Camping near Melbourne, properly.

Dry open forest on a ridge, gravelly ground, kangaroos through the sites at dusk and koalas in the manna gums if you look up long enough.

It is not dramatic country, which is exactly why it works as a first night out: quiet, flat, and close enough to town that a disaster is only an hour from home. Spring is the reason people come: the wildflowers through the Brisbane Ranges are among the best in the state. Summer here gets hot and the fire risk is real, so most locals go elsewhere between December and February.

Long-drop toilets and picnic tables. No drinking water, no showers, no bins — carry every litre you will drink and take the rubbish home.

Anakie Gorge is a twenty-minute drive away and makes an easy morning walk before you pack up.

Best for

First-timers · Families · Couples

Skip if

Anyone hoping for water views or a swim — the Brisbane Ranges are dry country and the creeks are seasonal.

BookingSites are booked through Parks Victoria online. It is small, so a long weekend goes early; a midweek night is usually there for the taking.

A river flat at the bottom of a steep gorge with the Lerderderg running past the sites.

Big old eucalypts, a swimming hole when the river is up, and enough shade that it stays bearable when the plains above are baking. It fills with families and four-wheel-drive clubs on long weekends and is close to empty on a Tuesday. Autumn and spring are the pick. The gorge holds cold air in winter and the road down gets slippery; summer brings the crowds and the fire risk.

A long-drop toilet and fire rings. No water at all, no showers, no bins. The river is not drinking water.

This is a state park, so dogs on leads are allowed — one of the very few places this close to Melbourne where that is true.

Best for

Couples · Families · Dogs allowed

Skip if

Low-clearance cars after heavy rain — the descent is steep, unsealed and occasionally rutted.

Worth knowingNo booking and no allocated sites — you drive in and take a spot. That also means there is no guarantee of one on a long weekend.

A quiet clearing behind the coast on an island with no mains power, no sealed roads and a koala population that outnumbers the residents.

You arrive on foot or by bike and the whole trip becomes an exercise in taking less. The silence at night is the point. Best in the shoulder seasons when the wind is kinder and the ferry timetable is still generous. Check the ferry before anything else — it decides the trip.

A toilet and not much else. No drinking water, no showers, and fires are not the way this island works — bring a gas stove.

Hire a bike at the jetty rather than walking. The island is bigger than it looks from the mainland.

Best for

Couples · First-timers

Skip if

Anyone who wants to unload a car boot at the site, and anyone bringing a dog — this is a national park.

Worth knowingFree bush camping with no booking last time we checked, but Parks Victoria has been tightening arrangements across the state — confirm on their site before you commit to the ferry.

Rows of tents and vans under old cypress and tea-tree with the bay a few steps away.

It is the Victorian summer holiday in its most traditional form: kids on bikes all day, an esky, someone’s cricket set, the same families in the same spots for thirty years. Not wilderness, and not trying to be. The foreshore camping season runs across summer and the warmer shoulder weeks rather than all year — check the dates for the season you want before you plan around it.

Proper toilet blocks, drinking water and showers. Powered sites in some sections. No fires on the foreshore — this is the trade you make for the plumbing.

Point Nepean National Park is twenty minutes further on and has no camping of its own, so this is the base for it.

Best for

Families · First-timers

Skip if

Anyone after quiet. In January it is a small town, and it sounds like one.

BookingBooked through the Mornington Peninsula Shire rather than Parks Victoria. Peak summer sites are allocated well in advance and long-standing families hold a lot of them.

A grassy clearing surrounded by mountain ash, cool even in February, with old timber tramway tracks running off into the forest in three directions.

It is a simple place: flat ground, tall trees, mist in the morning. The walks from the gap are the reason to stay two nights instead of one. Summer here is a relief rather than a trial; the ash forest runs several degrees below town. Winter is genuinely cold and the forest roads can close after storms.

A long-drop toilet and fire rings, and that is the lot. No water, no showers, no bins.

It is state forest, so dogs are allowed — and the Ada Tree and the Big Pats Creek walks are both within half an hour.

