The Castle Hill Community Association, along with local MTB clothing manufacturer Ground Effect and single-track specialists T5 Contracting, have been active in developing a network of dual-use mountain biking & tramping tracks in the Castle Hill Basin area now known as the Craigieburn Trails.
To date this development has included the construction of the Hogs Back and Sidle 73 tracks, the upgrade/reroute of the Dracophyllum Flat track, and the construction of the Coal Pit Spur track. These four tracks constitute the Craigieburn Trail,
24km of single-track with a couple of short linking sections of ski-field road from Flock Hill to Castle Hill.
These tracks add to the existing trail network within the Craigieburn Forest and Korowai/Torlesse Tussocklands Parks, and are mostly graded as intermediate mountain-bike standard.
We have more ideas for track development in the Castle Hill Basin and will be continuing to work with DoC on bringing those ideas to life.
Ground Effect Cycle Clothing have been a great supporter of the Craigieburn Trails since the outset, even spending a couple of their company Xmas days out working on trail building (one of which produced the “Ground Effect switches” north of Picnic Rock on the Hogs Back Track). Ground Effect were also heavily involved in the development of the Sidle 73 track and the re-route south of Cheeseman’s Forest Lodge.
