Self Guided Grampians Walk
A 7-day Pack-Free walk
Situated within the Western District of Victoria, the magical and remote landscape of the Grampians National Park showcase the magnificent sandstone ranges that were created over 400 million years ago. The Park has an outstandingly rich diversity with almost one thousand native plant species, representing one-third of the State total. As such the Park is notable for being the most important botanical reserve in Victoria, exhibiting a rich and colourful wildflower display in Spring.
Our Exclusive Walking APP
Designed by Life's An Adventure
Exclusively designed by Life’s an Adventure, the Self-Guided Walking Tours will be more than just a set of track notes on your smartphone. This fully interactive Self-Guided Walking app includes easy-to-follow walking notes, GPS tracking, photos at track junctions and points of interest en-route. Extra information about the natural environment and history is also included. The app will give you average walking times, distances for each section. Optional side-trips as well as short and long options for each day’s walk are also available.
As well as having the walking app on your phone, you will be given the information on the google map platform. Each waypoint on every walk will be triggered when you arrive at that point, whether it be a fork in the track or point of interest. This gives real-time feedback so you know where you are at all times! On top of this, you will receive a good, old-fashioned paper copy of each day’s track notes.
Pack Free Self Guided Walk
Your overnight bags transported for you
Our self-guided walks are Pack-Free. We take care of all your transfers to the trail as well as the transport of your luggage allowing you to walk with just a day pack.
Personal Location Beacon
For extra safety
Our guests have the option of hiring a Personal Location Beacon to take with you when walking. This extra safety feature can give you peace of mind should the unexpected occur.
Transfers
To the trail
Our self-guided walks include the option of transfers from Melbourne or from Stawell (45 minutes drive to Meringa Springs Lodge). Alternatively, guests are welcome to drive to the Grampians with transfers provided back to your car on the final day of the walk.
Flexibility and Freedom
Discover on your own
Self-guided walking holidays offer flexibility and freedom. Customers can discover places at their own pace. They walk independently but follow detailed walk notes, knowing that the notes have been compiled by one of our experienced guides. The beauty of this is our guides know these tracks inside out. They know the best lookouts, scenic lunch stops, and where to get great photos.
Superb Accommodation
Stay in self contained cabins
Our walking experience includes 6 nights in superb accommodation with ensuites. Including two feature stays at the small luxury lodge of Meringa Springs with its stunning infinity-edge pool and the legendary Royal Mail Hotel with views over the Southern Grampians.
Superb meals included
featuring Victorian Produce
During your walk enjoy wonderful meals featuring high-quality Victorian local produce. At Meringa Springs you will dine at the in-house restaurant, whilst at Dunkeld enjoy casual dining at the Parker Street Project Restaurant. Menus change frequently based on produce harvested daily from their 1.2 hectare kitchen garden. Dinner at Halls Gaps will be a more relaxed experience at the high-rated Kookaburra hotel enjoying pub-style fare.
They can also cater for special dietary requirement. Please give us as much detail as possible when booking.
To find out more click on any of the below links:
Why should you choose us?
Tour Itinerary
- Pack Free walk – carry as little as your water, lunch and camera each day.
- A walking app with GPS coordinates on your walk
- Detailed maps and trail notes
- Transfers to and from the trail each day
- 6 x dinners
- 5 x packed walker’s lunches
- 6 x breakfasts
- Your Overnight Bags will be transferred
- 6 nights’ accommodation including feature stays at Meringa Springs luxury lodge and the Royal Mail Hotel in Dunkeld.
- Fresh fruit and trail mix to enjoy during your walk
- Transfers from Stawell or Melbourne and return or drive yourself.
- Transfers to the trail where required
- National Park Pass
Optional hire of an EPIRB/PLB (Personal Locator Beacon) is available if required at an additional cost.
TRANSFERS: There are several options to get to this walk. Choose to drive to the Grampians, enjoy private transfers from Melbourne or catch the train from Melbourne to Stawell and we will pick you up from there (see pricing page for options).
ITINERARY: Arrive in the Grampians. No walking today, settle in and relax at your accommodation for the next two nights at the luxury boutique lodge of Meringa Springs at Wartook. Soak up the spectacular views of the Grampian Mountains from the lodge and perhaps enjoy a swim in the pool before indulging in a delicious dinner in the restaurant.
TRANSFER TIMES: Meet your driver at 8:30am for transfer from Meringa Springs Lodge, for a scenic 30-minute journey to the start of your walk. Upon completion of your walk, your local driver will meet you and transfer you back to Meringa Springs.
