Biking NZ Part 4: Tokoroa

Part 4 of the NZ biking series brings us a lot closer to our home base of Rotorua last summer in a small town known for its logging operations and low income neighbourhoods named Tokoroa. What most people don’t know, even those involved in the mountain biking scene is that this place has some of the most pristine built trails on the North Island.

About 5km out of the town is Cougar Mountain Bike Park. The park is not compromised of a lot of trails, but what is there is top notch! The locals we encountered in this area were also bar none some of the nicest folk around. The two areas at the park we spent the majority of our time biking were The Jungle Junction and The Flintstones trails. The jungle junction was basically a flowy downhill pumptrack with varying difficulty and steepness. The flintstones area was how I imagine pros get there lines groomed when they are shooting videos. It was flowy singletrack with big smooth berms and once again two down tracks with varying difficulty. Bam Bam was a pure flow with no jumps and Yaba Daba was a flow track with medium jumps and steeper faster lines. It was all fun and after spending a full day shredding the tracks, we knew we had spoiled ourselves going forward. It will be with great difficulty that we will ever find tracks quite like this area.

Along with this tribute to some awesome trails built by some awesome trails builders, is a video of Marisa ripping down Bam Bam. She may look ultra serious, but she is ear to ear grinning inside! Enjoy!