Mountainbiking Nelson : Waiwhero Forest North

Waiwhero North
This suggested ride is about 2 hours and 24km of riding. It is not very technical, but still a good blast on the downhills and lots of good exercise. It≠s good advice to wear a long sleeve shirt as in some places the gorse can overhang a bit. Dont let that put you off!
Please refer to the map and / or the Google Earth tracks to try and visualise where you are going in conjunction with this text! There are a lot of turn offs and its quite easy to get lost in there!
GPS co-ordinates can be taken from Google Earth by placing your cursor over the point you want and looking at the bottom of the screen. You can change the format in the options under the tools toolbar. I have included them in the text below so that you can enter them as waypoints if you have a GPS.

Getting there!
Head out from Nelson toward Motueka and take the inland highway through Upper Moutere and carry on toward Motueka about 11.5km and just before you get to the Riverside Community, turn left on Edwards Road.
Drive straight all the way down to the corner at the hill and turn left toward Ngatimoti. About two km further on you will find yourself at the top of a saddle; drive a bit further to the bottom of the hill and find the turnoff to the right into the forest at Mill Road. Drive up a couple of hundred yards and park by the gate here.
GPS co-ordinates for the turnoff are N41 11.202 S172 56.485

The Ride
Head up Mill Road for about 0.6km and find the turnoff to Link Road on the right. This is at N41 10.899 S172 56.314
Turn right into Link Road and carry on up for 0.9km past a turnoff on the right and on to the junction with Waiwhero Road which is at N41 10.468 E172 56.303.
Take the right and carry on up Waiwhero Road a further 1km to the top of the road at the ridgeline at N41 10.406 E172 55.849
Turn right and follow the main road along the ridge avoiding any turn offs for about 3.2km until you come to a big skid site at the end. The views up here are great.
This is at N41 9.360 E172 56.360
From here take the 200 metre track along the face to another skid site and then turn up the hill and climb your way to the very top and back onto the road you came along, you have just done a bit of a loop at the end.
Turn left and ride back down the road for About 0.4km. here you will find a turn off to the left, which is a wee detour which once again ends up back on the main road.
This is the "leisurely loop back" and is at N41 9.652 E172 56.256
Once you have ridden the short 300 loop back turn left back onto the main road again and head back a further 0.16km to the start of the "Long Sleeve Low Down".
This is at N41 9.839 E172 56.105
Ride up a tad and then down this firebreak for 0.65km back to Waiwhero Road.
A bit on the gorsey side in places, but a good blast. Turn right, and ride back up the road. Ride for exactly 1 km and you will come to a drop off to the left, this is the start of "The Gorse Gauntlet" this is at N41 9.871 E172 55.927.
Ride this fast firebreak all the way back down to the Motueka highway, this is a 2.73Km run dropping 230m to the valley floor. Once on the highway, turn left and ride up the highway for 1.8km and turn left into the forest again at the entry to Waiwhero Road. This is at N41 10.207 E172 55.340
Ride up about 0.4km and take a left into "Short Cut Road" This will take you all the way back up to the top of the ridge where you started from. From this junction with Waiwhero Road, ride along the ridge (again) 1.43km to find another drop off to the left, this is the start of "Shunt Road" and is at N41 9.997 E172 55.915.
Drop into the Shunt Road Firebreak and enjoy the blast down to the bottom. There is plenty of opportunity for "Air" along the way, but make sure you take any intersections to the left. At the bottom you will go through a drainage ditch and back out onto the road near the intersection with the Motueka Valley Highway.
From here turn left, and instead of going back up Short Cut Road, carry on around, and follow Waiwhero Road for about 4.5km to a junction with Mill Road, this is at N41 10.839 E172 56.174
You can either take the right and follow Mill Road back to the carpark, or turn left and ride up Waiwhero Road to the junction with Link Road, and then drop back down to the carpark the way you came up.

Waiwhero North Map: