Extra workers and tracks for mountainbiking
A recent club ride in Parapara forest, from left, Rees Potter, Blake Delaney, Murray Turley, Jayden Parata and Bruce Chick. Photo: Supplied.
Just six months after its formation, the GB Mountainbike Club is on a roll. It now has 42 members, conducts monthly social rides (first Sunday every month), has track maintenance days (every third Sunday), encourages youth involvement and is actively pushing for more trails.
The club's latest coup has been the recruitment of Periodic Detention (PD) workers for the creation of a 12km loop track designed by mountain-bike guru Jonathon Kennett on DOC land at Canaan.
Citing several successful models around the country, including Makara Peak near Wellington and trails put in around Rotorua, club president Bruce Chick and Quiet Revolution cycle-shop owner Martin Langley approached the Corrections Department in Motueka four months ago with the idea for the scheme. Until then PD workers were confined to Takaka township because there was no allocated transport. Now, largely because of this mountainbike project, Corrections has acquired a new 10-seater Ford Transit van to make such community projects accessible.
"It's a win-win for everyone," says Bruce. "We're getting our mountainbike track built and the workers get the satisfaction of working on a constructive recreation project that will benefit the community, maybe even themselves and their kids later on." The club is not involved in any actual supervision of PD workers.
Club secretary Mark Godden admits though that despite some gains, the biggest hurdle is still getting access to DOC and private land. "We had the Heaphy Track but that got taken away with the formation of Kahurangi National Park. Getting that back, even for the off-season, would be just getting back to what we had.
"That's ongoing for us and will occupy us for some time yet. But there are also lots of other trails to investigate that would not clash with walkers."
Nationally, DOC may be coming to see that viewpoint. This year, for instance, in Arthur's Pass National Park, DOC allowed mountainbikers to follow the route up Poulter Valley as far as Casey Hut. Historically, mountain bikes and horses have been prohibited from off-road tracks in all national parks.
Bruce acknowledges there are issues in New Zealand with multiple use of tracks. "In most countries, bikers co-exist with walkers quite amiably. Here, there's a bit of a ‘them and us' line drawn in the sand. It needn't be like that. Encouraging people, especially youth, to get into the outdoors, no matter how they do it, would bring great benefit to everyone."
Martin Langley was big in instigating the loop track around the Whakatu Incorporation pine forest at Parapara, a route now well-pedalled by both local and visiting mountainbikers alike. But it's the linking of trails that's generally seen as the key to mountainbike tourism taking off in the Bay.
Mark says that DOC has recently released its review of access into Abel Tasman National Park which proposes that the Totaranui-Gibbs Hill and Birds Clearing-Canaan tracks could be open to mountainbikers which he sees as a very postivie step forward. "The Rameka is well established and soon we'll have more to ride up at Canaan as well. There's a new bike park going in Marahau. By linking everything up, mountainbiking has the potential to bring in big bucks to the Bay. There's no reason why Golden Bay couldn't become a good mountainbiking centre for the South Island."
That may not be just wishful thinking. Tourism Rotorua recently released figures to show that the mountainbiking scene brought around $5 million into that region, and the AA recently listed "mountainbiking the Rameka" as one of the top 101 things to do in New Zealand.
For Golden Bay Mountainbike Club info, contact Bruce Chick at Golden Bay Glass, ph 525 7274.
Gerard Hindmarsh
