St Helens Trails

rangersac

Medically diagnosed OMS
So i rode dreaming pools Saturday. Still haven't decided if I'll ever ride it again.

Yes it has two amazing flow descents and the ride along constable creek will have trout fisherman crashing into every tree as they ogle pristine untouched trout nirvana but that last 7 odd kays. Oh and the dreaming pools are bloody cold but a fun feature.

After 20km i was actually enjoying myself but then i hit the fire trail.. A fire trail climb, come on. It's like they ran out of money. Worst still the area is forestry so you share it with motards, 4wd and wood hookers. Some one is going to get hurt or killed.

The last 4 kays is a relentless climb, though perfectly built, straight outta the IMBA guide. Even a fat unfit bloke like me rode the whole thing without pushing.

It's definitely a e-mtb trail for my money or one for the xc crew. I just don't think 10km of outstanding trail justifies the 20km of average and shit ones.
The fire trail bit is no worse than the fire trail section on the Blue Tier to Swimcart descent. Yeah it's dull, but I think it feels worse because it's at the end of the ride rather than at the beginning or in the middle so it's a bit of a let down. I agree with you thought that e-bikers are gonna love it. However if you can point me in the direction of a 27km trail that's all built for the Enduro/ DH crowd I'm all ears. Even the Blue Tier/ Atlas/ Dambusters descent into Derby requires several km of road slogging if you don't shuttle the section of from the Weldborough up to the Atlas trailhead.
 

Stredda

Runs naked through virgin scrub
I rode the St Helens trails for the first time a couple of weeks ago. I rode all of the Flagstaff hill trails apart from Icarus and Mack10 and ran out of time for Dreaming Pools.
Rode all of the lower trails on the Friday afternoon when we arrived. The Saturday, (which was our full day to ride) it rained all day so didn't get out. Rode the Sunday morning and did Old Salty Dog, Send Helens and some how Wedged In twice.
The trails hold up really well with all the rain we had the day before. Definitely a cooler, autumn/winter/spring riding destination.
Anyway, definitly will have to get back and do Bay of Fires and Dreaming pools. Will have to remember to pack spare legs I think ;)
 

nathanm

Eats Squid
The fire trail bit is no worse than the fire trail section on the Blue Tier to Swimcart descent. Yeah it's dull, but I think it feels worse because it's at the end of the ride rather than at the beginning or in the middle so it's a bit of a let down. I agree with you thought that e-bikers are gonna love it. However if you can point me in the direction of a 27km trail that's all built for the Enduro/ DH crowd I'm all ears. Even the Blue Tier/ Atlas/ Dambusters descent into Derby requires several km of road slogging if you don't shuttle the section of from the Weldborough up to the Atlas trailhead.
for me its more that the fire trail is out of character and serves no purpose (though I'm sure it actually does). Don't get me wrong it was a good and moderately easy way to cover some ground between trails but reminded me of my XC enduro days. You've got 20 kays of really well planned and built trail, then all of a sudden you just ride up a public road (albeit a fire trail). On my ride I did cross paths with a motard coming at speed the other way on a blind corner, thankfully I could hear him coming so pulled off to the side of the road before he came roaring round at speed. The entrance to the fire road climb is well chewed up by moto's so they appear to use that section extensively as well.
More to the point there was so much forest left to continue a mtb only trail on for those few kilometres so I'm still just left perplexed as to why they decided to use a fire trail to link up sections of newly built trail?
Is it a trail that people will come from all around to ride? I'd say no. The queenslanders who were on e-mtb's were saying the same thing, there's just too much climbing between fun bits, but that's always going to be the problem at St Helens/Scamander. The place is just too damn hilly to put in epic long trails, but by doing so it does provide something different and unique.
I've certainly enjoyed the 5 trips I've done so far this year and best of all after a days riding you can hit the beach for a surf, or pull our the kayak for a fish like I did for the rest of the weekend.
 

rangersac

Medically diagnosed OMS
I don't know what the original master plan was in terms of the trail route but I suspect they either a) ran out of money for last bit, hence using the fire trail, or b) COVID lockdown got in the way of the final construction phase as I know the opening was delayed. Also some of the Forestry coups in that area are active so it could well be that any trail through that section was gonna get trashed in the near future.

It's interesting to hear the differing opinions on it though. I think universally everyone in our group preferred it to the Ansons Bay to Swimcart trail that we did the next day, however since then I've heard from an e-biker that he didn't rate it because of the climbing and also because he almost rode off the trail inadvertently at one of the watering hole spots. I found this somewhat amusing since I think if you can't follow that trail then navigating anything beyond a concrete footpath is probably a challenge, and I'm hard pressed to imagine a trail that is better built for e-bikes than Dreaming Pools given the climbs are all pretty steady without any really technical challenges or sharp corners.
 
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