Waiheke has recently been voted by the Lonely Planet as the 5th best region to visit in the world! One step off the ferry and onto this beautiful island and it isn’t hard to understand why. This is now our third time (and third article) to this stunning island, you could say we have fallen for this island hard! Each time we visit we discover something new it is quickly becoming our escape of choice from the busy Auckland lives we are currently living!
NZ has 3 more public holidays than the UK, that to us is 3 more weekend trips/getaways the first one of spring lands in Labour Weekend. A weekend where NZ commemorates the 8 hour working day (they were one of the first country’s to legalise it) we decided to utilise this time off in our busy schedules and explore Waiheke some more. This time around the agenda was to visit some areas of the island we have never been to before, some places you just can’t reach on the normal hop on and hop off bus service that the island offers to the many day trippers.
E Bikes at Palm Beach
E Bikes to the Rescue:
To do this we needed transport. We thought about hiring a car, but after a quick Google search we found we could hire Electric bikes for the day (or longer if you wanted) which was just perfect as we had already discovered the delights of a E bike back in June on our cycle trip around Auckland. We came across E Cycles and Darleen who runs the little shop in Oneroa. She is extremely passionate about everything bike related and has lots of knowledge about the island, she even gave us a handy map to ensure we couldn’t get lost (not hard!).
Darleen set us up with some fab bikes that are guaranteed to get you around the island in one day without breaking a sweat. A quick lap around her test track (the car park!) and we were off.
Our Cycle Route in a Day:
Ask anyone about Waiheke and they will tell you it is hilly! Do not under estimate! The first time we visited we were on foot, the second time we took our bikes (tiring) so this time we wanted to learn from our past mistakes! Riding Waiheke on E Bikes was a dream. The island has very good roads, courteous drivers and more cycle lanes than I expected.
The top of Seaview Road looking down to Onetangi
At the bottom of the article is a map of the cycling route we took, we actually travelled a total of 30 km in the space of 2.5 hours but due to our stops in between we hired the bikes for a total of of 7 and half hours, we even had time for a cheeky 2 and half hour lunch break at Mudbrick Winery! I do believe this distance of travel will not over exert yourself and indeed the bikes (mine actually ran out of battery on the last hill -doh!).
Wine O’Clock
In our last article we wrote about our plans to get as far east of the island that we could reach but unfortunately not even the E Bikes could make that happen for us – well there always is next time!
Top Tip: If you need to find somewhere to stay when you visit Waiheke then we highly recommend booking your accommodation in advance, it’s important not to under estimate how busy this small island gets between September and March each year. We suggest checking out BookaBach (private homes often not found on AirBnB) or this link to find out instant availability of the motels/hotels/guest houses in the area.