During the 1960’s clay from the site adjacent to Halswell Quarry was extracted to build the roads around Christchurch. This left an area of steep hillsides and terraces. In the 1980’s when extraction was finished the area was planted out in pine trees. As the top of Kennedy’s Bush was developed, stormwater catchment ponds were created at the base of the hill. This was the canvas with which to work.
The original Crocodile Track was built in 2001 and provided a way for riders to get from Halswell Quarry to Kennedy’s Bush Rd. It was named after a rock feature half way up the climb. Halswell was a small outer suburb in those days.
In 2008 Craig and Rebekah Tregurtha moved to Halswell from Opawa (another Christchurch suburb) and Rebekah missed having easy access to the Port Hills. The Tregurtha’s at that time were involved with building a mountain bike loop at Living Springs, on the harbour side of the hill. They had formed the Christchurch Singletrack Club in 2009 to formalise that work and the events they ran. In 2009 Craig met Dan van Asch, owner of the land through which the Crocodile passes. On 20 February 2011 the club hosted a round of the Mountainbike New Zealand Nationals at Living Springs. 2 days later a devasting earthquake struck Christchurch and further development at Living Springs was abandoned due to the risk of rockfall. A long section of track had been marked out and building initated. A significant slip in October that same year wiped out a lot of what was scoped. Plans were put on hold indefinitely and that left them with time on their hands…
Craig talked with Dan with more intent about putting in another track on his Halswell land, and in August 2011 the first scoping session was done. Rebekah’s request was that it be something she was capable of riding since she was neither skilled nor fit. There was at that time very limited riding on the Port Hills for less skilled riders. Vegetation clearing for C2 began in October 2011 and the first dig session was held at the end of that same month. Work by hand continued over the next few months and a digger was used for part of it during May and June 2012. The track was officially opened, almost a year after work began, in September 2012. C2 was less steep than the Crocodile so made the area accessible to more people. C2 was named because it was the second track to be built and Rebekah likes puns and Crocodile starts with C and Craig starts with C too (C2).
We were running some low key races in the area that turned off C2 and went along the 4WD track and through the farm back in to the quarry and we realised we could build a small bit of singletrack (Deviation) and create a loop that we could use for races. Duncan and Etheridge Trails had just bought a Singletrack 240 trail building excavator and were keen to try it out so they were engaged to build this. Deviation was opened in December 2013. Deviation is a play on the initials of Dan van Asch and it was a deviation away from the Crocodile Track.
Storms during 2014 kept us busy and work on Lower Deviation didn’t begin until April 2015. Fulton Hogan provided a digger for this, Richard Craig and Jason Blair provided transport and we had a few different operators, all voluntary. After 19 trail building sessions, the track was opened in October 2015
