Difficulty: Hard
Time: 2 hours (6km)
Note: Parts of this track are closed during spring for the lambing season.
The Harbour Cone is located on the Otago Peninsula and is one of Dunedin’s iconic natural landmarks.
There are several options you can choose from to reach the top of Harbour Cone, depending on how long you want to walk for. We took the Bacon Track, loop option (2 hours). Mostly because it sounded so delicious.
Mike on Bacon Track, Harbour Cone Behind
The start of the Bacon Track is at the end of Bacon Street, which is in Broad Bay.
Drive along Portobello Road until you reach Broad Bay. Bacon Street is on the right, just after the Historic Fletcher House. At the end of Bacon Street the road you’ll see a sign for the ‘Bacon Track.’ Parking is a little awkward so you may need to park further down the road if there are several cars already there.
Michelle at Rocky Knob enjoying the view.
After walking down the track a little way we followed the signs over the stile through farmland to the left of Smiths Creek, across Highcliff Road and up to Rocky Knob. The track is marked with fence posts with yellow tips. From Rocky Knob the track can become hard to discern, but keep heading towards Harbour Cone and you’ll re-find the markers.
If you prefer, you can continue to the left at the first stile and take the steeper, more direct route which by-passes Rocky Knob.
Section of Stone Wall between Rocky Knob and Harbour Cone
(We like loop tracks so took the gentle track up and the steeper track back down). The Steeper track is host to huge, climbable macrocarpa trees, a row of kanuka trees beside the barbed wire fence and the ruins of Allens Farm.
Neat the top of Harbour Cone the track becomes unclear, so we just scrambled up the rocks to the trig station at the summit. From here you can sees views of Hoopers Inlet, Aramoana, Port Chalmers and parts of Dunedin City.
For a less challenging options, or a shorter walk, you can start the track on Highcliff Road. There is a (very) small place for car parking on the Harbour Cone side of the road at a bend in the road, near a cluster of large trees. From here it should only take roughly half an hour to the summit.
Michelle on remains of Allen Farm
Mike and Michelle at the top!