What’s special

Wyperfeld National Park is a place of peace, contrasts, brilliant starry skies and wildlife. Victoria’s third-largest national park, it protects an extensive area of mallee vegetation. It also has lake beds (mostly dry), red gums and wilderness areas. The park is famous for its birds, including the remarkable mound-building malleefowl, and also has many mammals and reptiles and a wide variety of wildflowers.

Best time to visit

Spring, autumn and winter are all good times. Summers can be extremely hot. Nights can be cool, even frosty, in any season.

What to do

There are many opportunities for both short and overnight walks. The area around Wonga Hut has a good track network including nature trails. For overnight walks, consult a ranger and, if possible, complete the intentions book.

You need to carry water, a map and compass, and wear strong comfortable shoes as well as a shady hat. It’s easy to get lost if you walk off-track.

When driving, stay on surfaced and formed roads or 4WD tracks. Take plenty of fuel and drinking water and check track conditions before setting off.

Where

The park is in north-western Victoria about 450km from Melbourne – at least 5 hours drive on sealed roads. There is no public transport access.

Accommodation

Hotels, motels and other accommodation in towns such as Rainbow, Hopetoun and Ouyen are within easy driving distance of the park. The park has two main campgrounds, Wonga in the south and Casuarina in the north, with toilets, water and fireplaces. There are no cabins and no powered sites, but groups can stay at Pine Plains Lodge on privately owned land within the park.

 About the park

Wyperfeld is in the country of the Wotjobaluk people, and the park has many scarred trees and recordings of middens, artefacts and burials. European settlers avoided the area because of its infertile sandy soils and low rainfall, so the land was not cleared and the native plants and animals have survived. The park was first reserved in 1909 and has been greatly enlarged since to its present area of 357,017ha.

Fires, often caused by lightning but sometimes lit as part of fire control programs, are frequent in the park. We question these programs, as excessive burning can adversely affect flora and fauna.

The park’s lakes fill (very occasionally) from Outlet Creek, which carries Wimmera River water from lakes Hindmarsh and Albacutya to the south when they are in flood. This last happened in 1974, and water remained in the lakes for two years, allowing river red gums and other plants to regenerate. With a warmer and drier climate, it’s uncertain whether the lakes will ever fill again.

In 2001 the Friends of Wyperfeld produced an excellent and comprehensive guidebook Wyperfeld – Australia’s first mallee national park, written by experts Geoff Durham and Leon Costermans. This is now out of print, but you can find a digital version online.

Friends groups

Friends of Wyperfeld National Park
Friends of Wyperfeld National Park

Victorian Malleefowl Recovery Group
Victorian Malleefowl Recovery Group