Canyon Explorers — Attraction in South Island

Booked the full day canyoning (only available on Wednesdays), went in the day before as there was rain forecasted that night to ask if they believe the canyoning would still go ahead - to which they advised it was supposed to be light rain and all should be good. Unfortunately it rained heavier than predicted and morning of they called us to advise it would not go ahead and offered to rebook for the full day on Thursday or a half day that afternoon. We opted for the full day on Thursday as the half day didn’t sound worth the money. We cancelled our plans for Thursday as canyoning was the main reason for our trip to NZ. They called us almost 7 hours later (3pm) to advise due to numbers the Thursday was no longer going ahead…

Honestly extremely disappointed at how it was handled. We can understand that the weather can make canyoning dangerous, but to then offer us a rebooking and cancel it due to numbers is horrendous, on top of that the trip was meant to depart at 9am so they would’ve been aware on how many opted for the following day - not sure why they waited 6 hours to...

Amazing experience, as a teenager that loves water and scrambling around having fun and is super cofidence in water, I thought is would be a bit on the safety side and quite easy, but it was loads of fun , suited to everyone from my mum who hates this kind of stuff and the guides were lovely helping her though the canyon , to me and my brother leaping of rocks and scrambling around. We got kited up quickly with good gear so we didn't get cold (just make sure your boots are tight enough to stay on), and we started of with a couple ziplines , then abseiling which the guide let you down faster than I would have expected and has a couple tricky steps at the bottom, then we slid down a couple waterfalls , which was a bit scary but is honestly so fun, then we jumped of into the bottom of the waterfall which I proceeded to get stuck behind which was a bit of a laugh, after making our way though the rest of the canyon we got warm showers and hot chocolates...

Excellent Guides (Derek & Emily) Very professionally run operation. I highly recommend this company. We did the ½ day trip which in retrospect was a big mistake. I strongly encourage anyone that is even mildly athletic (and can swim) to do the full day trip. I suspect the clients are more agile on the longer trip. The most fun I had on the excursion was actually helping the non-swimmers in the deeper sections of water where they could not touch bottom or were very frightened. I would estimate that the entire section of river/canyon could have been done in a 1/2 to 3/4 hour of river time. There were 11 clients on our trip of which two were non-swimmers and two more were very unsure on their feet. In any event, great job, excellent guides and stay away from the ½ day trip if you have done anything like...