Winter 100 ways
Lee Slater and Sarah Bennett soar to spectacular highs cycling through incredible vistas on our Great Rides.
New Zealand’s 22 Great Rides take you into some of the country’s most beautiful landscapes – from wild coastlines, remote river valleys and gorges, to rural plains, tussock-covered high country and mountains.
Cycling allows you to soak it all in at the perfect pace, and reach places you might otherwise never see. Here are just a handful of highlights.
Eatwell’s Lookout
Tracing the bays, hills and ridges of the Marlborough Sounds, the Queen Charlotte Track packs in more water views than any other Great Ride. Arguably the best, however, is Eatwell’s Lookout, reached on a short, sharp but essential detour between Camp Bay and Kenepuru Saddle. The views up and down Queen Charlotte Sound, and out into Cook Strait are sublime.
Ghost Lake Hut
This is another Great Ride with no shortage of incredible views, which open up in earnest beyond Lyell Saddle where the trail emerges above the bushline and cuts across the face of Mt Montgomery to its high point of 1280 metres. Just beyond, at 1200m, Ghost Lake Hut, on Old Ghost Rd, affords what is probably the most captivating view. An overnight stay allows you to appreciate it in the evening light, starry night, and the following dawn.
Tekapo B
The ride between Lake Tekapo and Lake Pu¯ kaki is total eye-candy, coloured with surreal blue lakes and hydro canals, golden tussock, and mountain ranges of various shape and hue. It’s classic Mackenzie Country. Perched high above Lake Pu¯ kaki, Tekapo B Power Station takes the Alps to Ocean Cycle Trail experience to the next level, offering a panorama over the lake and Southern Alps including Aoraki/Mt Cook.
Waiau Valley
Chances are your eyes will already be as big as saucers before you’ve turned a pedal on the St James Cycle Trail. This remote high country conservation area is about as beautiful as New Zealand gets, so by the time you reach Maling Pass (about an hour in) you may already be overdosing on natural grandeur. At 1308m, the pass ushers you into a whole new world of wonderful, with the descent offering an ever-widening view of the Waiau Valley, with its soaring peaks, golden tussock and pockets of beech forest.
Coppermine Saddle
One of the country’s most accessible alpine mountain bike rides, the one-day Coppermine Trail heads directly into forested hills behind central Nelson. Getting up high requires a steady climb along an old tramway line, but with each corner comes an ever-expanding panorama of Tasman Bay and the Kahurangi ranges. Having emerged above the bushline and sidled around Wooded Peak to Coppermine Saddle (878m), new views open up over the Richmond Ranges and upper Maitai Valley.
Dunes Trail
The Motu Trails have riding to suit all levels and stellar views. While the inland Motu Rd and Pakihi Track sections are all about wild backcountry scenes and deep forest, the gentle Dunes Trail has spectacular seaside vistas. The classic view, according to trail manager Jim Robinson, is ‘‘looking east with the coastal hills and peaks of the Rauku¯ mara Range fading into the distance over the Pacific Ocean’’.
Arapuni Suspension Bridge
A good way to give yourself white knuckles and wobbly knees, this suspension bridge provides access to Waikato River Trails at Arapuni village. Stretching across a rocky gorge section of the mighty Waikato, the bridge was built in the 1920s so construction workers could get to the power station site. At 152m long, and more than 50m high, it’s one of the longest pedestrian (and cycling) bridges in New Zealand, with a spectacular vantage of the heritage-listed power station below.
Great Lake Trail
There’s eye-popping scenery along much of Taupo¯ ’s Great Lake Trail’s 71 kilometres, including gushing waterfalls, lush native forest and a spectacular volcanic gorge. It’s the elevated vistas over New Zealand’s largest lake, however, that blow most riders away. Headlands and rocky outcrops afford panoramic views way across Lake Taupo¯ to the volcanoes of Tongariro National Park. Closer is a series of beautiful, forested bays, some accessible from the trail, and offering pictureperfect swimming and picnicking.
Sunset Point
No list of lookouts would be complete without a sunset spot, right? When it comes to the Great Rides, look no further than the West Coast Wilderness Trail. There are plenty of places to watch daylight fade over the ocean, lake and rainforest. Our favourite is Hokitika’s Sunset Point, the perfect place for a post-ride feed of fish and chips, with the Tasman Sea crashing against the driftwood-strewn beach.
This article first appeared on the Nga¯ Haerenga New Zealand Cycle Trails website.
Visit nzcycletrail.com for more information on our Great Rides, Heartland Rides and bikepacking routes around New Zealand.