thornes will be part of a volunteer programme carrying out Doc services on the island and its surrounding marine reserve.
In March 2006, the island claimed the life of Doc worker Mark Kearney, who was killed in a volcanic eruption while stationed at Raoul.
His body has never been found.
Mr Thorne said work on the island would include monitoring a MetService weather station, maintenance of the island's ecosytem, and a weeding programme to help re-establish native vegetation.
"I guess in way it will be more of the same of some of the paid work I've been doing for Doc for years," he said, laughing.
The pair hope to spend more time together travelling with their caravan, fishing, and tramping once they return from Raoul Island in August.
Mr Thorne started working at the Department of Lands and Survey (DLS) - the forerunner to Doc - in 1970 and was initially based at Mt Cook.
He moved to Wanaka, three years later, to spend the rest of his career working among the mountain valleys of Mt Aspiring National Park and the many remote conservation areas of the Doc estate.
He first worked as a ranger within the huts and tracks programme with DLS.
Mr Thorne helped build walking tracks throughout the Wanaka and Makarora Doc estates, as well as replacing and renovating many of the numerous mountain huts scattered throughout the district.
He moved to work with Doc's fledging biodiversity programme after 12 years in the job and has since headed breeding, recovery, and re-establishment programmes of several native species in and around Wanaka.
He lists the Lake Wanaka islands breeding programme of buff weka as a highlight of this time, while other bio-diversity programmes he has been involved with include the monitoring of Otago grand skinks, kea, black robins, and native bats at Makarora.
Alongside his bio-diversity work, Mr Thorne has been an educational adviser, taking Doc's conservation messages and programmes into schools.
He has also spent 35 years as a voluntary adviser to Wanaka LandSAR, his knowledge of the Mt Aspiring National Park and its surrounds playing a part in many search and rescue call-outs.
He has also visited the Antarctic eight times on Doc work but the "outstanding" Matukituki Valley is a place which will stay in his memory, particularly the Cascade Saddle track.
