With a good weather forecast we headed to Garston to ride the Welcome Rock trail. This is a private trail that the owners have hand built on of their High Country Farm as a walking and biking track.https://www.welcomerock.co.nz/
We stayed the night before in the “Red Shed”, located in a refurbished woolshed. The one room studio, was light and comfortable. The outdoor baths were tempting enough for Andrew to run himself a bath after dinner and he watched the free-range chicken wander around outside the fence.
The next morning we drove 8km from the start of the Nevis Road to the old Ski hut. The clouds hugged the hills , but we could tell it was going to be a blue sky day.
The trail itself was described as Grade 3, with some more technical bits. It was not physically exhausting, but it was mentally tiring having to concentrate for long periods of time on narrow tracks. Tussock often covered the track from both sides so you had to trust that where you were heading on the bike would work itself out and that there were no hidden ruts or obstacles.
The all the views were fantastic on this clear day
With a number of stops for views or because one of us had fallen off our bikes the 27km took about 4 hours round trip back to the Ski Hut. To be honest, it was only me who fell off – once while riding and twice down banks while standing beside the bike.
We didn’t use much power on the e-bikes, but must admit the last few kilometers back up the hill we did with full power on. To chew up the 6 km in 15 minutes under power rather than the indicative 45 minutes on a conventional bike was absolute bliss at the end of the ride!
