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The Heaphy track can be walked or mountain biked. Photo: Joe Harrison

Heaps to see on the Heaphy

Features, Great Walks, Heaphy Track

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Marios is an adventure guide and author of 18 walking and tramping books.

By Marios Gavalas

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October 2018

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Marios is an adventure guide and author of 18 walking and tramping books.

By Marios Gavalas

Beech forest, coast, rainforest and tussock - the best word to sum up the Heaphy is variety.

If there’s one word to summarise the Heaphy Track, it’s variety. From the beech forests of the upper Aorere and the craggy pinnacles of the Douglas Range, the track climbs towards Perry Saddle and the lookouts framed with mountain neinei. Then the wide expanse of Gouland Downs open up. These eroded peneplains are the stumps […]

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October 2018

About the author

Marios Gavalas

Marios Gavalas works as an adventure guide, showing off Aotearoa’s wild places to international visitors. He is the author of 18 walking and tramping guide books and has been a Wilderness contributor for over 10 years. He is happy on his mountain bike or skis and can often be found in his garden communing with gnomes.

More From October 2018

Great Walks, Wild People

Great Walks

Great Walks, Heaphy Track, Mountain biking

Great Walks

Tramp or mountain bike the Heaphy Track?

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The 2026 Wilderness Outdoor Photographer of the Year competition

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Knockin’ on heaven’s door

Mud, sweat and tears in Longwood Forest

A majestic coastal walk

Should you go SOBO or NOBO?

A trail of two islands

Five ways to Lake Angelus

The Tararua’s forgotten traverse

Every Tararua hut reviewed and ranked

The possibilities of packrafting

Walk1200km‭ ‬in 2026

The past beneath our boots

From peaks to beaks

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