Best for

Couples · First-timers · Dogs allowed

Skip if

Winter novices — the clearing is cold, damp and often fogged in from June to August.

Worth knowingState forest camping — no booking, no allocated sites. Arrive early on a Saturday.

Damp messmate forest cut through with old gold workings, mineral springs and creeks.

The camping is scattered rather than organised — a handful of clearings off forest roads, each holding a few groups. It feels further from Melbourne than it is, which is most of the appeal. The forest is wet and cold through winter and the tracks cut up badly. Autumn and spring are the window; summer brings fire restrictions across the whole district.

Assume nothing: no toilets at most clearings, no water, no bins. Bring a trowel, bring water, take everything out.

Neither Hanging Rock nor the Macedon Regional Park allows camping, so this is where people who came for Mount Macedon actually sleep.

Best for

Couples · Dogs allowed · Four-wheel-drive only

Skip if

Families who need a toilet block. Facilities here are thin to non-existent depending on which clearing you land in.

Worth knowingNo bookings in the state forest. Which areas are open changes with roadworks, harvesting and fire recovery, so check Forest Fire Management Victoria or Parks Victoria the week you go.

Open grass under big old trees beside the Loddon, with mineral springs, a swing bridge and the remains of a gold-era settlement in the scrub around it.

Box-ironbark country: dry, bright, full of birds, and quieter than the Daylesford end of the same region. Spring wildflowers and autumn colour are both good here. Summer is hot and the district goes to high fire danger quickly.

Toilets, tables and shelters. Treat the spring water as mineral water rather than a supply — bring your own drinking water.

Castlemaine is twenty minutes away when the weather turns and you want a bakery and a roof.

Best for

Families · First-timers · Couples

BookingCamping is managed locally rather than by Parks Victoria alone — check the current arrangement online before you drive up, because it has changed in recent years.

Flat grassy sites along the Little River with the razorback ridge of the Cathedral Range standing straight up behind you.

It is the biggest and most organised campground in the park, which makes it the one that suits a family or a first tent, and the walks start from the site rather than a drive away. Autumn and spring are ideal. Summer on the exposed ridge is punishing and the park closes on days of extreme fire danger; winter is cold and the rock gets slick.

Long-drop toilets, picnic tables and fireplaces. No drinking water, no showers, no bins — the river is not a supply.

Sugarloaf Peak by the Canyon Track is the walk people talk about, and it is steeper and more exposed than the sign suggests. Start early, take water, and turn around if the weather closes in.

Best for

Families · First-timers · Couples

Skip if

Anyone expecting an easy stroll — every walk from here goes up, and the Razorback is a genuine scramble.

BookingBooked through Parks Victoria online. Weekends between September and April go months ahead, especially the long weekends.

Smaller, shadier and closer to the river than Cooks Mill, tucked in under blackwoods with the water audible from most sites.

It suits two people and a small tent better than a family convoy, and it books out for exactly that reason. Same as the rest of the range: shoulder seasons are the sweet spot, summer is hot and fire-restricted, winter is cold and wet.

Long-drop toilets and fireplaces. No drinking water, no showers, no bins.

The Neds Peak track leaves from the campground, which means you can be on the ridge before the day visitors have parked.

Best for

Couples · First-timers

Skip if

Large groups and caravans — the sites are tight and the access is narrow.

BookingParks Victoria online, and it is the first campground in the park to fill.

A high grassy saddle just below the main ridge, ringed by rock, with the sunset on one side and the sunrise on the other.

Carrying water up is the price, and the night sky is what you get for it. This is the standard first overnight walk for Melbourne people learning to hike with a pack. Do it in the shoulder seasons. Wind on the ridge in winter is serious, and summer heat on that climb has caught out plenty of fit people.

A long-drop toilet. Nothing else at all — every litre of water and every meal comes up with you, and all rubbish goes back down.

Carry at least three litres a person for the night. There is no water on the ridge, and people underestimate that one more than anything else in this park.

Best for

Couples

Skip if

First-timers on their first night out, and anyone who has not carried a loaded pack uphill before.