WALK GRADE: Walk 1: Mt Stapylton: 4.6km, 2-2.5hrs return, medium hard. Walk 2: Mt Zero: 2.8km, 1-1.5hrs return, medium.
TERRAIN: Steep ascent and descent. Compact hard path and rocky terrain. Uneven and some little bits of easy rock scrambling.
WALK ITINERARY: After breakfast, your driver will transfer you to the start of your walk. Today enjoy two walks of Mt Stapylton and Mt Zero. Our first walk to Mt Stapylton climbs to an elevation of almost 500m, this short return walk takes in some large rocky features, including a natural amphitheatre, sheer rock faces and eroded caves, together with some sheltered woodland on its way to a spectacular summit view in all directions. Named by NSW Surveyor-General Major Thomas Mitchell in 1836 after his assistant surveyor Granville Stapylton while exploring for new grazing lands, this walk, suitable for fit and energetic walkers, involves water crossings, slippery track surfaces, rock hopping and rock-scrambling as well as exposure to heights. It begins and ends at the Mt Zero Picnic Ground. Afterwards take the walk to Mt Zero. This conical-shaped hill represents the start of the future 160km Grampians Peaks Trail, but was also climbed by Major Mitchell in 1836 when he described it as “a remarkable cone at the western extremity of a chain of mountains”. Views of Mt Stapylton and the surrounding Wimmera plains on this walk are some of the best in the area. Afterwards your driver will return you to Meringa Spring Lodge to spend the later afternoon relaxing before enjoying another wonderful dinner in their restaurant.
TRANSFER TIMES: No vehicle transfer this morning guests will walk directly from Meringa Springs to the trailhead. Choice of finishing your walk at MacKenzie Falls and climbing the steep stairs to the carpark for your transfer to Halls Gap or return to Zumsteins by the same route for collection by the transfer operator.
WALK GRADE: 11.7km, 4hrs, Easy to Moderate.
TERRAIN: Today’s walk involves crossing shallow waters, some scrambling over rocks and slippery track surfaces but nothing overly challenging. The walk down to McKenzies Falls is steep. There are constructed steps and stairs.
FLEXIBLE WALK: Optional shorter walk to finish at Mackenzie Falls.
ITINERARY: After breakfast walk directly from the Lodge to the start of the trail which makes its way to spectacular MacKenzie Falls. The first part of this walk follows a heritage route once used by squatters, timber-cutters, bee-keepers and construction workers building the Wartook Reservoir upstream. From the old picnic grounds of Zumsteins we follow the river more closely and experience the cascades of pretty Fish Falls on the way to one of Victoria’s most popular waterfalls, the Mackenzie Falls, as it tumbles 40m into the deep pool at its base. Once you reach MacKenzie Falls you can take the 265 steep steps to the carpark for your transfer to Halls Gap or return to Zumsteins by the same route for collection by your driver. Whilst you have been walking your luggage has been transported to your accommodation for 2 nights in a quality motel in the charming town of Halls Gap. Halls Gap is a delightful village in the heart of the Grampians with an array of shops, cafes and restaurants. Halls Gap was named after Charles Browning Hall who in 1841 followed aboriginal tracks through a gap between the Mount William Range and the Mount Difficult Range while searching for suitable grazing run. Tonight enjoy dinner in a local restaurant in the heart of the village.
TRANSFER TIMES: No vehicle transfer this morning guests will walk directly from their accommodation to the trailhead and walk back to their hotel at the end of the day.
WALK GRADE: 10km, 5hrs, hard.
TERRAIN: A mix of a steady continuous ascent with some steeper sections. Some steep descents also. Clear and well maintained trail with constructed steps and stairs. Some walking on uneven, rocky terrain. Elevation gain 280m.
FLEXIBLE WALK: Optional shorter walk to finish at Mackenzie Falls.
ITINERARY: After breakfast walk directly from the hotel at Halls Gap to the start of the trail. This an impressive circuit walk taking in many features including cascades, waterfalls, chasms, viewpoints and big landscape views. Initially, you’ll follow Stony Creek where gold was found in 1887 and pass some dramatic features like the Elephants Hide. This is a massive rock face that is known in geology as a “cuesta” formation where the resistant sandstones slope gently upwards and are broken off forming huge cliffs of the type you’ll discover later in the walk. It is a journey with plenty for everyone and worth starting early as you may wish to paddle in the streams, rest on the rocky climbs and absorb the views from perhaps the most popular of sites in the Grampians…The Pinnacle. After completing the circuit walk directly into your accommodation at Halls Gap with time to relax or explore the village at leisure. Tonight enjoy dinner in a local restaurant.
