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Follow in the footsteps of early explorers, pioneers and bushrangers whose exploits have become part of Australian history and folklore

The Convict Trail, NSW
The Great North Road was built by up to 720 convicts, often working in irons, between 1826 and 1836 to connect Sydney with Newcastle and the Upper Hunter Valley in NSW. Much of this engineering master piece still exists and in parts still carries today's traffic. This trail follows the route of the 240 km Great North Road. Most of this road continues to be used today, offering an alternative, slower paced scenic route between Sydney and the Hunter, where one can explore the brilliant engineering works created by hundreds of convicts - many working in leg-irons. Relics such as stone retaining walls, wharves, culverts, bridges and buttresses can still be seen along the entire length of the Great North Road - in Sydney suburbs like Epping and Gladesville, at Wisemans Ferry or Wollombi, Bucketty or Broke, or when walking in Dharug and Yengo National Parks.

Bushranger Ned Kelly, Vic
Ask any group of Australians what they think of Ned Kelly and you will soon discover that there is little grey area. Over a century after Ned's death, opinions are still usually either black or white. In general terms, the masses see Ned as either a merciless killer who unforgivably chose to take up arms against society, or as a national hero who was the embodiment of the Australian spirit.
The Ned Kelly Trail follows the life of the most famous person in Australian folklore by identifying the keys places in the Ned's life, and telling what happened there, what relics of the outlaw remain there today and how to get there.

The Afghan Cameleers, NT
The Outback Camel Company has been exploring the vast deserts of inland Australia since 1976 after successfully completing Australia's first commercial camel expedition -  across the Simpson Desert. Using a string of pack camels to carry all the supplies and equipment, they honour the tradition of the pioneering 'Afghan' cameleers who played such a crucial role in the exploration, development and sustenance of inland Australia. They are the only camel tour operator in the country that actively explores all of the continent's great deserts without restricting themselves to one area, via a range of distinctive educational treks & expeditions travelling through some of Central Australia's most remote areas.


Explorers Hume and Hovell, NSW
The Hume and Hovell Walking Track stretches over 440km between Yass and Albury and allows walkers to rediscover the route of explorers Hamilton Hume and William Hovell on their expedition to Port Phillip in 1824. The route offers a variety of topographies, vegetation types and land uses, as well as numerous points of historic interest. Apart from bush walking, the track gives access to other recreational activities including camping, fishing, swimming, nature study, photography and wildlife observation. The track starts at Cooma Cottage on the outskirts of Yass and finishes at the Hovell Tree on the banks of the Murray River in Albury. It has three track heads approximately 100 kms apart - James Fitzpatrick at Wee Jasper, Thomas Boyd on the Goobarragandra River 23 kms from Tumut and Henry Angel on Burra Creek near Tumbarumba.

Explorer John McDouall Stuart, SA/NT
The Explorer's Way follows the route of John McDouall Stuart, a famous Australian explorer who was the first to traverse the continent in 1862. This drive connects Australia's south and north, from Adelaide in South Australia to Darwin in the Northern Territory, and takes in many of Australia's best-known icons, including the Flinders Ranges, the opal mining town of Coober Pedy, The Painted Desert, Alice Springs, Uluru (Ayers Rock) (as a detour), Tennant Creek, The Devil's Marbles, Wycliffe Well - reputed to be Australia's UFO capital, Mataranka, Katherine and Darwin.


The original Ghan Railwaymen, SA/NT
The Ghan is one of the world's great rail journeys, a ribbon of steel through outback Australia that links Adelaide and Darwin. The original Ghan, named after the Afghan cameleers who helped open up the outback, first ran in 1879 over 40 kilometres of track between Port Augusta and Quorn. Over the next 50 years it was extended in stages through the Flinders Ranges to Maree and Oodnadatta, then finally to Alice Springs in 1929. The stories of passengers being stranded in the desert for a week or more after torrential downpours washed the track away are legendary. When the second line was built and re-routed through Tarcoola in 1980, the Old Ghan line was left to the elements. However it's a fascinating journey of discovery to drive along the Oodnadatta Track in search of the remnants of the old line.


Bushrangers of the NSW Tablelands
The Two distinct types of bushranger haunted the developing colony of New South Wales. The first became active around the 1830s. They were embittered men, often former convicts, who rebelled against the harsh administration. The second wave occurred around the 1860s. These were more enterprising characters, who sought to steal a part of the newly made fortunes of the gold fields. This drive visits the localities where some of Australia's most infamous bushrangers gained their notoriety. The whole of the western NSW Tablelands area was plagued by bushrangers, but the rolling hills and twists and turns of the roads of Upper Lachlan proved the perfect place for these outlaws to commit their crimes. This landscape provided great cover and helped these outlaws to disappear and evade capture.

