After eight years, two cyclones, a landslide and a pandemic, international hikers are at last lacing up for this remote and spectacular trail
hen New Zealand’s 10th great walk was announced in 2015, the first thing Jed Findlay did was hop on Instagram. He knew that the Paparoa Track, which connects the small South Island communities of Blackball and Punakaiki and cost NZ$12m to build, could be a boon for his family’s business.
Then he watched as the Paparoa Range was hit by successive natural disasters, followed by a global pandemic that shut down tourism entirely. Now, eight years after his initial quick thinking, Findlay is finally welcoming hikers from across the globe and helping them tackle one of the most remote – and spectacular – walks in New Zealand.
Even the existing track required extensive work to bring it to a gradient suitable for mountain bikers. Averaging 6.5 degrees, it is classified as a Grade 4 advanced track. The track router Hamish Seaton admits that it is “still reasonably steep, so a rider will pick up speed fairly easily”.was used to create a detailed map of the region’s contours down to one-metre intervals. Then the planners embarked on 72 trips over eight months to finalise a 25-metre corridor.
I can’t think of many places in the world where a trail has been built through such challenging terrain “I can’t think of many places in the world where a trail has been built through such challenging terrain,” says Seaton, who has worked other bike routes in New Zealand. Through it all the construction teams adhered to the mantra articulated by project manager Mark Nelson. “Every tree was a conversation: could we go around it, avoid cutting it, protect its roots?”
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