Road Trip Victoria
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Victoria has so many tiny regional towns you can plan road trips with thousands of different variations. If your looking for a road trip in Victoria or a road trip from Melbourne here some of the major regional towns and resorts to get you started planning your road trip stops!
Road Trip Victoria Ideas
The Great Ocean Road
The most famous Victorian Road Trip is of course the Great Ocean Road, if you havn’t been for a long time it might be time to put it back on your list! It’s not just the coast that is beautiful but the inland areas of the Otways as well. Which can be there own road trip too!
The Greater Otway National Park & Otway Forest Park Road Trip
A road trip through the Otway Ranges is one of the best road trips in Victoria to visit rainforests and waterfalls and do bushwalks.
A huge park formed by the joining of the Otway National Park and several smaller parks the Otway National Park is a beautiful destination all year round. It’s fern adorned rainforest walks can offer respite for exploring in summer and in winter the waterfalls pound and the landscapes are often misty and surreal.
If you want to take your dog you can visit destinations in the Otway Forest Park.
Popular towns include Forrest for its brewery plus nice easy (and dog friendly) bushwalks like Lake Elizabeth and nearby Stevensons Falls and its many MTB tracks. The local store sells products from all around the region.
If you love food with a view The Perch in lavers hill offers warm and inviting restaurant with gorgeous views and plenty of outdoor tables for those with a dog (I checked and they said they are very welcome).
There are loads of this to visit but Melba Gully and Triplet Falls are two very popular highlights of the National Park.
Popular places to stay include Bimbi Park where you can spot Koalas and visit beaches and bushwalks in the region (camp or stay in accommodations including new solar powered cabins), Glenaire Cottages for a dog friendly haven complete with wood fire and the option to have a spa with a view or staying on the Great Ocean Road which passes through the Otways in many spots.
Booking.comThe High Country
Last summer I did a 2wd bitumen road trip in the High Country in Victoria (there are also heaps of 4wd only tracks that are popular)to Falls Creek, Dinner Plain and Bright. It was absolutely gorgeous up the top of Falls Creek crossing through the Bogong High Plains, really unique alpine vegetation and as it was blue skys and sunny the views across the mountains were gorgeous.
I camped but there are also accommodation options in all these places. As an added bonus you can stay in your van for free in dinner plains (a little high country town with an old school village feel) in Summer and wander up to the pub for dinner and a beer, something you definitely can’t do in winter.
Make sure to visit Mt Buffalo National Park to see alpine lakes, waterfalls and for impressive views across the mountains. You can camp up here, but unfortunately, the grand old chalet is no longer open to guests so for accommodation you will need to stay back down the mountain.
This road trip is best saved for summer when you don’t need snow chains and all the roads are open so you can enjoy the stunning alpine views.
The Murray River
Probably one of Victorias most famous road trip destinations, the Murray River runs the full length of the Victoria border and has plenty of small and larger regional towns to explore. A lot of these towns have state park nearby so there are plenty of opportunities s to ride your bike along paths and gravel roads and camp by the river. The Murray River is a great destination if you want to travel with your dog as it has lots of dog friendly camping opportunities.
There are great options for accommodation from bush cabins to luxury resorts (hello Sebel Yarrawonga) and many places to enjoy meals with a view looking over the river and other areas like lakes.
Towns up along the Murray can be a really good option for a winter road trip in Victoria as the temperatures are often several degrees warmer than Melbourne and Southern Victoria.
There is quite often less rain with clear sky and sunshine (just be prepared for chilly nights when you head inland). If you are very lucky, sometimes in places like Swan Hill or Mildura you can luck on temperatures close to 20c even in winter.
On a more recent visit to the Murray I ducked over the border into Renmark South Australia. Here, the Murray is completely different with high dramatic cliffs looking over huge river floodplains.
