Cooma to Mallacoota via the Australian Alps

Today I headed off from Cooma early, at 7 am, because I wanted to make sure that I don't feel rushed along the way and get time to enjoy the scenery. I started by driving along the main road to Jindabyne, where I filled up with petrol before taking on the 170 km drive towards the Victorian coast through the mountains along the Barry Way/Snowy River Road. This leads through some very remote areas and there are no supplies along the way.

The road starts as Barry Way in Jindabyne, until the Victorian border, after which it is called Snowy River Road. The first 20 kilometers are sealed, until you pass Ingebirah, after that it is a gravel road for most of the way right to Gelantipy in Victoria, about 100 km away. The road winds itself in and out of deep valleys that have been carved out by the Snowy River and its contributories over thousands of years.

View from Wallace Craigie Lookout, soon after Ingebirah, You can just make out the road on a couple of ridges towards the South.

The descent after Ingebirah Gap really brings home how high the Southern Tablelands of NSW are. The drive from Canberra to Jindabyne appears so flat that it comes as a surprise that it is possible to drive down hill for so long. The road is fairly wide and in good nick on the NSW section, so there is no problem driving it, despite the sheer drops on its downhill side. Once you get to the bottom the road then follows the Snowy River for quite a while, with some minor ridge crossings along the way. Once you cross into Victoria it departs from the Snowy and crosses a relatively high ridge to Suggan Buggan, where you will find a couple of houses and a historic school house. After Suggan Buggan the road climbs again onto the Victorian high plateau. I found this part of the road most challenging. The gravel was quite loose and the road very steep and narrow. I was praying that no car comes the other way, as it would have been very difficult to cross and my side of the road was the downhill side - and if you think the drops in NSW are high, here they are enormous, definitely not a track to take if you tend to acrophobia. Soon after you reach the top you get onto sealed roads again. (by the way, along the 100 km of unsealed roads I had one car and one motorbike coming the other way, I had to overtake one poor chap going my way, who seemed to be very worried by the heights and drove at about 15 km/h).

Attempt at taking a picture of the drop next to the road, sorry I didn't want to drive any closer, there are no barriers or anything...

The Snowy River valley after the descent. I looked for Brumbies (plenty of brumby poo on the road) but didn't spot any.

Three hours after I left Jindabyne I arrived in Buchan in Victoria, where I took a break to look at the caves. There are two main caves, both of which can be visited by guided tour. I chose the Royal Cave. The cave is easy to walk through, you only need to stoop in a few places, but there is no crawling required. The lighting is well designed and shows off the best features very well. There are some very impressive stalactites and stalagmites, as a matter of fact is has one of the highest "totem stalagmites" in the world. The tour took about 45 minutes under ground and cost twenty bucks.

Royal Cave, Buchan. I took lots of pictures; these modern cameras are very good even without flash.

From Buchan I headed further towards the coast to Orbost, where I met the Snowy River again. Here it is quite tranquil, I guess it is tired from carving out big valleys and tumbling down many rapids. It is getting ready to join all its mates in the Pacific Ocean.

The Snowy River at Orbost, Victoria

From Orbost I took the Pacific Highway to Mallacoota. I have driven this before and find it quite tedious. It is relatively bendy for an A road and full of caravans that you can't overtake. But hey! I've got time and arrived here safely. The whole journey took me about 7 hours driving time, so like the Snowy River I am a bit tired and I am getting very tranquil sipping my white wine while I write this post.