Otago tourism mined

The Otago Rail Trail is New Zealand’s first dedicated long-distance cycleway, following part of the course of a former railway 15km into Central Otago from Dunedin, and used by some 2, cyclists a year. The Sydney Morning Herald’s Andrew Bain joins the region’s new gold rush, a modern resource for an area that had, until the past decade, been all but forgotten by tourism. “The rail trail’s impact in Central Otago is obvious,” Bain writes. “Despite initial indifference and some opposition to the trail’s creation, the towns along the route are dominated by its presence. Almost every bed-and-breakfast, hotel and restaurant is adorned with cycling mementoes, pubs spruik menu items such as the Big Bike Burger and the trail head at Clyde can seem as crowded as the long-gone goldfields.” The Otago Rail Trail opened in 2.