The Central Otago Region

Central Otago New Zealand is an area of outstanding natural beauty which spans between the city of Dunedin and the premier resort town of Queenstown. From Queenstown it is a one hour drive through the award winning wine region of Gibbston and then through the winding Kawarau George through to Clyde - the start (or finish) of the trail.

From Dunedin it is a one hour drive to Middlemarch the start (or finish) of the Otago Central Rail Trail. You can also choose to take the train the Taieri George Railway for your transfer to Middlemarch if you are starting with us from Dunedin.

Biking the Otago Central Rail Trail immerses you in this timeless, wide open Central Otago landscape. Steeps you in the history of gold's lure, farming and rail. Leads you past basking trout and majestic tors, while overhead fly the freewheeling native Falcon, Karearea.

Oturehua poet Brian Turner, in his essay "Humanity and Nature" about Grahame Sydney's Maniototo art, captures the environment of Otago Central's Rail Trail

"His is not a world waiting to be used by 'adventure-tourists' and 'thrill-seekers', it is for those who prefer reflection and contemplation... In essence so many of his paintings are about staying not leaving, about enduring, hanging on. How do you persist and exist here, glory in what you see, respect what has gone before, what remains, and what will live on? What does live on? Nothing organic remains the same; little of what we, humans, make is assured of continuance. But a painting might last, a poem, a story. The land tells a story, the dilapidated buildings testify to other stories bound up in the land's story, and the clouds are transient but keep on coming, forming and reforming.

"Sydney's world, his wilderness where the spirit is tested and strengthened by a pure airiness, great space, is almost always unforested. Or is it? If you can locate yourself here it is in a forest of loneliness, temperamentally, where you are exposed to yourself and everything else. You need strength of purpose, of character; you need courage to stand up here and not avert the eyes. Only through distance can you find yourself. Beyond the far blue, gold, or dun hills and mountains, beneath cirrus edged with gold, there's a self to be reckoned with.

Do we explore the land, or does it explore us?"

from 'Humanity and Nature,' by Brian Turner, in 'The Art of Grahame Sydney' (Longacre Press, 2000)

Come on a New Zealand biking trip with OFF THE RAILS and experience Central Otago!