A Few Days In Chch, Wat Should I Ride?

onyabike · *by **onyabike** on Mon 30/Aug/10 9:30am*

Hiya. will be in the garden city to see metallica next month. going to bring a heavy duty trail bike and hopefully squeeze a couple of days riding in. port hills i guess. i kind of like tech trails - bit of DH and black diamond - and sweet flowing trails. not all that good at clearing gaps though. any suggestions of tracks i simply should not miss? cheers.

Trail · *by **Trail** on Mon 30/Aug/10 9:56am*

If up the hills do check out Flying Nun. Not a super long piece of trail, but definitely a fun piece of trail!!

If you have a day spare I would suggest heading out Mt Oxford way.

danose · *by **danose** on Mon 30/Aug/10 11:08am*

heavy duty bike + likes tech = lava flow?

onyabike · *by **onyabike** on Mon 30/Aug/10 11:42am*

just looking at mount oxford on map. there looks like what could be a nice loop from west coopers creek over summit and back out again. would that be a good ride? if so which direction?

yes - lava flow sounds good. maybe that and a couple of other tracks in that area. and flying nun.

Trail · *by **Trail** on Mon 30/Aug/10 11:47am*

That is a good loop. Park at Coopers Creek, ride in over the bridge and up the 4wd track past the hut (scouts?). Up the face of Mt Oxford - is a couple of hours carrying. Come back down the ridge that drops to the Wharfedale/View Hill carpark, and then ride down the Coopers Creek track to get back to the car. About a 5 hour loop for reasonably fit and competent people.

onyabike · *by **onyabike** on Mon 30/Aug/10 11:50am*

sweet. looks like an early start then!

Trail · *by **Trail** on Mon 30/Aug/10 11:56am*

Oh, there may be a little snow on the top of Oxford still... usually not a problem

http://mountainbikingzane.wordpress.com ... g-mission/

snr_merv · *by **snr_merv** on Mon 30/Aug/10 12:38pm*

If you appreciate flowing gnarly stuff ride Greenwood. Must be about 10 minutes of carrying speed through the rocks/corners as fast as you can. Not so good if unfit or unskilled.

Good series of tracks I rode yesterday, climb Worsely spur, ride Flying Nun a couple of times, charge up to Vic Park via Summit Road/Thompsons shared use track, Mt Vernon Traverse track, Castle Hill track, up the road, Witches Hill, up the road, John Britten, down the road, Greenwood, Captain Thomas, finish Sumner for fish and chips/coffee/beer/whatever, ride home. All those tracks require some solid technical ability to clean and are fast and fun when you get the flow going. Took about 3 hours yesterday.

Lavaflow would be disappointing right now I would imagine. Straight down some rocks not really knowing where you're going so hard to pin it/enjoy it (especially riding it for the first time), then big boggy ruts at the bottom...

Nelson style missions require going out of town a bit.

danose · *by **danose** on Mon 30/Aug/10 1:04pm*

snr_merv wrote:If you appreciate flowing gnarly stuff ride Greenwood.

plus if you don't mind climbing you can turn around at the bottom, climb back up and do it all over again :love:

ditto for castle rock track (2 or 3 laps up and down that is always fun) - was it still a bet wet to go up yesterday (cos I know you're not averse to a good bit of techo climbing)

onyabike · *by **onyabike** on Mon 30/Aug/10 5:39pm*

cheers - im gettn excited.

Nick_K · *by **Nick_K** on Mon 30/Aug/10 6:28pm*

Bottle lake - It might be all thats open

pedalingkiwi · *by **pedalingkiwi** on Mon 30/Aug/10 7:08pm*

Nick_K wrote:Bottle lake - It might be all thats open

Oh no, didn't even last a year before the chronic pesimissim got to him ...... Nick you should have lived here before Canterbury wetting became the prevailing weather pattern. Back in the day we had some fabulous dry winters. I'm not b'shitting !! Promise.

Nick_K · *by **Nick_K** on Mon 30/Aug/10 7:13pm*

pedalingkiwi wrote:
Nick_K wrote:Bottle lake - It might be all thats open

Oh no, didn't even last a year before the chronic pesimissim got to him ...... Nick you should have lived here before Canterbury wetting became the prevailing weather pattern. Back in the day we had some fabulous dry winters. I'm not b'shitting !! Promise.

If it wasn't for sking I'd probably have turned to the bottle by now.

snr_merv · *by **snr_merv** on Mon 30/Aug/10 9:25pm*

danose wrote:
snr_merv wrote:If you appreciate flowing gnarly stuff ride Greenwood.

plus if you don't mind climbing you can turn around at the bottom, climb back up and do it all over again

ditto for castle rock track (2 or 3 laps up and down that is always fun) - was it still a bet wet to go up yesterday (cos I know you're not averse to a good bit of techo climbing)

Sunday was near perfect, tacky to slightly greasy with the odd bog hole across the whole hill, rocks all dry and grippy. It'll be all a bit wet now though!