BookingBooked through Parks Victoria like the drive-in sites. Numbers are limited, so it is not a turn-up option.

A small, simple set of sites in regrowth forest on the plateau.

The forest here is young because of the 2009 fires and the country still shows it, which gives the place a particular quiet. It is close, it is easy, and it is a sensible place to find out whether your gear works. Cool on the plateau even in summer. Winter is cold and wet and the campground can close after storms.

Toilets and fireplaces. No drinking water, no showers, no bins.

Masons Falls is a fifteen-minute drive and takes about twenty minutes to walk — the easiest waterfall payoff of any camp this close to town.

Best for

First-timers · Families · Couples

Skip if

People wanting a river or a view — this is forest camping, and the views are a short drive away at the escarpment lookouts.

BookingParks Victoria online. Small, so weekends go, but midweek is usually open.

Grassy terraces above the water with big gums, a swimming beach below and kangaroos that treat the place as theirs.

It is the most set-up camping in the park and the reason families come back every January: kids can be sent to the water and be visible the whole time. Summer is the season and the lake is warm enough to swim. Water levels drop through autumn, so the beach walks further out as the year goes on.

Flush toilets, hot showers and drinking water, which is unusual for a national park campground in Victoria and is precisely why it suits a first family trip.

The lake is a working water storage, so the shoreline moves. What was a beach at Easter can be a long walk down at Christmas.

Best for

Families · First-timers

Skip if

Anyone after solitude in January, when it runs at capacity.

BookingParks Victoria online. Christmas and January are allocated a long way ahead — think months, not weeks.

A string of sites along an arm of the lake, more spread out and quieter than Fraser, with boats coming and going and a lot of dead-quiet water in the early morning.

The kind of place where nothing happens for three days and that turns out to be the point. Best from late spring through autumn. In winter it is cold, grey and largely empty, which some people prefer.

Toilets and fireplaces, no showers and no drinking water. Bring everything you will drink and wash with.

It is a long way in on gravel from Eildon. Do the last section in daylight the first time.

Best for

Families · Couples

BookingParks Victoria online, with peak summer sites gone early.

Wide river flats along the Howqua, ringed by steep forested spurs, with clear water running over stones and huge old gums for shade.

Horse riders, four-wheel-drivers and families with the same battered camp chairs share it, and it is one of the best-loved river camps in the state for good reason. The valley is a summer and autumn place. Winter is cold and the road down can be miserable in the wet; snow closes the higher tracks above it from June.

Long-drop toilets and river flats. No drinking water, no showers, no bins. The Howqua is clear but still needs treating.

This is horse country and always has been. Give riders room on the tracks and do not camp across the river crossings.

Best for

Families · Four-wheel-drive only · Dogs allowed · Couples

Skip if

Caravans and low cars — the road down is steep, narrow and unsealed.

BookingCamping in the Howqua Hills is managed by Parks Victoria and the arrangement has shifted in recent years — check whether the flat you want is bookable or first-in before you leave Mansfield.

A flat clearing on an old timber mill site in the valley behind Lorne, ferns and tall trees on every side and the St George River running past.

Being able to walk to waterfalls in the morning and be on the beach with fish and chips by lunch is the whole argument for it. The Otways are wet. Summer and autumn are the driest run; winter camping here is for people who genuinely like rain on canvas.

Toilets and fireplaces. No drinking water and no showers — Lorne has both if you need them.

Phantom Falls and Won Wondah Falls both start from near the site, which makes this the rare camp where the walk does not need the car.

Best for

Couples · First-timers · Families

Skip if

Anyone wanting a beach camp — the ocean is a drive away, not a stroll.

BookingParks Victoria online. Summer weekends and Easter go a long way ahead across the whole Otways.

Sites tucked between the forest and a small protected bay, with rock platforms, rock pools and koalas in the manna gums on the way in.

It is the campground people in Melbourne talk about all year and try to book every summer, and it earns it: you sleep within earshot of the water. Summer and autumn. Winter is wild and wet on this coast and the access road turns greasy.

Long-drop toilets and fireplaces. No drinking water, no showers, no bins. Bring every litre.

