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Mt Peel circuit, Cobb Reservoir

Mark Eaglesfield

Mt Peel (1654m) is a long hike above Cobb Reservoir in the Tasman District of South Island. As a day-trip, it is accessible from Lake Peel parking lot, which is around 1 hour 25 minutes from Tākaka. Lake Peel itself is an official DOC destination reached by a poled route, but the summit is not. I circled Lake Peel by walking around the rim of the corrie (cirque).

The mountain straddles the border between the Tasman and West Coast Districts, and is part of Kahurangi National Park.

Don’t confuse this with South Island’s other Mt Peel, which is far to the south, near Peel Forest, Canterbury.

Time

The entire hike took me around 7 hours 30 minutes, including breaks. This involved:

  • around 4 hours to the summit (including breaks) via the northern spur

  • around 30 minutes resting at the summit

  • around 3 hours returning to the parking lot via the southern spur and Point 1534

Access

I don't recommend doing this as a day-trip from Motueka or Nelson. Why not? Because you would have to drive over Tākaka Hill twice. A souvenir shop in Tākaka sells a shirt reading, "It’s just a hill, get over it," the joke being that it's actually a tedious long road over chain of hills with 257 corners.

Cobb Valley Road is a normal road. After crossing a bridge, it becomes the narrow but paved Cobb Dam Road, winding through a steep gorge above the Tākaka River. There are few guardrails and several rockfall zones. Passing another car will often require some backing up. After the second bridge, which is at Cobb Dam, the road surface becomes unpaved, making it harder to handle the tight turns. I wouldn't drive a campervan along this road, and I am disappointed that some people do so.

Screenshots of the NZ topographic map are licensed as CC BY 4.0 by Toitū Te Whenua Land Information New Zealand (LINZ).

The parking lot for this and other nearby hikes is to the left of Cobb Dam Road, near the southern end of the reservoir.

Route

From the parking lot, I ascended Lake Peel Track through meadow and forest. Between 1100 and 1200 meters, the blue route shown on my NZTopo50 South app diverges from the DOC track. I don't know why. I used the DOC track, as I didn't see any other.

Eventually I reached the tussocky northeastern ridge of the corrie around Lake Peel. There were orange markers the whole way.

At the 4-way signpost in the gallery’s 7th picture, below, I diverged straight ahead up the ridge, i.e. I followed none of the four signs. There were no more markers, but there was often a faint impact track, and the general direction was always obvious. The ridge became rocky and undulating, requiring some careful descents from rock outcroppings. (For comparison, it is easier than rocky ridges in Arthur’s Pass.)

After the final outcropping on the ridge, it was an easy tussock ascent to a gently sloping triangular area, where tussock gives way to loose red rock. I crossed this to reach the summit and went a bit further for the view north, then rested to gaze at Iron Hill across the Cobb River Valley to the northeast. I hiked past the Sylvester Lakes to Iron Hill’s summit three days later.

The dry grass near the summit was too slippery to sit on; rock was better.

For the descent, I followed TinyTramper’s ascent/descent route. I walked along the gentle southwestern ridge of the corrie until I reached a cairn, then descended a tussock slope to an orange marker pole, and turned left (north) toward Lake Peel along the easy-to-see Balloon Hut track. The hut is to the south of my topomap screenshot. (It is presumably a good place to stay for a multi-day trek involving Mt Peel and Mt Arthur.)

I saw a kea flying around the corrie, but I wasn’t able to get a photo or video.

If 1 is an easy track, and 4 is using hands and feet on exposed rocks, I give this a 4 at worst. It was mostly a 2. Using TinyTramper’s ascent/descent, which means not doing my undulating rocky ascent, it is a 3 at worst.

Far left, Mt Mytton. Left, Lockett Range, including Iron Hill center-left. Behind Lockett Range, high Mt Snowdon. Center, Cobb Reservoir. Center-right, ascent spur. Right, Mt Arthur and the Twins. Far right, Mt Peel summit.

Summit hidden at left, beyond the snow patches. Ascent ridge in center. Descent ridge at right.

Hunting

The entire route is in a hunting area. Hunters are forbidden to “discharge firearms near tracks, huts, campsites, road-ends or any other public place.” I have hiked in more than 30 hunting areas, and only passed hunters twice - this wasn’t one of those hikes.

Here is the DOC topomap with all hunting areas visible.

Pages about this route (via the northern spur)

This particular ridge is quite nasty with terrain and undulation. It’s not only the rocks that get you tripped up but the short mountain bushes, which seem to be designed for slipping and scraping.

Pages about the hike to Lake Peel

Pages about the out-and-back hike via Point 1534

Pages about multi-day hikes traversing Mt Peel

Nearby hikes

Local history

What resulted was the biggest rock-and-earth dam constructed in the country, 221m across and 35m from its foundation to the access road across the top.

Mt Peel seen from elsewhere