AUSTRALASIA VICTORIA DESTINATIONS LEFT:
Koalas in the Yarra Valley
RIGHT:
Sovereign Hill BELOW:
Grampians National Park
seal-spotting opportunities and a koala conservation centre for those who allocate a little extra time.
w SEE Most of Phillip Island’s wildlife attractions are packed into a 10-hour tour that leaves Melbourne just after lunch and returns late at night. 1st Class Holidays sells the Penguin Parade tour for £96 (£48 for under-12s). For something distinctly
stranger than koalas, however, Bayplay at Portsea, on the Mornington Peninsula, offers £59 snorkelling tours that take swimmers to see weedy sea dragons. These fragile little oddities look like seahorses dressed up in flamboyant cabaret costumes. It’s possible to make a day of it at this well-run activity hub, which also offers stand-up
Speaking of roos, the one place
Sea dragons are fragile oddities that look like seahorses dressed in flamboyant cabaret costumes
paddleboarding, sea kayaking and guided bike tour adventures.
bayplay.com.au In the Yarra Valley, the
prime attraction is Healesville Sanctuary, which is one of the best places in Oz to see native wildlife gathered in one place. Animal lovers can tick off the platypus, Tasmanian Devil and dingo, as well as the more ubiquitous roos and koalas.
zoo.org.au/healesville
you’re practically guaranteed to see them in the wild is on the Anglesea Golf Course, which is handily near the start of the Great Ocean Road. Further along, the heavily forested area around Cape Otway is koala central. This is also where Otway Fly
Treetop Adventures can be found. Visitors have two options: a treetop walk on a canopy walkway that winds around the upper reaches of the rainforest, or a two-and-a-half-hour zipline tour. The latter involves guests whizzing through the rainforest at high speeds, and teetering on suspension bridges. A £71 ticket covers both.
otwayfly.com In the Grampians, self-drivers can pick up walking maps at the Halls Gap Visitor Information Centre, and string together a
series of rock shelters marked with Aboriginal cave paintings into a hiking route. To delve a little deeper, Brambuk cultural centre in Halls Gap goes into the art, Dreamtime creation stories, music, weapons, food and tools of the Koori people, who have traditionally inhabited the area.
brambuk.com.au Perhaps regional Victoria’s
most impressive attraction is in the 1860s gold-rush city of Ballarat. Sovereign Hill is a re-creation of a mining settlement, with shops manned by people carrying out traditional 19th-century trades, and horses and carriages clattering down the unpaved streets. As well as offering visitors the opportunity to pan for gold in a stream, the village features gold pours, mine tours, candlemaking demonstrations and
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