The Great Ocean Walk passes through, so you will share the morning with people who have walked in from Apollo Bay. The rock pools at low tide are the best part of the day for kids.

Best for

Couples · Families

Skip if

Anyone arriving without a booking in summer, and anyone with a dog — national park.

BookingParks Victoria runs a ballot for the peak summer period at the popular Otway coastal campgrounds — enter it months ahead rather than hoping to book. Outside peak, it is a normal online booking.

Open ground on both banks of the Aire where it meets the sea, low scrub, big sky and a lot of wind.

Kangaroos at dusk in numbers that stop conversation. It is more exposed than Blanket Bay and considerably easier to get a site at. Summer and autumn. It is exposed, so a winter front here is a long night.

Toilets and fireplaces. No drinking water, no showers. The river is tidal and brackish at the mouth, so it is not a supply.

Peg everything properly on arrival, before dinner, not after. The wind gets up in the evening.

Best for

Couples · Families · First-timers

Skip if

Tents with weak poles. The wind off this coast finds every weakness in cheap gear.

BookingParks Victoria online, and the peak summer period may fall under the coastal ballot — check which applies to the dates you want.

A wide grassy flat behind one of the biggest, emptiest beaches in the state, with green hills on three sides and surf you can hear all night.

The beach is not a swimming beach — the rips are serious — but as a place to walk for an hour and see nobody, it has few equals in Victoria. Summer and autumn are the run. The valley is green because it rains, and it rains most in winter.

Toilets, tables and fireplaces on a big open flat. No drinking water, no showers, no bins.

There is no phone signal down in the valley. Tell someone your plan before you drop off the ridge.

Best for

Couples · Families

Skip if

Families who want the kids in the water. Johanna is a surf beach with no patrol.

BookingParks Victoria online, with the peak summer period allocated by ballot in recent years. Check the arrangement for your dates.

A big grassy flat beside the Gellibrand River under tall trees, with a short walk upstream to a waterfall and glow worms in the banks after dark on a still night.

It is the friendliest of the inland Otway camps and the one that suits a family with young children best. Green all year, wet most of it. The glow worms are best on warm, still, dark nights, which means summer.

Toilets and fireplaces on an open flat. No drinking water, no showers. The river needs treating.

Forrest is fifteen minutes away with a brewery, a bakery and the best mountain bike trails in the region, so a wet afternoon has somewhere to go.

Best for

Families · First-timers · Couples

BookingBooked online through Parks Victoria. Popular with Geelong families, so weekends fill from spring onwards.

A small campground above a lake formed by a landslide, with drowned tree trunks standing in still water and platypus in it at dawn and dusk.

The camping is basic and the walk down to the lake takes twenty minutes. People come for one thing and are usually rewarded if they are patient and quiet. Platypus are most reliably seen at first light in the cooler months. Winter is workable if you are equipped for wet cold.

Toilets and fireplaces. No drinking water, no showers, no bins.

Dawn on the lake is the trip. If you are not prepared to be up in the dark and sit still for half an hour, camp somewhere else.

Best for

Couples · First-timers

Skip if

Big groups — it is small, and noise carries straight down to the water.

BookingParks Victoria online. Small enough that a weekend booking matters.

Hundreds of sites in tea-tree and banksia behind Norman Beach, with granite peaks above, orange lichen on the rocks and wombats walking through the campground at dusk as though they are paying rent.

It is the single best-known camping trip in Victoria and busier than any other, and it is still worth it. Autumn is the local’s answer: warm water, empty tracks, no ballot. Summer is beautiful and full. Winter is cold, quiet and often magnificent.

Flush toilets, hot showers, drinking water, a general store and a visitor centre. Cabins, huts and safari tents as well as camp sites. No fires anywhere in the park at any time of year, so bring a gas stove.

There is no fuel in the park and phone signal is patchy to absent past the entrance. Fill up at Foster or Yanakie on the way in.

Best for

Families · First-timers · Couples

Skip if

Dogs, which are not permitted anywhere in the park, and anyone hoping to turn up in January without a booking.

