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Your shortlist for Wanaka — the hikes everyone's talking about, the water everyone forgets, and where we fit in.
Most lists like this repeat the same five photos and call it a guide. This one has actual numbers attached — distances, elevation gain, how long things really take — because "stunning views" doesn't tell you whether you need a full day or forty-five minutes. Eight of these are on foot. The last two are only reachable one way: by boat.
Hikes and lake both.
16km return, about 1,230m of elevation gain, and 5 to 7 hours depending on fitness — the one everyone's seen a hundred photos of, and it earns the reputation. The track climbs almost without a flat section from the car park on Mount Aspiring Road, mostly across farmland. The famous viewpoint sits roughly 30 minutes below the actual 1,578m summit — most people stop there, and that's fine. Go early: the car park fills fast, and the whole track closes from 1 October to 10 November each year for lambing.
About 20 minutes from town on Mount Aspiring Road, this is really four walks in one, all starting from the same car park. Diamond Lake itself is a 10-15 minute stroll in. Push on to the full Rocky Mountain Summit Track and it's 7km return, roughly 3 hours, climbing about 500m to a 775m summit — same caliber of view as Roys Peak, a fraction of the people. Turn back earlier at the Lake Wānaka Lookout (5km, 2 hours) if you want most of the view for less of the climb.
A proper excursion — about an hour's drive from town, the last 30km on gravel with a few fords, out to the Raspberry Creek car park in Mount Aspiring National Park. From there it's roughly 10km return, 3 to 4 hours, crossing the Matukituki River on a swing bridge before climbing through beech forest to a sub-alpine basin facing Rob Roy Glacier. The name comes from the Scottish outlaw Rob Roy MacGregor, given by European settlers in the 1870s. Around 20,000 people walk it every year — one of the most accessible glacier views in the country for the effort involved.
The willow didn't start as a tree — it started as a fence post. Around 1939, a branch was driven into the shallow water at Roys Bay to keep livestock off the shoreline, and it simply refused to stay dead, rooting itself into the solitary tree that now sits offshore. It was a local curiosity until 2014, when a Christchurch photographer's misty, cormorant-filled shot of it won a national photography award — it's since become one of New Zealand's most photographed trees, with over 80,000 posts tagged #ThatWanakaTree. Five minutes from the car park, free, best in the early morning light before the crowd arrives.
A glacier-carved lump of rock right on the edge of town — 4.5km round trip, about 240m of climbing, 90 minutes if you take it easy. The payoff for the short, steep grind: from the 548m summit you get both lakes at once, Wānaka and Hāwea, plus the Clutha River and the Southern Alps behind them. Ten minutes' walk from the shops, no car needed, and quietly one of the best sunset spots in town for the effort it takes to get there.
A pine plantation about 2km from town, near the Clutha River outlet, threaded with roughly 20 mountain bike trails built and maintained by the local riding community. One bike counter on a single trail here has logged over 400,000 rides since 2016 — this is genuinely used, not just a trail on a map. Mostly intermediate and advanced terrain with a handful of easier lines, and sheltered enough to be one of the better options when the wind's up or the weather's turned.
No booking, no cost, no gear required beyond what you bring yourself. Glendhu Bay and the town beaches near the Wānaka Tree are the easiest places in, with clear, cold, glacier-fed water even at the height of summer. It's the simplest way to actually touch the lake instead of just photographing it — worth doing before you commit to anything else on this list.
The path along Roys Bay and out toward the Wānaka Tree is flat, easy, and where the town actually spends its evenings — dog walkers, families, people just sitting on the grass. It connects easily to longer options if you want more distance, but even the short version, ten or fifteen minutes each way, is worth it for the view alone.
Mou Waho, Ruby Island, Stevensons Island — you can see all three from the shore, but the only way onto any of them is by boat. Mou Waho is the standout: a DOC scenic reserve with its own small lake sitting on top of the island, reached by a short forest walk from the beach. Ruby Island holds the remains of a 1920s dance floor. Stevensons is the quietest of the three. Seeing them from a lookout and actually standing on them are two different trips — that's where we come in.
Half-Day Islands TourFull-Day Islands TourBrown trout arrived in the 1860s, and landlocked salmon followed not long after — both have now been established here for more than 150 years. Lake Wanaka runs to 311m at its deepest point, New Zealand's fourth-largest lake by surface area, so there's genuinely a lot of water and a lot of fish to find in it. Whether you've never held a rod or you've been doing this for decades, we'll get you out to where they actually are.
Half-Day Fishing CharterFull-Day Fishing Charter
Wānaka rewards people who go beyond the postcard shot — on foot, on a bike, or out on the water with us.
