Canyon Road Unbelievably Scary as It Is Beautiful

The Skippers Canyon road, 25 minutes north of Queenstown, has been deemed one of the world’s 22 most dangerous roads by British firm Driving Experiences, who gave the road an “overall road fear factor” of seven out of 10.

Driving Experiences said the Skippers Canyon road was “as unbelievably scary as it is beautiful”.

It said the narrowness of the road meant that if two vehicles had to pass each other, one might have to reverse for up to 3km to get to a place that was wide enough.

“The extremely narrow path, cut in the middle of a sheer cliff face, makes it hugely difficult to manoeuvre any vehicle,” it said.

The route is gravel and maintained by the Queenstown Lakes District Council to the standard of a back-country road.

Council spokeswoman Michele Poole said the item on the road was inaccurate.

“It’s a perfectly safe road as long as you drive to the conditions. It’s very well signposted,” Poole said.

The Daily Mail reported that the list was based on the World Health Organisation’s 2013 global status report on road safety and other data sets.

Original article by Michael Daly, The Sydney Morning Herald, March 12, 2014.

Photo by Getty Images.