Track Crew News - January 2010

Happy New Year to everyone!

I’m sure we are seeing more riders than we have ever seen before. Some days when passing through the Carpark we were seeing up to 30 odd cars in the car park plus the extras parked at the Hub café.

A lot of these people are visitors so if they look lost help them out. Good sport at the moment is trying to work out why people have crashed in a number of odd places. We have some very strange holes in the blackberries and ferns at the moment.

If you are a visitor please ride in the correct direction in Wairakei. As a general rule all tracks to the West off SH1 are one way.
All on the Eastern side are two way unless indicated on the signage. 99% of our riding is on single track so keep off the roads and stay within the Mountain bike zones.

Not much happening track wise, just a bit of maintenance being done in places and catching up on other jobs around the place.

We are about to start building a new track from the Huka Jet flat back up to the top of the hill by the Volcanic Activity Center.
The track is being paid for by the Ministry of Tourism and will mean we have a easy route up to the top after coming of the new by pass bridge, will also give us a great return track after doing Totara Gully.

Thomas has been hacking away at the web site and we have a few great videos on the site to check out. If you have any photos or good web cam stuff please This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Track of the month:
Redwoods Heaven on a hot day

Track Crew News - May 2010

Improvements are still happening in Wairakei thanks to the dedicated few Brendon and Pete Lockwood have built a new Cork Screw uphill which will make this circuit a lot more popular as it’s a great little down hill on the other side It has a whip de do from hell which will take your breath away

Carwyn has been chipping away on Deb’s up hill and a working bee is planned so it can be finished off in one hit.
Pete Manning has made a little change in Walters gum trees that adds to the flavor, Walters is now a major way home thanks to all his work

Rotary Ride is still being improved with help from a bunch of Contact guys working on the Huka Lodge section for a day.
For those sharper people out there you will have noticed a big increase of walkers on the Rotary Ride. Doc have a big tree down on the walking track so have asked if they can divert walkers on to our track to help them out. 
So just be extra careful with more people around.

Kawakawa Bay is moving along. We are past the look out and heading down into the bay. We have to build a zig and then two zag’s before we can drop into an amazing gully of big ferns that will take us down into the bay and link onto the old track at the bottom of the stairs.

We had a visitor late home on W2K, if you come from out of town check out the distance on the W2K signs before embarking on a headland ride at 5 o’clock It’s a bit further than you think with the climbing involved and it gets dark under the trees by 6 o’clock or make sure you have a set of lights or can ride with a touch between your teeth.

The Track Crew

Track of the Month:

Young Pines - Oldie but a goody

Track Crew News - June 2010

Big thanks to the people who turned out to Marshal on the Moon Ride and to Murray Fleming for the support he gives to Bike Taupo.

Working bee on Debs track went great, the uphill is now open to the Mr. & Mrs. mid point with now only about 100 meters to build along the top so the track can enter at the Buzzard.

The Huka Lodge up hill is now much friendlier to ride thanks to the Contact Crew who ripped into it one Tuesday. This is all part of the Rotary Ride Upgrade, which we hope to keep chipping away at for the next two years.

And last on the list you can now ride all the way to Kawakawa Bay and back we have joined up the tracks below the old steps leading down to the bay.

We have just got to finish the track down to the lake and will then be pulling out and fixing the odd bit we are not happy with.
Most of the funding has come from Doc to up grade the track so a big thanks to them for looking at the future

The Track Crew

Track of the Month:

Aratiatia - Remember when we could only ride on that side of the river

Track Crew News - April 2010

Kawakawa Bay is now really stating to come together we are 4.6 Kms in now. We have just crossed the stream that had the bridge with the rock steps on the other side
We are not happy with the odd spot so will be making some adjustments when we come out If you think the hill is a bit hard we had a 72 year old turn up on a road bike at the top the other day.

Work on The Lake Track is coming along with a huge amount of behind the scenes work being done by many people. We have tight dead lines set down by the Government having to have the feasibility / business study done by 31st of May.

They didn’t like our W2K one: We reckoned it was feasible and then built it.

Our tracks got a great write up in the Australian MTB magazine that’s thanks to all those people who work on the tracks and also the people who have sponsored us over the years. Thanks also to the Guys who took the Aussies for a ride pity they didn’t come to Taupo for two days

The Contact boys have been busy doing some improvements on Kegresse and have made it a lot better after you come out of the gullies. Its still very techy in the gullies but now flows much better after that.

Other track work going on is an alignment of the Cork Screw uphill and people still chipping away at Debs up hill

Logging crew is working in paint ball area so please stay away from the Q line road area and watch out for logging trucks near the car park, they are bigger than you and will win any race!

Please don’t forget to contact us about any trees or other track damage or if you think a track is getting over grown and needs a trim up

The Track Crew

Track of the Month:

Retro - Keeps you honest