The driveway to the house is the world famous and heritage protected Skippers Canyon Road. Photo / Tall Poppy
The driveway to the house is the world famous and heritage protected Skippers Canyon Road. Photo / Tall Poppy
A picturesque homestead at the centre of New Zealand's gold-rush history, and on the heritage-listed Skippers Canyon Road, is up for sale.
The "off the grid" property on close to 20 acres, with the Shotover River running alongside, is one of the first to go on the market in thecoveted scenic area for close to a decade.
The four-bedroom home is completely self-sufficient with solar panels for power, its own chemical-free water supply, a wood burning stove and coal range.
Tall Poppy real estate agent Dennis Croll believed it was the first time in more than 10 years that land had come up for sale in Skippers.
"It's definitely one of the rarest property opportunities to become available in Queenstown for quite some time," he said.
The self sufficient property has its own water supply and solar panels and movie-set views. Photo / Tall Poppy
The home is owned by a well-known Skippers Canyon family, the Scheibs, who are fifth-generation locals. Their earliest settlers were the first to use electric power in Skippers, and also developed hydraulic sluicing to extract gold from the Shotover River.
More recently, the family developed and owned the local pipeline bungy before it was sold to AJ Hackett. It still runs the Skippers Canyon Jet.
Croll described the property with a council value of $610,000 as "heaven on earth", with just "birds, frogs and gentle stream nearby" to listen to.
Historically, Skippers Canyon is famous as the heart of the Otago gold rush and its road — finished in 1890 — was Heritage Listed in 2006 and remains largely unchanged.
In 2016 it made headlines when it was named the third most dangerous road in the world — to the bemusement of locals.
The Skippers Canyon scenery has been the backdrop for blockbusting Hollywood movies with Mission: Impossible — Fallout one of the most recent filmed there.
Croll said the property was perfect for someone looking for a quieter lifestyle, but still wanting to be close to New Zealand's premiere adrenalin playground.
"Skippers is a largely untouched piece of paradise and is desirable in a strong market like Queenstown," he said.
"It's rare today to find a home with such a rich history, in a truly unique location that offers a substantial amount of land like this."
The property is for sale by deadline treaty, and closes at 4pm on December 12, 2018.