BookingPeak summer and Easter at Tidal River are allocated by a ballot run by Parks Victoria months in advance, not first-come booking. Outside the peak period you book online like anywhere else.

Walk-in camps on white sand beaches that cars cannot reach, reached through wet forest and over granite saddles.

Sealers Cove at low tide, Refuge Cove for the anchorage and the quiet, Little Waterloo Bay for the water. Two or three nights on the southern circuit is the best multi-day walk in the state for most people. Autumn and spring are the pick. Summer means heat on the exposed sections and a full booking system; winter means short days and cold, wet camps.

Long-drop toilets at the camps and tank or creek water that must be treated. No showers, no bins, and no fires anywhere in the park.

Sealers Cove creek crossing is tidal. Time the walk to arrive near low tide or you will be wading at chest height with a pack.

Best for

Couples

Skip if

First-timers and anyone who has not walked with a full pack before. The distances are honest and the creek crossings are real.

BookingEvery overnight walk site is booked and allocated through Parks Victoria, and numbers per camp are capped. You cannot simply set off and find a spot.

A small camp on the edge of a coastal reserve looking straight out at Waratah Bay with the Prom on the horizon.

Grass, tea-tree, a short path to the beach and rock pools at the end of it. It gives you a lot of what the Prom gives you with none of the ballot. Best from October to April. It is exposed to the southerly, so pick your weather.

Toilets and tables. No drinking water, no showers, no bins, and fires are not permitted here.

The old lime kilns and the fossil beach at Walkerville are a short walk along the shore and most people miss them.

Best for

Couples · Families · First-timers

Skip if

Large caravans — the sites and the access are modest.

BookingBooked through Parks Victoria. Small site count, so summer weekends still go early even though it is quieter than the Prom.

Simple sites in banksia scrub on the shore of Lake Victoria, with still water, a lot of birds and a peninsula of low heathland behind.

It is flat, easy country for walking and riding, and it is quiet in a way that the coastal parks further west never manage in summer. Spring wildflowers on the heath are the reason to time it. Summer brings mosquitoes in numbers you should take seriously.

Toilets and fireplaces. No drinking water and no showers — Loch Sport has supplies and is the last stop before the park.

Take proper insect repellent and a head net for dusk. This is lake country and it behaves like it.

Best for

Families · Couples

Skip if

Anyone who needs the surf. The ocean beaches are across the water, not out the front.

BookingBooked online through Parks Victoria. It rarely fills outside the summer holidays, which is part of why people who know it keep coming back.

Sites among banksias behind a long stretch of orange-rock coastline, with clear water, a boardwalk along the headland and almost nobody outside the summer weeks.

Cabins and lodges as well as tent sites, which makes it a rare place to take people who do not camp. East Gippsland runs warmer and drier than the west. Summer is the peak; autumn is the quiet reward.

Toilets, cold showers and fireplaces, with cabins on site for people who want a bed. Bring drinking water — do not count on a supply.

The nature trail along the coast between the bluff and East Cape is an easy hour and is the best thing at Conran that is not the swimming.

Best for

Families · Couples · First-timers

BookingCamp sites, cabins and lodges are all booked through Parks Victoria. Christmas books out very early.

A green grassy reserve in a limestone valley, with lyrebirds in the gullies, a spring-fed pool and two guided cave systems in the hill above the campground.

It is the softest introduction to remote-feeling Victoria there is: you are a long way east, but there is hot water and a kiosk. Caves are the same temperature year round, which makes this one of the few Victorian trips that works in a heatwave or a cold snap. The valley itself is best in spring and autumn.

Flush toilets, hot showers, drinking water, powered sites and cabins. Close to a full-service campground by Victorian standards.

Book the cave tour when you book the site. In holidays the tours sell out while you are still putting the tent up.

Best for

Families · First-timers · Couples

Skip if

Anyone chasing solitude in school holidays — it is the anchor of the whole district.

BookingCamp sites, cabins and safari-style tents are booked through Parks Victoria, and cave tours are booked separately on the day or ahead.

