Tall Trees and Vines touring route

Recommended duration:  2 days
Total distance:  Melbourne–Healesville 65.5 kilometres, Healesville–Marysville 27.9 kilometres, Marysville–Melbourne 93.3 kilometres
Driving time:  Melbourne–Healesville 1hour 15 minutes, Healesville–Marysville 20 minutes, Marysville–Melbourne 90 minutes

Highlights

• Over 50 wineries
• Healesville Sanctuary
• Black Spur
• Mt Donna Buang.

Healesville Sanctuary gives you an opportunity to see over 200 species of Australian wildlife, including the elusive lyrebird and platypus. Wander through enclosures to see animals in their native habitats or join a ‘Meet the Keeper’ session and learn about Australian animals from the experts who care for them. Linking the Yarra Valley with the mountain areas around Marysville is the road known as the Black Spur, which extends between Healesville and Narbethong on the Maroondah Highway. Famous for its heady scenery of spectacular tall forests of immense mountain ash trees and lush green ferns, the Black Spur winds its way up the Great Dividing Range.

In Marysville visit Victoria’s highest waterfalls – Steavenson Falls – a 84 metre drop to the bush and fern-fringed Steavenson River below. A popular attraction both by day, the falls also look magnificent at night when they are illuminated by floodlights. Or keep driving along Lady Talbot Forest Drive, a track that follows a winding path through eucalyptus forest along the Taggerty River. Take a picnic lunch, and a walk through old growth myrtle beech forest to cascading waterfalls.

In winter the mountain areas are often covered with light snow, and Mt Donna Buang and Lake Mountain both offer tobogganing and cross-country skiing during the snow season. In summer see the mountains ablaze with wildflowers.

On your way back down the hill to the city, call in to sample some of Australia’s finest wines from over 40 cellar doors throughout the Yarra Valley.