Sorrel takes the dirt road specialist and hits the back roads to the glorious Grampians.
Victoria's Grampians National Park is one of the state's biggest. More than a thousand kilometres of dirt road crosses it. If you want to see parts most tourists miss, Peter Sambell is the man to call.
Peter runs Adventure Southern Cross Tours and has been driving through the area since 1977. He is very knowledgeable about the region's flora and fauna. His motto is "See the real Grampians".
Where many operations in the area stick to the main road, Peter's tours head off the beaten track and head deep into the bush. There you can see eastern grey kangaroos, swamp or redneck wallabies, emus, red deer, echidnas, goannas, 200 species of bird and over 900 plant species.
Tours head down Silverband Road towards Dunkeld, then to Lakeview Lookout, along Stony Creek Road to the Rosea Track and past the Eastern Wall, a large cliff from where you get a good eastern view of the Grampians.
After driving down a rocky and rugged track to a valley bottom, tours go to Phillips Island and take a morning tea break.
The tour then goes along Glenelg River Road, past a reservoir which was once a cattle station. Siphon Road has an emergency airstrip, which is mostly used by grazing emus and kangaroos.
Then it's along the Goat Track on the Victoria Range, where there are beautiful views of the entire Victoria Valley and Moora Moora Reservoir.
Manja Shelter is an Aboriginal art site which has images in red ochre. It’s believed the ochre, which is mixed with emu egg yolk or animal fat, was traded for spears and other bits and pieces. Bark was used as a paint pot and the paint was sucked through a bark straw and blown over their hands to create a stencil.
Lunch is taken at the picnic ground in Buandik.
Red Rock road takes you past Asses Ears and the highlights of the tour, McKenzie Falls, Balconies Lookout and Boroka Lookout, from where you can see Falls Gap.
The tour takes around nine hours and is a delightful way to discover some truly out of the way places.
