Destination Guide
Cycling in Tasmania
Tasmania: kunanyi/Mount Wellington from sea level, East Coast wilderness roads, and the quiet roads that produced Richie Porte — Australia's most complete cycling landscape.
Tasmania is the cycling destination that mainland Australians discuss in hushed tones and international visitors have barely discovered. The island state lies 240km south of Victoria across the Bass Strait, its separation from the mainland having produced a landscape of extraordinary ecological diversity — cool temperate rainforest, alpine dolerite peaks, beaches of white silica sand on an East Coast that sees more sunshine than Hobart despite being further south, and a West Coast of such geological rawness that the roads through it feel like they were carved for access rather than pleasure. It is on these roads — the empty East Coast run from Bicheno to St Helens, the long Wellington descent from the dolerite summit to the Hobart waterfront, the wild Queenstown approach through the mineral-stained hills — that the particular quality of Tasmanian cycling reveals itself: an absence of other people that mainland Australia cannot offer and Europe cannot replicate.
Last updated: 15 Mar 2026
- Terrain
- Road, Climbing, coastal, wilderness
- Difficulty
- Moderate — Expert
- Road Quality
- Good
- Cycling Culture
- Moderate
- Traffic
- Very Low
Pro Cycling Connection
Tasmania produced Richie Porte, who finished third at the 2020 Tour de France and won multiple stage races at the highest professional level including the 2017 Critérium du Dauphiné. Porte developed o...
Best Time to Cycle in Tasmania
Tasmania's cycling season runs November through March (Southern Hemisphere summer), with January and February the warmest and most reliable months for summit approaches including kunanyi/Mount Wellington and Jacobs Ladder. November and December are e...
Temperature: 2°C (winter) to 28°C (summer)
Best Cycling Climbs in Tasmania
Cradle Mountain Road
12km · 520m · 4.3% · CAT2
Cradle Mountain Road is the approach climb to one of Australia's most celebrated wilderness destinations — a 12km Category 2 ascent from the Mersey River lowlands to the entrance of Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park at 934m that combines accessible gradient with genuinely remote atmosphere. The road begins near Moina at the junction with the Claude Road at approximately 414m in the dairying country of the Forth River catchment and climbs steadily through wet eucalyptus forest and Tasmanian endemic rainforest to the national park boundary and visitor centre at the head of the valley. This is not a technically demanding climb by gradient standards — the 4.3% average and 8% maximum place it firmly in the accessible category — but the remoteness of the location, the quality of the environment, and the reward of arriving at one of Tasmania's most spectacular natural amphitheatres under one's own power give the ascent a significance that gradient statistics cannot capture. The lower 4km from Moina at 3-4% follow the Cradle Creek drainage line through pasture and mixed farming, the road well-surfaced and carrying modest tourist traffic toward the national park. Above km 4 at approximately 600m the road enters the tall Eucalyptus obliqua forest that lines the approach corridor to the park — the trees here are among the largest in Tasmania, some exceeding 70m in height, and the road runs in deep shade through a forest that has a structural complexity and atmospheric density that is unlike anything in mainland Australian cycling. The gradient from km 4 to km 9 is consistent at 4-5%: long straight sections through the forest with occasional views through the canopy to the dolerite domes of the Cradle Mountain massif above. The maximum gradient of 8% arrives at km 10-11 on the final approach to the national park entrance, a ramp that provides the last concentrated effort before the road levels at the visitor centre precinct. The national park entrance at 934m delivers the climber into a different world: the dolerite columns of Cradle Mountain (1,545m) are visible directly above the visitor centre, the alpine vegetation of button grass and pandani heathland extends across the valley floor, and on clear days the summit of the mountain is framed against a sky of particular Tasmanian clarity.
