The track, on land owned by Canadian country music star Shania Twain and her now estranged husband Robert "Mutt" Lange and negotiated as part of the approval for the couple to buy the Crown lease of Motatapu Station, was opened in March this year by Prime Minister Helen Clark.
Since then, an estimated 100 people have walked it, including four experienced Queenstown trampers who are search and rescue volunteers.
One of the four, Judy Fotheringham, said the Motatapu was not a track but a poled route, going high over exposed and dangerous ridge tops.
Walking times on brochures and track markers were misleading, she said.
What should have taken five to six hours, according to the Doc information, took up to nine hours to walk.
"Someone could get lost," Ms Fotheringham (50) said.
"You're walking along looking for the next pole, when suddenly it's below you. If there was a wind blowing, you'd just go over. You'd be away."
The group said the Motatapu Track hut books were filled with experiences similar to their own.
Ms Fotheringham said she knew of one person who had been airlifted off the track.
She said she wrote to Doc about the difficulties of the track and misleading information and received a letter advising her the department had altered its publicity.
But a check by the Otago Daily Times at the Doc office in the Queenstown visitor centre found no stickers or amendments to the information.
Doc staff gave no warnings that times or conditions on the unchanged brochure were incorrect.
No Doc intention forms - with panic dates if people do not report in after a tramp - were available in Queenstown for the Motatapu.
The only forms available were Mountain Safety Council intention forms to be left with friends or family.
Doc Wanaka area manager Paul Hellebrekers, who manages the Motatapu Track, did not think Doc information was misleading.
The Motatapu was "never intended to be another Routeburn".
"Obviously, it's dangerous, like any track in certain conditions. It takes you over high parts. Certain parts you need to be careful."
An extra hut, planned to be built next summer, would help alleviate long days.
He had walked the track twice and looked at hut book comments.
Some trampers walked it more quickly than Doc recommended times and others had taken longer.
One tramper was airlifted when "he was almost out and got tired". Department of Conservation Wakatipu programme and community relations manager John Roberts subsequently produced an amended Motatapu brochure with an extra stick-on label.
The unchanged brochures were provided in "error", he said.
Mr Roberts later contacted the ODT to advise Doc planned to reprint its brochure.
"We've taken on board the comments received over things like times and added information about it being a demanding track."
