Waipara Valley Vineyard Trail

Distance: About 15 km
Time: About 2-3 hours of cycling (but the whole day including stops for wine tasting and lunch was 9:30 am till 4 pm)
Start: Glenmark Reserve, entrance on Church Road, Waipara
Finish: Same place:  It's there and back with loopy bits in the middle
Date: Friday 24th January 2020

With four bikes on the bike rack, over secured and lurching around slightly alarmingly, we drove to the Glenmark Reserve and the start of the Waipara Valley Vineyard Trail. It was looking to be a scorcher of a day and we set off on our intrepid journey.  We had the grand idea of cycling to the end of the trail and then starting the wine tasting so as not to peak too early.

The Vineyard Trail is absolutely stunning - a hidden gem in Canterbury (you can download a map and detailed track description here).  It starts off on Church Road but soon turns off through the vineyards along shingle farm tracks, up hill and down dale - also under a bridge (State Highway 1). At the high point you see panoramic views through the vines and across to the foothills. With the green vines and the yellow parched grass it reminded me of a Van Gogh painting.

After about 40 minutes of cycling (including plenty of photo stops) we arrived at Black Hills Winery and started the wine tasting. A chenin blanc, reisling, rose, and three pinot noirs, we loved all of them.  Apparently there is a mosaic of soils in the Waipara region (limestone, clay, mudstone, Waipara greensands) and so the wines are highly variable depending on where the vine is grown.

The return journey was more wobbly for some reason. Jane's bike chain kept falling off and at one point she bought a cork pin board of some random vineyard workers (tricky to carry on a bike). At the Waipara Springs vineyard it was 31 degrees.  We felt pretty stuffed but another wine tasting (for the non-drivers) and a superb lunch outside under a tree set us right. A final wobble and one flat bike tyre saw us back at the car.

 I don't know if it was the wines, but the bike rack was suddenly looking dangerously non-straight to some. There was alot of talk about cycling 30 km back to Zhanna's house but instead we over over secured the bikes to everything and drove home. It was a lovely day!!