Hawea Flat (Feb 1st to 20th) PART 2

On our 2nd week in Hawea Flat, we managed to get out for several bike rides. They talk about mountain biking being pretty amazing in the area however Wanaka was not a favourite. We checked out their bike park, the Sticky forest, a few times however it had really short laps and nothing too impressive to talk about. We did get out for a couple of day trips into Queenstown area which did indeed have some awesome spots! First was 7 mile bike park which is just 7 miles outside of Queenstown and is a pretty fun network of cross-country trails. We also ventured out to Coronet Peak which is one of the ski hills in the area. They don’t have the chair lift going in the summer months here so we biked up to the top for some incredible views of the area and the bike down was good fun! Wish we had more time to check this place out since we couldn’t quite get to all of the trails this time around.
People talk about how awesome the downhill biking is in Queenstown, where they have a gondola-assisted mountain bike lift at Skyline park. It was on both of our lists of things to try out but with bike rentals and a 1 day lift pass it is not cheap! Unfortunately we decided to pass this time but hopefully we will be back another time to give it a go! I’ve never rented a downhill bike before and this seemed to be a pretty great spot for it! There is still time so we will see what happens:)
Closer to home, in Hawea Flats, we also attempted to bike up Grandview mountain but only made it up about half way since we both (well mostly Keegan;)) didn’t have it in our legs for a summit view. Still a really beauty evening ride out.

Aside from all the biking this week, we did a pretty spectacular hike up breasthill mountain. This one starts just off of Lake Hawea and has another steep start but the top offers some amazing views of the lake, mountains and farmland in the area. You can do this as an overnight trip with Pakitihu hut just sitting over the top but we did it as a day hike and had lunch at the top instead.Read more