Access

You can either walk up (see Mount John via Lakeshore).

Or you can drive up. Just before the settlement of Lake Tekapo on SH8 coming from Twizel, turn into Godley Peaks Road. Continue 2 km to the gate and kiosk on the right.

As this road is privately maintained by the University of Canterbury, there is an $8 access charge.

Take care on the narrow drive up to the parking areas at the top. During busy times you may have to wait while traffic descends.

The start of the track is signposted from the carpark entrance.

Track

The track can be followed either clockwise or anticlockwise. It is often narrow and rocky, but there is little gradient. It circumnavigates the summit with views changing from Lake Tekapo to the MacKenzie Basin to the highest peaks of the Southern Alps and everything in between.

Geology

The MacKenzie country is a moonscape. This elevated plateau was infilled by the outwash of glaciations. During Ice Ages, glaciers forming in the high peaks of the Southern Alps, disgorged vast quantities of material during their retreat. These meltwater rivers carried gravels, sands and silts, dumping their load in the natural contours and flattening them out.

Lying at altitude of over 600 metres and being in the rainshadow of the mountains, the dry, cold country around Lake Tekapo experiences a continental climate similar to Siberia. Summers are very hot, winters are very cold and there is little rainfall. This is why the area is so arid and dusty.

Mount John is a roche moutonee - or rock sheep. An outcrop of resistant rock has the effect of slowing a glacier in its tracks, arresting its flow and diminishing its erosive powers. An attenuated slope results. Conversely on the downstream side, an acceleration increases its erosive power, giving a steeper slope. Observed from a side view, the shape resembles a sheep - at least it did to French geologists who first described these features.