A wide sandy flat beside the Snowy at the bottom of an enormous gorge, with a 1930s steel bridge across it and cliffs going up on both sides.

Very few people, very big country. Rafters put in here, and most nights it is them, you and the river. Summer and autumn only. The access roads are unsafe in the wet and can be closed for long stretches after storms or fire.

Long-drop toilets and fire rings. No water, no showers, no bins, no fuel and no shop for a very long way.

There is no phone signal and there will not be for hours in any direction. Take a paper map, spare fuel and more food than you need.

Best for

Couples · Four-wheel-drive only

Skip if

Caravans, nervous drivers and anyone on a tight schedule. The road in is the hardest part of the trip.

Worth knowingNo booking. Check Parks Victoria for road and park closures before you leave — this area has been shut for extended periods after fires and floods.

Sites strung along a tea-coloured river where it meets the sea, with a lighthouse on the headland, dunes behind and forest that runs unbroken to New South Wales.

It is as far from Melbourne as Victorian camping gets and the emptiness is the whole product. Summer and autumn. This coast was badly burnt in 2019 and 2020 and parts of the park have been closed and reopened in stages since, so confirm before you plan around it.

Long-drop toilets and fire rings. No drinking water, no showers, no bins and no shop nearer than Cann River.

Carry everything, including drinking water for the whole stay. There is no resupply once you turn off the highway.

Best for

Couples · Families

Skip if

A weekend. Anything less than four nights is spent driving.

BookingBooked through Parks Victoria. Check current access and closures on their site at the same time — it is the single most important thing about a trip out here.

Open river flats on the Mitchell with deep green swimming holes, warm rock slabs and the Den of Nargun gorge walk downstream.

Popular with families who have been coming for decades and quiet enough midweek that you can have a bend of the river to yourself. A summer river camp above everything else. The river runs high and cold in winter and spring and the flats can flood.

Long-drop toilets and fire rings on open flats. No water, no showers, no bins.

The Den of Nargun is a significant place for the Gunaikurnai people. Walk it, read the signs, and stay out of the cave itself.

Best for

Families · Couples · Four-wheel-drive only

Worth knowingNo booking — first in. That makes January a lottery and a Wednesday in March a certainty.

A campground on a plateau at around 1300 metres beside a small alpine lake, granite tors, snow gums and a night sky that makes people stop talking.

You can swim in the lake in January, walk to the Horn for the view over the whole north-east, and be cold enough at 6am in February to want a beanie. The campground opens for the warmer part of the year — roughly from spring to autumn — and closes for the snow season. Check the opening dates before you plan; they move with the weather.

Flush toilets, hot showers and drinking water, which is generous for a national park at that altitude. No fires on the plateau — bring a gas stove.

Take clothing for ten degrees colder than Melbourne, whatever the forecast says. The plateau makes its own weather and it changes in an hour.

Best for

Families · Couples · First-timers

Skip if

Winter, when it is closed. And anyone who has packed only summer clothing.

BookingParks Victoria online, and the summer weeks book out well ahead.

A shaded creek-side campground in tall forest at the foot of the Staircase Spur, which is the standard way up Victoria’s highest mountain.

Half the people there are eating early and going to bed; the other half are back at four in the afternoon looking wrecked and pleased. Lovely on its own terms even if you never leave the creek. The camp is usable across the warmer months; the mountain above it is a serious alpine environment and is snow-covered and dangerous in winter and often into spring.

Toilets, tables and fireplaces beside the creek. No drinking water, no showers. Mount Beauty is fifteen minutes away for supplies.

If you are going up the Staircase, start at first light and turn around by early afternoon regardless of how you feel. Weather on the summit is not the weather at the car.

Best for

Couples · Families · First-timers

Skip if

Anyone planning to walk up Bogong without alpine gear and a forecast. That mountain has killed experienced people.

Worth knowingNo booking at the campground last time we checked — arrive early on a summer weekend. Confirm on Parks Victoria before you rely on it.

A camping area beside a hut on the shoulder of the sharpest mountain in Victoria, with snow gums, alpine grass and a sunrise over the Razorback that people plan whole years around.

