Southern Highlands

You can travel across a lot of bitumen exploring NSW but it is a rewarding destination. Every town has history, sights, amenities and local ‘characters’. The tip is to take the time to stop and discover, rather than treating places like fuel and snack stops.

One of the prettiest spots, and a rewarding day trip from Sydney is the Southern Highlands. About an hour’s drive from Sydney, you can leave the highway and take the scenic drive through the area. Mittagong is the gateway and has an excellent Tourist Information Centre on the Sydney side of town. It also has some good eateries and interesting shop front architecture. Nearby Wombeyan Caves is one of the most extensive and complex cave systems in Australia. Both Mittagong and Bowral have many private gardens that open to the public in September and October.

Bowral is an excellent base for exploring if you want to stay a night or two with good B & Bs and guesthouses. It has historic streetcapes and lovely gardens. The gardens are very traditional and ‘English’. The Corbett Gardens and the gardens of the Grand Mecure Hotel are a sea of colour at Tulip time (spring). There’s also the excellent Don Bradman Museum. Yes, he was born in Cootamundra but the family moved there when he was three, so it was a Southern Highlands water tank the Don took to with his cricket stump and golf ball to get his eye in. You may bump into a mate of mine there. James Kemsley has a great involvement with the museum, local cricket and the community. He also draws the iconic cartoon, Ginger Meggs.

Sutton Forrest and Moss Vale are particularly pretty towns, and the area has a very English feel with green rolling hills. For those continuing south, there’s a McDonalds (and a roadside café) about halfway between Sydney and Canberra, on the expressway at Sutton Forest. Just before the Golden Arches you pass a turn off to the Belangelo Forest, the scene of the brutal backpacker murders. At the time of writing, the perpetrator, Ivan Milat, was ensconced in Goulburn Gaol, going on hunger strikes and eating bits of metal in an effort to get a retrial to prove his innocence. It will never happen.

West of Goulburn you get some pretty spots steeped in old gold mining history as you head out to Crookwell. For more on areas worth visiting south, west and east, check out the Inland and Outback section.

For those who like art, craft and tearooms, Berrima is rewarding. It’s Australia’s best-preserved Georgian settlement (1830’s). It also has an historic gaol, courthouse and one of Australia’s oldest pubs. A self-guided historical tour is available. If you’re into books, Berkelow’s Book Barn on the road into town is worth stopping for – there are some 200,000 second hand and rare books.

Further south, Bundanoon is known for its excellent guesthouses and views across Morton National Park. It was once THE spot for a honeymoon. Morton National Park has 14 designated walking tracks from Bundanoon, including a night walk to Glow Worm Glen. The Park has sandstone cliffs, waterfalls, wooded valleys and the winding tributaries of the Shoalhaven River.

Nearby Kangaroo Valley is also full of natural beauty including the 80m high Fitzroy Falls. As a struggling writer, the only honeymoon I could afford was a few nights camping in the Valley. it poured the whole time and a two-man tent with a soaked floor and a wet, smelly dog wasn’t exactly what the child-bride had in mind. We haven’t camped out together since but we did get a ‘real’ honeymoon in Greece seven years later.

Robertson is another charming little town (the movie Babe was filmed there). To memory there is a Big Potato in town as this is the centre of the state’s largest potato growing area. Check out Ranelagh House, an ‘English Manor’ designed in 1924. I went on a Whodunnit Murder Mystery weekend there and the setting was perfect for the theme of an old private school reunion. It was on this occasion that I dropped into the Robertson pub to find a beer glass suspended over the bar by a bit of fishing line. Curiosity gets the better of most visitors who have to part with a gold coin to find out why it’s there. The money goes to local charity – and I’m not going to tell!

More Information

For more information about New South Wales:

• Events And Festivals
• Accommodation
• To See And Do
• Sydney
• North Coast
• Blue Mountains
• Hunter Valley
• South Coast
• Inland And Outback

New South Wales Tours With Tours To Go