Canberra and the nearby Brindabella Range through the Snowy Mountains of New South Wales and the Victorian Alps to just north-east of Melbourne – taking in eight national parks, our highest mountains, including Mt Kosciuszko at 2228 m, and the headwaters of some of Australia’s most significant rivers.

Extending 500 km from north to south and averaging a width of just 50 km, this beautiful alpine and sub-alpine area is also home to a wide variety of native plants and animals. In its lower reaches you’ll meet kangaroos, possums, wombats, echidnas and wallabies, while higher up the slopes both the endangered mountain pygmy possum, the world’s only exclusively alpine marsupial and weighing in at just 45 g, and the endangered southern corroboree frog have adapted to the cold climate.

During winter, snow lovers revel in the Australian Alps’ 12 resorts, which offer a wide range of groomed and off-piste skiing, snowboarding, cross-country skiing and shoe-showing. In the green months (spring, summer and autumn), the land bursts with life – flowers, plants and animals – and there are plenty of ways to explore: by car on foot, horseback, mountain bike, canoe, microlight aircraft , helicopter or para-glider.

Producer Sorrel Wilby and her team: West Ashton (cameraman), Jeremy Ashton (sound recordist) and Ken Eastwood and Gaelene Christian (associate producers) scale mountains, tackle the oldest caves and learn about the region’s most beautiful and rare animals in the ninth DVD in the award-winning Australian Geographic Best of Australia documentary series: The Australian Alps.


Best of Australia: The Australian Alps is free to Australian Geographic subscribers with issue 93 (January–March 2009), along with a full-size poster map of the region, complete with informative captions and travel tips.


To subscribe to the journal, click here.


Click on the following links to read more about the Australian Alps:
Classic drives
Out and about in the Alps: winter
Out and about in the Alps: spring, summer and autumn
A timeless landscape: Alps national parks
How to get there and where to stay
Parks and tourist information offices
Experiences from the DVD


NEXT: Discover Australia: World Heritage Rainforests of Northern NSW