Bushranger Captain Thunderbolt, NSW
Thunderbolt's Way is named after Australia's Gentleman bushranger, Fred Ward, alias Captain Thunderbolt. Ward was wrongly jailed twice, and sentenced to work gangs on Sydney's scandal-ridden Cockatoo Island. His brazen escape, organised by his part Aboriginal wife, Mary Ann Bugg, launched them on a career of plunder and defiance of laws they considered corrupt. It amassed for them a cult following by oppressed, dirt-poor farmers, and his popularity grew to become a threat to the very authority of the Crown.
Thunderbolts Way covers the scenic inland route from Nelson Bay at Port Stephens, to Inverell in the New England tablelands. It passes through the towns of Raymond Terrace, Stroud, Gloucester, Barrington, Nowendoc, Walcha and Uralla. The map also covers the towns of Forster, Tuncurry, Taree, Harrington, Armidale and Glen Innes.

The Golden Pipeline Builders, WA
During the gold rush of the 1890s, water was almost more precious than gold in Kalgoorlie. WA Engineer-in-Chief C.Y. O’Connor took on the seemingly impossible task of piping water from
Mundaring Weir in the Perth hills to the arid Eastern Goldfields 560 km to the east. O'Connor succeeded spectacularly. Over a century later the pipeline still operates and runs alongside the Great Eastern Highway from Perth to Kalgoorlie. The National Trust of Australia (WA) has initiated the Golden Pipeline Project which honours the pipeline's builders and helps residents and visitors to WA discover and follow the trail of the pipeline and associated buildings through WA's wheatbelt district.

The Botanists Way, NSW
In 1804, colonial explorer and biologist George Caley walked from the Hawkesbury River to Mount Banks, NSW. The Botanists Way is based on the route’s association with Caley, as well as other botanical explorers of the area, and takes in traditional Aboriginal pathways, Aboriginal knowledge and use of plants, Mount Tomah Botanic Garden and the diverse bushland of the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area. The Botanists Way touring route links the Hawkesbury Valley and Lithgow along the Bells Line of Road and Chifley Road, connecting many of the botanical attractions and themes in the area and crossing the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area with spectacular wilderness on both sides of the road.

The Overlander's Way, Qld
The Overlander’s Way is a designated driving route through central and western Queensland, covering over 1,500kms of diverse landscape between Townsville to Tennant Creek. A fully sealed road, the route follows the paths of great explorers, the fierce, aggressive and in dependent Kalkadoon Aboriginal clans, and the white pioneers who entered and settled their homelands. The trail takes in places like Mount Isa, Cloncurry, Richmond, Charters Towers and Townsville that reflect the real character of the Outback, as well as area's rich indigenous heritage. Features of the drive include the Waltzing Matilda Centre, Winton; Qantas Founders Outback Museum, Longreach; Australian Stockman's Hall of Fame, Longreach; Australian Workers' Heritage Centre, Barcaldine; Lark Quarry Dinosaur Trackways, near Winton.

Tasmania's Convict Trail
When Governor George Arthur came up with the idea to build a prison on Tasman Peninsula’s southern-most tip, he may have thought he had found the perfect place to reform the criminal mind but he could never have imagined how powerful and important it would become to Australia’s understanding of its history. Some 73,000 convicts were transported to Van Diemens Land and about one in five served time at Port Arthur. This trail, from
Hobart to the Tasman Peninsula, visits the major convict sites on the way to and around the peninsula itself. The remains of many, like the Port Arthur convict settlement and the convict coalmines of Saltwater Creek, still exist and are a bleak reminder of the days of the ball and chain.

Explorer Capt. Chuarles Sturt
In Sturt's Steps follows a route that approximates that taken by Captain Charles Sturt during his 1844-45 inland expedition to what we now know as Cameron Corner. The purpose for the expedition was to settle the debate about an inland sea in the centre of Australia. It was during this trip in 1845 that he discovered the Desert Pea near a creek which he named Cooper Creek, after South Australia's Chief Justice Sir Charles Cooper.
With no public roads across the Barrier Ranges we begin the journey further north that the line taken by the expedition. Leaving Broken Hill the journey begins at the old Yanco Glen turn-off on the Silver City Highway and heads over the ranges past Mt Gipps Station and Tarrawingee township ruins before meeting the road running northward from Silverton.

Poet Henry Lawson
Along with his contemporary Banjo Paterson, writer and poet Henry Lawson is among the best-known Australian poets and fiction writers of the colonial period, and is often called Australia's "greatest writer". Lawson was born in a town on the Grenfell goldfields of New South Wales. Lawson attended a Catholic school at Mudgee; the master there, Mr. Kevan, taught Lawson about poetry. Lawson's mother was another strong influence in Lawson becoming a writer.
This drive commences in Grenfell, Lawson's home town, and works its way back towards Sydney, visiting towns where Lawson lived or visited that had an influence on his writing on the way.

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