This hillside, which felt the touch of the bulldozer’s blade not long ago, has become a real treat for Rotorua’s trail builders. Gunna Gotta, Corridor, K2 and plenty more have either been reborn or created anew on this slope, where the felling of the trees has left room for creative minds with shovels and dozers to have some fun.
Tokorangi is a treat; it was built in 2012 with permission from the local Iwi, Ngati Whakaue, and like it Gunna Gotta doesn’t loiter in the logged areas for too long, soon dropping into the native bush. It’s a fast ride, with pumps and jumps galore, but make sure you lift your head to take in the magic views across Rotorua before the trail heads into the trees and swoops down the steep side of the hill in a string of awesome 180-degree berms. We were lucky enough to score Tokorangi on a stunner of an afternoon, where the sun burst through the clouds just before sunset – it’s pretty hard to overstate how good it feels to soak in that kind of a scene before taking a rip down such a fantastic trail. Sam Osborne and Paul Gray from local bike shop and hire business Planet Bike show us how Tokorangi is meant to be tamed.
