Grampians Peaks Loop, Australia

The Grampians Peaks Loop beckons. After a year of confinement, the allure of wandering through wild landscapes for days on end is irrestible.

Starting at Mt Zero and extending southwards to Mt Abrupt, the yet-to-open Grampians Peaks Trail is a 160-kilometre-long walking path. As a precursor to its launch, a 35-kilometre loop walk showcases a section of the new Trail. It features some of the most spectacular scenery in the Grampians, including the Wonderland Range, the Pinnacle and Mt Rosea.

We walk out of Halls Gap early, packs on our backs, mist shrouding the peaks, the sky rose-pink with swirling corellas. It’s Gwangal Moronn (Autumn), the season of honey bees, sunrises and flocking birds. 

Smooth-barked, lemon-scented gums, pungent with citronella this dewy morning. The first rays of the sun lighting up the sandstone peaks. Kangaroos grazing. A neon flash of crimson rosellas. Magpies leading the dawn chorus.

Venus Baths are tranquil at this hour. The dark water held in rock pools reflects the sunlit trees and bright green ferns. The slow flight of a white-faced heron. Water glistening on the slab rock walls of Splitters Falls.

Stone monoliths stand in the ancient landscape, a wonderland of weathered forms. Ridgelines softened by trees. Deep, forested gullies. The morning is silent now, except for the whisper of wings.

The joy of a day given over to walking, with time enough to linger wherever we please. The sky clears to a bright blue. The meandering track takes us through fern groves, past rocks brushed with sage-green lichen and into the Grand Canyon. Its towering rock walls and rocky terraces are impressive, if not as monumental as those of its namesake.

We walk through the narrow rocky corridor that is Silent Street. It’s cool and hushed deep within the gorge.

We notice what looks like the remnants of drawings on the underside of a low overhanging rock shelter. More than 80 per cent of all known rock art sites in Victoria are in the Grampians/Gariwerd, including the only known painting of Bunjil, a powerful figure in the spiritual life of the traditional owners. In the time before time, the Great Ancestor Spirit, Bunjil, began to create the world we see around us. 

We hear someone calling our names. It’s a friend and her sister. They are walking to the Pinnacle lookout as a finale to a few days exploring south-west Victoria. We sit together on the summit, catching up on each other’s lives and looking out across the plain to Mt William, the Grampians’ highest peak.

As the ground underfoot changes, so does the vegetation. Banksias, white flowering tea trees and Oyster Bay cypress pines give way to grass trees. We weave our way in and out of the heath, following the ridgeline and stopping to look out over sweeping slopes, craggy peaks and massive sandstone cliffs. 

We arrive at Bugiga, our first overnight camp, to find that there’s no water in the tanks (despite an assurance from parks’ staff to the contrary). Fortunately, we know there is water a couple of kilometres back at Sundial Carpark. We put aside our desire to sit and watch the play of fairy-wrens and trudge back along the forested trail to fill our containers.

When night comes, it is gentle. The sky glitters with stars and heavenly pearly bodies.

The rising sun makes gold dust of the foliage. Yellow-tailed black cockatoos shatter the early morning quiet with their raucous cries. 

The trail takes us along a sandy path before the ascent of Mt Rosea. Wilder country now, we navigate a maze of rocky outcrops and narrow stone tunnels, cross a high bridge over the Gate of the East Wind, and walk out along the edge of the escarpment. A treecreeper makes its jerky way up a dead trunk. An eagle dives through the sky to snatch its prey, far below. Trees gnarled by wind and rain. Rocks folded and faulted by the ancient uplifting of ocean beds.

The Grampians/Gariwerd is the end of the Great Dividing Range. The range stretches more than 3,500 kilometres from the northern tip of Australia, continuing south to New South Wales before bending westwards and disappearing into the plains west of Mt Rosea.

An abrupt descent off the rocks and down through messmate forests to Borough Huts Campsite. Skinks darting across the track. Currawongs, magpies and kookaburras vying for food. High-spirited school students letting off steam after a day of learning in nature’s classroom. 

All night the low hooting of owls, the sonic squeak of bats and the scuttling stealth of swamp wallabies. We dream of the mysteries held within the sandstone ranges. The traditional owners, the Djab Wurrung and Jardwadjali people, have lived here for more than 20,000 years. The country holds the knowledge of their culture, beliefs and traditions. 

On the last day of the Grampians Loop Walk, the trail leads us off the Grampians Peaks Trail and towards Halls Gap. The way is not as spectacular or as well crafted as the new trail, but it has its consolations. Emu tracks imprinted in the sand. Pink heath, slender wattle and ground-hugging boronia flowering by the side of the track. Once out of the damp creek corridor, the breeze is warm and fragrant with peppermint. Wallabies graze on the plains. Voices drift up from Lake Bellfield. Through the trees, we glimpse the peaks of the Wonderland Range.

As we walk back into Halls Gap, a kamikaze kangaroo tears across a busy road before disappearing into the bush. We pause to catch our breath. An eastern spinebill, with its distinctive down-curved beak, lands centimetres from where we sit. It is not at all perturbed by our presence.

The 160-kilometre-long Grampians Peaks Trail promises to be an unforgettable experience of dramatic peaks, panoramic views and all the majesty of an ancient and rugged landscape. No one can tell us when it will open. But, when it does, it will be a walk on a grand scale, so steeped in beauty and culture that it will attract walkers from all over the world. We look forward to stepping out from Mt Zero one day soon, the Grampians Peaks Trail ours for the walking.

Interested? Want more information? Take a look at our 5 things you need to know about the Grampians Peaks Loop.

If you’ve read this far then you might also like to look at the Larapinta Trail, Walking into the Light or even the Camino Francés