Wollongong-raised adventurer picked to chart remote NZ for Street View

Former Smith's Hill High School student Sharmali Kulatunga won a competition held by outdoor gear maker Kathmandu for the Google project - and it plays in perfectly with her passion for walking and photography.

After finishing high school she studied piano at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, but then decided she was more interested in medical science as a career.

That is, until she caught the bug for hiking remote and breathtaking parts of the world. Inspired by a short film featuring climber Alex Honnold, it was Patagonia, deep down the lower end of South America, that first lit her trekking fire.

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Once she'd conquered some of the most spectacular trails in the world, she was hooked. She has since trekked through Iceland, around Mont Blanc in France, and along the Kepler Track deep in NZ's South Island.

Just in case her vocations didn't seem diverse enough, she'd also been working as an aerialist - performing on silks hung from the ceiling - and that spun off into rock climbing, which she'd enjoyed at school sport.

In March she will head to NZ with a small team and a specially rigged backpack, atop which is fixed the 360-degree camera which will chart the path for Google Street View.

"There's be a team there, but I'll be doing a lot solo," she said.

"It's a secret location - I can't reveal it until after the footage been released."