Great Walks booking site crashes for second year
Tuesday, 28 May 2024
Bookings for the Milford Track and Lake Waikaremoana Track opened at 9.30am
After six minutes, dates to the end of October were sold out.
DOC said 11,000 people were logged in ready to book at 9.30am.
The Department of Conservation is apologising after its website to book spots on the highly-popular Milford Track and other Great Walks has crashed.
11,000 people were logged in just before bookings opened at 9.30am for Milford and Lake Waikaremoana tracks, DOC said.
People on social media reported they could not get on as the website kept crashing, or once they had entered the names of the trampers, the website went down.
By 11.15am there were approximately 2800 bookings made for the Milford Track, compared with around 2600 on opening day last year.
There were around 400 bookings made for Lake Waikaremoana Track in the same timeframe, and that number is increasing.
DOC director of heritage and visitors Cat Wilson told Stuff Travel: 'We are really sorry this has been a poor experience. It doesn't meet people's expectations and it doesn't meet ours.'
“It was a disappointing start to the bookings. It was a patchy experience but at one point we took the decision to reset the system which would have looked like a crash to some people. We are pretty disappointed it wasn’t the smooth experience we were hoping for and we will having conversations about how we can manage this next year.”
Asked if a lottery system might be a better way of going about booking, Wilson said everything was on the table.
“We looked at a whole lot of things last year but I think everything is back on the table and look at whether this is the best system.”
The booking site crashed last year, when 10,000 people tried to book the ‘finest walk in the world’ when it went on sale.
At 9.30am on Thursday May 30, Abel Tasman Coast Track; Rakiura Track and Whanganui Journey will open for bookings. Followed by the Routeburn Track and Paparoa Track on June 5, then Kepler Track; Heaphy Track and Tongariro Northern Circuit on June 6.
The Mountain Safety Council recommends people research the walks before booking one to make sure they know what is required.
By the end of July 2023, the number of people who had booked a Great Walk had reached pre-pandemic numbers.
DOC had combined the bookings systems for Great Walks and other huts and camp sites to make booking more straightforward for users. This meant people only need one account to book the Great Walks and all other accommodation.
Walks continue to attract high levels of New Zealanders, who accounted for 70% of bed-nights booked last year.
2023/24 statistics show total Great Walk bed-nights were up 7.7% on the previous year with 128,115 bed-nights compared to 118,921 in the previous year.
The numbers were also up 7.1% compared to the pre-COVID summer of 2019/20 of 119,581 bed-nights.
Abel Tasman Coast Track bed-nights were up 11.2%, Tongariro Northern Circuit was up 10% and the Heaphy Track bounced back to 88% of pre-COVID levels despite only reopening as a full walk in October 2023 following storm damage.
Wilson recommended people have their online login sorted in advance to book their preferred walks so they’re all ready to go.
She also said to keep checking the website as people cancel their bookings.
How has your experience been booking a track today? Let us know in the comments.