The hut is a shelter, not accommodation — you carry a tent and use the hut if the weather turns. A summer and autumn walk for most people. In winter it is a snow trip requiring proper equipment and experience, and people get into trouble there every year.

A toilet and a hut. No reliable water at the camp — the nearest source can be a walk down the spur and can dry up. Carry water up and take all rubbish down.

Register your walk and tell someone your plan. There is little to no phone signal on the spur, and the summit is exposed.

Best for

Couples

Skip if

First-timers, and anyone without alpine clothing. This is above the treeline in effect and the weather can turn in twenty minutes.

Worth knowingNo booking for the camping area. That is not a licence to turn up in bad weather — check the Bureau forecast for the alpine area, not for Bright.

A wide grassed valley ringed by mountains, with an old station site, a small cemetery and the Wonnangatta River running through it.

It is one of the most remote places you can drive to in Victoria and it feels like it. Deer, silence, and an enormous number of stars. Seasonal road closures shut the high tracks through the alpine area for winter and spring — commonly from around the Queen’s Birthday weekend until late spring. Confirm the closure dates with Parks Victoria before you plan anything.

A long-drop toilet at the main flat and nothing else. No water supply, no showers, no bins, no fuel, no help.

Travel with a second vehicle or a satellite communicator. There is no phone signal in the valley and recovery is a day-long exercise.

Best for

Four-wheel-drive only

Skip if

Two-wheel-drive vehicles, anyone travelling alone without recovery gear, and anyone who has not driven steep unsealed spurs before.

Worth knowingNo booking and no facilities to book. You are entirely self-sufficient from the moment you leave the bitumen.

A big, flat, shaded campground beside Fyans Creek with room between sites and the Mount William range above.

It is the sensible base for the southern half of the park: fifteen minutes from Halls Gap, close to the Wonderland walks, and calmer than staying in town. Spring for wildflowers and full waterfalls, autumn for stable weather. Summer is hot and carries high fire risk in a park that has burnt badly more than once.

Toilets, tables and fireplaces. No drinking water and no showers — Halls Gap has both, and a pool.

Parts of the Grampians have been closed for fire recovery in recent years. Check Parks Victoria for the specific walks you want before you commit the drive.

Best for

Families · First-timers · Couples

BookingParks Victoria online. Easter and the spring long weekends go early.

A smaller, quieter campground in stringybark forest up near the escarpment road, without the crowd that gathers on the valley floor.

Kangaroos everywhere at dusk, and the lookouts are a short drive rather than a long climb. Shoulder seasons, as with the whole park. Cold and often wet in winter, high fire danger in summer.

Toilets and fireplaces. No drinking water, no showers, no bins.

Boroka Lookout at sunset is five minutes away and is the best view-to-effort ratio in the Grampians.

Best for

Couples · Families

BookingBooked online through Parks Victoria, and it holds a site later into a long weekend than Borough Huts does.

A rocky, low-scrub campground under the Mount Stapylton massif, popular with climbers and with people who want the northern half of the park to themselves.

The rock here is orange, the light in the evening is extraordinary, and the walking is short and steep. Spring and autumn. The north end gets hotter than Halls Gap and it burnt through the summer of 2024 and 2025, so recovery closures are a live issue.

Toilets and fireplaces. No water, no showers, no bins.

The rock art shelters in the northern Grampians are among the most significant in south-eastern Australia. Visit the ones open to the public, stay on the boardwalks, and touch nothing.

Best for

Couples

Skip if

People wanting shade and grass. It is exposed, stony country.

BookingParks Victoria online. Check the northern Grampians access notices at the same time — this end of the park has spent long periods closed.

Purpose-built walkers’ camps strung along a long-distance trail down the spine of the range, with tent platforms, shelters and water tanks.

You can walk the whole thing over about a fortnight or take a two or three night section, which is what most people do and what most people should do. Autumn and spring only, sensibly. Summer heat on the ridges is dangerous and the trail is closed on days of extreme fire danger.

Toilets, tent platforms and shelters, with tank water that must be treated and cannot be assumed to be there. No showers, no bins, no fires.