TRANSFERS: After breakfast, your driver will arrive to pick you up for a pleasant 15-minute journey to the start of the trail. Upon completion of your walk, you will be collected from within the Borough Huts Campground for a scenic 40-minute transfer to the Royal Mail Hotel at Dunkeld.
WALK GRADE: 13kms, 5-6hrs, Medium Hard
TERRAIN: Today’s walk starts with a steady ascent to Mt Rosea with nearly 400m elevation gain with an average angle of ascent at 23%. But, the descent is longer, although less steep, dropping 687m in elevation over the final 8.2km. Well formed walking trail but some sections of uneven rock and boulders.
ITINERARY: This full-day walk explores Mt Rosea, sitting high above Halls Gap. We start our journey at an elevation of around 600 metres and climb steadily through forested slopes, the track then veers around to the south and east through boulders and over rock formations while opening up views over large parts of the central Grampians. It’s not quick walking and shouldn’t be, as there are great opportunities to rest and absorb the environment of this stunning mountain range before reaching one of the highest peaks in the Grampians, Mt Rosea sitting high at more than 1000m elevation. Later after a long steady descent, you’ll reach Borough Huts where in World War Two, there was a base for charcoal production, when petrol was in short supply. Make your way to the end of the walk where you will meet your driver for the transfer to the small town of Dunkeld at the southern tip of the Grampians. Spend the next two nights at the Royal Mail Hotel at the foot of Mount Sturgeon. Tonight, enjoy casual dining at the Parker Street Project Restaurant enjoying fresh local produce sourced from its 1.5-hectare kitchen garden.
TRANSFERS: Your driver will provide a short transfer to the start of this final walk as well as a return transfer on completion.
WALK GRADE: 6.6kms, 3-4 hrs return. Strenuous, steep in parts.
TERRAIN: Track climbs steadily at first then flattens as it follows the escarpment before a final steeper ascent to the summit. Total climb of 494m. Can involve water crossings, slippery track surfaces, rock hopping and rock scrambling.
ITINERARY: After breakfast at the hotel your driver will transfer you to the start of the trail. This half day walk starts from 6km north of Dunkeld. After winding its way up through pleasant woodland, the track crosses several landslips from heavy rains in 2011, before gaining elevation and wide views to the east. After some more climbing, views to the west emerge, but it’s the summit that offers the grandest views and deserves a good break to absorb the serenity. Retrace your steps where your driver will meet you for the return transfer to your accommodation at Dunkeld. Tonight, enjoy another fabulous dinner at the Parker Street Project Restaurant with an inspired menu of superb fresh produce.
ITINERARY: Your tour finishes after breakfast.
TRANSFERS: For those that have driven to the Grampians, your driver will return you to your car at Meringa Springs. For those who have come by train from Melbourne your driver will transfer you to Stawell Railway Station to connect with your return train and those that have selected private transfers to Melbourne will be transferred back to Melbourne CBD.
Tour Prices
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FIRST TIME TRAVELLER FROM
$
2599
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First time traveller with Life's An Adventure |
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7 day walk |
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PAST PASSENGER FROM
$
2499
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Travelled with Life's An Adventure previously |
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7 day walk |
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OPTIONAL
$
Xtras
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SOLO TRAVELLERS |
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Additional Information
- Prices are per person in Australian dollars and include GST.
- A non-refundable deposit of $300 per person is required to secure your booking.
- Note: If you are booking within 90 days of your departure date – we will require full payment at the time of booking
- Prices are based on twin share of rooms.
- Payments must be made online via our NAB (National Australia Bank) secure payment page via credit card (Visa or Mastercard) or over the phone.
- Your detailed self-guided kit will be sent to you in the post 6 weeks prior to your walk.
- Use of a Personal Emergency Beacon (EPIRB) is complementary however a $250 holding deposit will be charged at the time of booking which will be refunded to you after your tour. This deposit will be forfeited if the EPIRB is lost or returned damaged.
- We advise taking our Travel Insurance to cover items such as cancellation of tour due to adverse weather conditions, injury, evacuation, delayed flights, lost luggage, illness, etc.
Booking Terms and Conditions
Before you book please read our Booking Terms and Conditions. Click here.
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