The Great South Coast Walk: a new long-distance trail?

[gang-gang]

When my wife and I walked from Sydney to Mallacoota 12 years ago, we enjoyed it so much we thought that it should become an "official" long distance walking trail a la Heysen Trail, Bibbulmun Track, Alpine Walking Track etc. At 660 km long, it would be the only long-distance track in Australia that is primarily a coast track. It is nonetheless very diverse, passing through a range of habitats - forest, heathland, wetland, headland, beach etc - and several National Parks. To cut to the chase, I have finally taken a step towards making this walk a reality by setting up a website called Great South Coast Walk. This describes the proposed walk and also has a forum where people can make suggestions and comments that, hopefully, will improve the actual track and logistics or offer ideas of how it can be further developed or promoted. Harnessing the collective wisdom of the bushwalking community seems the best way forward.

This post is to invite you to have a look at the proposal and contribute to the development of the walk by having your say on the website forum, or on this Bushwalk.com forum if you prefer.

[hakea]

Great initiative, promoting the walk and getting the word out through the website is a wonderful idea.

I have had a quick look through your website and think that it has been done well.

[ribuck]

No need for it to be an "official" walk, which risks restrictions and closures. If you document it on your website, people can walk it. And if it becomes popular you can publish a book about it too.

[LachlanB]

Thanks for doing the website up, it looks quite excellent! I'd read your original account at gang-gang.net, and thought that it sounds like a really good walk.
Out of curiosity, could you add a single kml file to your website which has all the sections combined, rather than broken up into 11 parts?

[gang-gang]

I'll have a look to see where I could put a whole-of-track file. The downloadable files are the same as the ones used for the individual track sections on the website, which need to be separate.

[Xplora]

A great idea for those who like coast walking. You should probably include (I did not notice it) permits and camping fees for some sections. Royal National Park, Mimosa Rocks and Ben Body all have camping fees and I think there is a permit needed to walk parts of Ben Boyd. Many people stay at the Green Cape Lighthouse but that will set you back around $260 for a night without a meal. Looked very nice though.