Check which sections are open before you book. Fire and flood have closed parts of the trail for extended periods, and the closures are section by section rather than all or nothing.

Best for

Couples

Skip if

First-timers straight off the couch. The sections are long and the ridges are exposed.

BookingEvery night on the trail is booked through Parks Victoria, camp by camp, and capacity is capped. This is not a walk you can improvise.

A pine-shaded flat at the base of a lump of orange rock that rises straight out of wheat country and is one of the best climbing crags in the world.

Half the campground is climbers who have been there a month; the other half is people who came for the sunset from the summit road and stayed a night. Autumn and spring are the climbing seasons. Summer out here is genuinely hot with little shade beyond the pines.

Toilets and tables under the pines. No drinking water, no showers. Natimuk, ten minutes away, has a pub and a shop.

Arapiles, Dyurrite, is a place of deep cultural significance and access to some areas has changed to protect it. Read the current park notices rather than an old guidebook.

Best for

Couples · First-timers

Skip if

Anyone expecting scenery on the drive. The Wimmera is flat, and then suddenly it is not.

BookingParks Victoria manages the camping. Confirm current arrangements and any access changes before you drive four hours — this park has been subject to management review.

A quiet campground in low desert scrub and yellow gum, where the ground is sand rather than dirt and the birds start early.

The malleefowl mounds nearby are the draw for people who know about them, and in spring the wildflowers across the heath are worth the drive on their own. Spring for the flowers, autumn for the weather. Summer in the Little Desert is hot, exposed and best avoided.

Toilets, tables and fireplaces. No drinking water, no showers. Nhill is the last supply point.

It is called a desert and it behaves like one at night — the temperature drop after dark surprises people every time.

Best for

Couples · Families · First-timers

BookingParks Victoria online. It rarely fills outside the spring wildflower weeks.

River red gum forest on the Murray, the largest of its kind anywhere, with sandy beaches on the bends, brolgas on the plains and warm water you can float in for an afternoon.

Camping is along the river rather than in a formal campground, which is what makes it feel generous. Summer and autumn are the swimming months. The forest floods on purpose in winter and spring, and access changes with the water.

Toilets at a few main areas and none at most river sites. No drinking water, no showers, no bins. Bring a shovel and take everything home.

Barmah is Yorta Yorta Country and jointly managed. The forest is also home to feral horses that are a live management issue — leave them alone and give them room.

Best for

Families · Couples · Dogs allowed · Four-wheel-drive only

Skip if

Anyone visiting in a wet winter — the tracks flood and the forest closes.

Worth knowingNo bookings for the riverside camping. Check Parks Victoria for flood and track closures, which are common and change quickly.

A long island of red gum forest between the Murray and Gunbower Creek, with camping strung along the water and almost nobody there outside holidays.

Fishing, canoeing, a chair in the shallows. It is unglamorous camping and completely restful. Warm months, when the river is swimmable. Winter is cold, flat and often wet underfoot.

Almost nothing: assume no toilets, no water, no bins. Self-sufficient camping in the proper sense.

Mosquitoes at dusk on the Murray are not a minor inconvenience. Bring repellent, long sleeves and a screened tent.

Best for

Families · Couples · Dogs allowed · Four-wheel-drive only

Worth knowingNo booking along the river frontage. Track access varies with river height, so check before towing anything in.

A campground beside one of the pink salt lakes in the Mallee, where the water goes from grey to pink depending on the season, the light and the algae.

Flat, quiet, enormous, and at night one of the darkest skies within reach of Melbourne. Go between April and October. The pink colour is most reliable in the warmer part of that window as the lakes dry.

Long-drop toilets, tables and fire rings. No water at all. Carry everything, including enough water for a breakdown.

Do not walk on the salt crust and do not drive off the tracks. It looks solid and it is not.

Best for

Couples · Four-wheel-drive only

Skip if

Summer visits. The Mallee in January is brutally hot and there is no shade to speak of.

Worth knowingNo booking last time we checked. Confirm on Parks Victoria, and check road conditions — the Mallee tracks are impassable when wet.