Arrowtown Day Trip from Queenstown: The Drive, the Gold and the Good Food

Arrowtown sits about twenty minutes from Queenstown and it is the easiest good day out in the district. A main street of restored gold rush shopfronts, a river you can still pan for gold in, over 100 km of walking tracks that start where the shops end, and a cinema that hands you a cheeseboard halfway through the film. You can do the short version in an afternoon or stretch it across a whole day without ever feeling like you are filling time. Need wheels for it? Evolve Rentals brings the car to where you are staying in Queenstown.

How far is Arrowtown from Queenstown?

About twenty minutes, or twenty five if the Frankton lights are against you. It is roughly the same from Queenstown Airport, out through Frankton and up past Lake Hayes. Coming the other way from Cromwell it is about forty minutes. The road is sealed the whole way and it is a straightforward drive in any weather, which is not something you can say about every road out of Queenstown.

The town has plenty of car parking and bike racks, and once you are out of the car the whole of Buckingham Street is a few minutes end to end. Park once and leave it there.

Do you actually need a car to get to Arrowtown?

No, and we will say so plainly. The Orbus network runs there. Route 4 comes from Arthurs Point through Queenstown and route 2 runs from Frankton, fares are cheap with a Bee Card, and the buses are perfectly good.

The catch is what a day in Arrowtown is actually made of. The Chinese Settlement is best early, Sawpit Gully takes two to three hours before you have eaten anything, and the last film at Dorothy Browns finishes late. Fitting all three around a timetable means dropping one of them, and it is always the one at the end of the day. Driving yourself is the difference between an afternoon in Arrowtown and a day in it. We have written the honest version of that argument in Do You Need a Car in Queenstown?, including the times when the answer is no.

What should you see first in Arrowtown?

The Chinese Settlement, and it is free. It sits at the top end of Buckingham Street, with Ah Lum's restored store about a hundred metres down the hill and the huts on the flats behind it. Interpretation panels in English and Chinese tell you who lived there in the 1880s and how, and the main dray track through the middle is flat enough for a wheelchair or a buggy. Give it under an hour. It is the part of Arrowtown that changes how you read the rest of the town, because the pretty main street and the huts down on the river flat were the same place at the same time.

Then the Lakes District Museum at 49 Buckingham Street, open nine to five every day. It is small and it is properly done, and it is where the gold rush stops being a theme and turns into a set of actual people.

Can you still find gold in the Arrow River?

Yes, and people do. The museum hires out gold pans and sends you off with an instruction sheet and a couple of videos, and the river is a two minute walk from the counter. Work the edge of the bank where the water slows and the gold gets caught behind rocky outcrops, and go after rain rather than in the middle of a dry spell.

Two things nobody warns you about. It takes far longer than you expect, and the Arrow is cold enough that shoes you do not mind soaking are not optional. Nobody has ever retired on an afternoon in that river, but a flake in the bottom of the pan is worth the wet feet.

Which Arrowtown walk is worth your time?

It depends how much of the day you want to give it, and there are over 100 km of tracks to choose from. Thirty minutes gets you up Tobins Track, which climbs out of the town and hands you the whole basin. An hour and a half does the Millennium Trail, flat and easy and along the river. Half a day is Sawpit Gully, a seven kilometre loop of two to three hours that involves rock hopping a creek and turns slippery after rain. It is the one everybody talks about, and it is not the one to do in the shoes you wore to brunch.

Macetown comes up in every conversation about Arrowtown, so it is worth being clear about it. It is a walk or a bike ride, not a drive. The route follows the riverbed and crosses it repeatedly, so leave the car in town and go on foot or on two wheels.

Is Arrowtown good on a bike?

Very. The Queenstown Trail is a 130 km network and it runs straight through Arrowtown, with the Arrow River Bridges section the obvious first ride. Our friends at Going Blue hire Trek Marlins and Powerfly electric bikes from half a day upwards, and the Arrowtown to Queenstown ride is one of their regulars. Use the code EvolveVIP for twenty percent off. There is more on pairing the car with the bikes in our post with Going Blue.

Take the electric one. The trail is beautiful and it is not flat, and nobody has ever finished that ride wishing they had done it the hard way.

Where should you eat in Arrowtown?

Aosta at 18 Buckingham Street is the one we send people to. Northern Italian, built around the Aosta Valley and cooked with Central Otago produce, brunch from eleven and dinner from five, seven days a week. Book ahead, and at the moment that means a call, a text or an email rather than the online form.

For something less of an occasion, The Fork and Tap at 51 Buckingham Street does the job, and it is the right end of the street for an afternoon that is in no hurry. If you are eating your way around the whole district rather than just Arrowtown, we have a post on the pie shops worth driving for.

What do you do in Arrowtown when it rains?

This is where Arrowtown quietly beats everywhere else. Dorothy Browns is upstairs from Aosta at 18 Buckingham Street, open seven days, and it is a proper boutique cinema rather than a small multiplex. The armrests are built to take a cheeseboard and a glass, there is a bar with local wine and craft beer, there is a bookshop attached, and the main theatre still runs an intermission. In winter they show silent films on the balcony next to the fire.

Dinner downstairs and a film upstairs is the best wet afternoon in the Wakatipu, and you never had to move the car.

How do you shape a day in Arrowtown?

Start with the Chinese Settlement while it is still quiet, then the museum, then hire a pan and get in the river before lunch. Eat on Buckingham Street. Give the afternoon to a walk or a ride depending on the weather and on how big lunch was. Then either stay for dinner and a film, or drive back around Lake Hayes as the light goes, which is quietly the best twenty minutes of the day.

In April the town fills up for the Arrowtown Autumn Festival and the trees do the thing everybody photographs. That one has its own post, because it is a different day out from an ordinary one.

Getting to Arrowtown with Evolve

We bring the car to you. Nobody else in Queenstown does that, which is the entire reason Evolve exists. You tell us where you are staying, one of our team meets you there and walks you through the car, and Arrowtown is twenty minutes after that. No counter, no queue and no shuttle to a car park you have never heard of. Book a car with Evolve Rentals.

If this is your first time driving here, our guide to driving in New Zealand covers what actually catches visitors out, and none of it is the thing they expect.

FAQs

How long does it take to drive from Queenstown to Arrowtown?
About twenty minutes. It is roughly the same from Queenstown Airport, and the road is sealed the whole way. From Cromwell, on the other side, allow about forty minutes.

Is the Arrowtown Chinese Settlement free to visit?
Yes. It is open ground at the top end of Buckingham Street and you walk it at your own pace. Allow under an hour. The main track through the middle of the settlement is suitable for a wheelchair or a buggy, though the side tracks off it are not.

Can you pan for gold in Arrowtown?
Yes. Hire a pan from the Lakes District Museum on Buckingham Street and walk two minutes to the Arrow River. Look along the edge of the bank where gold catches behind rocks, go after rain rather than in a dry spell, and wear shoes you do not mind soaking.

How long do you need in Arrowtown?
Half a day covers the Chinese Settlement, the museum and lunch. A full day lets you add a walk or a bike ride and stay on for dinner and a film, which is when the town is at its best and when almost nobody on a bus timetable is still there.