Jacobs Ladder (Ben Lomond)
6.2km · 570m · 9.2% · CAT1
Jacobs Ladder is the most feared short climb in Australian cycling and the road on which Richie Porte built the climbing engine that would eventually earn him a Tour de France podium. The 6.2km ascent at 9.2% average on the access road to Ben Lomond National Park's ski plateau begins at the park entry gate at 990m elevation and immediately announces its intentions: the gradient reaches double figures within the first 200m and does not significantly relent until the final approach to the summit plateau at 1,560m. The 18% maximum sections occur on the staircase switchbacks that give the climb its name — a series of sharp hairpins cut into the exposed dolerite escarpment that, viewed from below, do indeed resemble a ladder ascending a vertical wall. The Ben Lomond plateau sits in Tasmania's northeast highlands and the approach to Jacobs Ladder involves a 40-minute drive from Launceston through the midland farming country of the St Pauls River valley — the mountain becomes visible from the plain at a distance of 30km, its dolerite ramparts forming a dramatic silhouette above the rolling farmland. The access road from the valley floor to the park gate is graded and accessible for most vehicles; the sealed Jacobs Ladder section begins at the park gate and is the only sealed access to the ski resort above. In winter the road is maintained for ski resort access but snow chains may be required above the midpoint; in summer the road is fully dry and the views from the exposed switchbacks across the northeastern Tasmania lowlands to the Bass Strait are extraordinary. This is not a climb for riders in their first week of hilly cycling: the 9.2% average and 18% maximum on a 6.2km road at nearly 1,000m starting elevation requires a combination of climbing fitness, appropriate gear selection (34/28 minimum, 34/32 recommended for riders without significant mountain climbing experience), and the psychological commitment to work through the sections where the gradient exceeds what feels sustainable.
kunanyi / Mount Wellington
21.4km · 1220m · 5.7% · HC
kunanyi/Mount Wellington is one of the great sea-to-summit cycling climbs in the world — 21.4km from the Hobart waterfront at 51m to the 1,271m dolerite plateau summit, the entire elevation gain unfolding in a single continuous ascent that begins in the inner suburbs and ends above the cloud layer on an exposed highland where the Southern Ocean wind requires a jacket regardless of the summer warmth below. The mountain dominates Hobart's eastern skyline with the authority of a Ventoux or an Etna — visible from every street, its summit weather narrating the day's cycling conditions in real time, the snowline in winter and the cloud cap in summer providing a live barometric reading that Hobart cyclists have been interpreting for decades. The climb begins at the Knocklofty Reserve turnoff in the western suburbs, the residential streets giving way to bush road within 500m of the start junction, and the gradient building from the initial 3–4% through the lower forest to the sustained 6–8% of the middle section between 400m and 900m elevation. The steepest section arrives in the upper mountain above the Springs (a roadside stop at 450m with café and toilets) where the road enters the subalpine zone and the gradient reaches 10–12% on several exposed ramps above the treeline. The final 3km to the summit plateau are on fully exposed road above the vegetation, the dolerite rock formations that give kunanyi its distinctive skyline profile closing in from both sides as the summit approach narrows. The summit at 1,271m is spectacular in clear conditions and genuinely dangerous in poor weather — wind speeds exceeding 100 km/h have been recorded at the summit in winter, and the sudden temperature drop from base to summit (typically 8–12°C in summer) requires a layering strategy that many first-time visitors underestimate.
Insider Tips
Cycle2 on Elizabeth Street in Hobart is the essential first contact for Tasmanian cycling visitors. The staff ride kunanyi/Mount Wellington and the East Coast roads regularly and t...
The approach to MONA (Museum of Old and New Art) by bicycle from the Hobart waterfront is a 14km ride along the Derwent estuary on quiet roads that makes for an exceptional rest-da...
How to Get to Tasmania for Cycling
Getting around: Car Recommended
Tasmania requires a hire car for any cycling itinerary that extends beyond Hobart. The island is 300km north-to-south and 350km east-to-west but road distances are longer due to the mountain terrain —...