Downhill Thrills at the Craters Mountain Bike Park

Easy does it…

Speaking of grades, the difficulty of mountain bike trails in New Zealand are identified by different grades. The grade system runs between one and six, one being the easiest and six being the most advanced. In MTB parks like Craters, these grades are identified by coloured trail markers, usually found on the trail map or at a sign at the beginning of a trail. Green is easy, blue is intermediate, and black is advanced. As this is our first time at a MTB Park, we figure green would be the smartest choice of the lot.

Hammering it to the top

We follow a trail called “Hammer It” which steadily takes us uphill inside a young pine forest. We don’t have to over-exert ourselves too much on the way up, which takes us over small wooden bridges and under tunnels constructed out of old car tyres. Fantails, a native New Zealand bird which, to be honest, are cute as hell, laugh at us as we power up the hill even cheekily flying into our faces!

Finally, we hit a crossroads where we can continue onto an intermediate trail or start doing some downhill on the green “Nail It” trail. Nail It is is!

Single track fun at the Craters MTB Park

Nailing it to the bottom!

Standing on the peddles in a horizontal position, lifting our asses up off the seat, and keeping our fingers hovering over the brakes, we start our downhill run. The trail throws humps and bumps at us, wide slanted corners and tiny drops – anything to keep on gathering speed so we don’t have to peddle one bit. On some sections, the trees open up to give us quick glances of views that, to be honest, we are going too fast to make out what they are.

With plenty of corners, the trail makes the most of the downhill making the steady uphill climb to begin with definitely worth it! Once we make it back to the bottom and back to the car park we start in, we have huge grins on our faces. We did it! Our first MTB Park trail! Not only did we not manage to kill ourselves, but, man had a blast with the downhill thrills.

Riding the tourist trap

To make our way back toward the Souvenir Outlet, we take a track called “Tourist Trap” that gradually goes up the remnants of a pine forest that has been cut down, and into a stunning little section of redwood forest. It has a quick section of downhill and back to the highway where we cross back to the Souvenir Shop. We thank Richard for the bikes and have a quick visit to one free activity in the area, The Huka Honey Hive.