The bid to create a world-class Yarra trek, from river mouth to near mountain source

A 13-day hiking trail is being planned along the length of the Yarra River, snaking from the sands of Williamstown Beach to the pristine source of the city’s drinking water at the lip of the Upper Yarra dam.

The 220-kilometre trail, scheduled to open in 2029, is being promoted as Victoria’s answer to the Camino, the legendary pilgrimage walk to Santiago in Spain.

The tourist trail is being developed in partnership with the Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung Aboriginal Heritage Corporation and will champion First Nations connections to the river. It will be called the Birrarung Valley Walk, taking its name from the Woi-wurrung language name for the river, which loosely translates to “river of mists”.

It will also celebrate the river’s environmental values and its influence on post-colonial art and architecture, say the walk’s proponents, environmental organisation Birrarung Valley Walk Inc.

The trail has been designed in 13 daily stages of between 12 and 22 kilometres, with accommodation available at the end of each day’s journey.

Beginning at the river’s estuary in Williamstown, the walk passes through the Royal Botanic Gardens and Heide Museum of Modern Art, winds through Warrandyte to the hill towns of Healesville and Warburton, and ascends along mountain ash forest trails to its final leg in the Yarra Ranges.

“It’s pretty unique. We’ve looked all around the world. We haven’t been able to find any other walks in a major capital city that go along its major river to its source,” Birrarung Valley Walk chief executive Nichola Lefroy said.

The trail development has been co-led by Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung elders, and it is hoped it will create career pathways for a unit of river rangers using Indigenous knowledge and practice to restore the river corridor to ecological health.

Elder and walk director Aunty Alice Kolasa, said the river “is alive and has a voice”.

“Walking beside her, she speaks the stories of our ancestors held in our songlines to protect Country.”

Kolasa said it was important to visit and respect the site.

“It’s more than a river. She tells the story of memories past, until now. Our creator formed her and Melbourne grew up on the banks of Birrarung. She’s mighty.”

Though trails already exist along most of the Yarra River corridor, there are multiple missing links – mainly in the foothills north-east of Melbourne – which will need to be connected. About 15 per cent of the proposed trail is either unbuilt or closed to the public.

The project requires $5.1 million in funding, including $2.3 million for trail construction.

The walk’s proponents have commissioned economic modelling by MCa Modelling and Analysis, which forecasts it will be used by between 210,000 and 240,000 people within its first 10 years, and generate $374 million in spending – of which $136 million will be influenced by First Nations tourism.

Birrarung Valley Walk director Chris Chesterfield, a professor of practice at Monash University’s Sustainable Development Institute and former waterways manager at Melbourne Water, said impetus for the walk grew during the COVID years, when thousands of locked-down Melburnians connected with the city’s rivers and creek corridors.

Chesterfield said the walk was designed to be attempted either in one 13-day adventure, or in smaller sections over time, “exploring the unique nature of the Birrarung, its billions of years of history before humankind, its tens of thousands of years of relationship with Aboriginal people, and its more recent influence on the development of Melbourne since European colonisation.

“Hopefully it will become for Melburnians, and maybe for more Australians, something that becomes one of those life goals. If you’re a Melburnian you should walk the Yarra,” Chesterfield said.

Multiple state and local government agencies have been involved in planning the proposed trail, including the Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action, Melbourne Water, Parks Victoria, and the nine councils the trail would pass through.

Professor John Thwaites, a former deputy premier and minister for the environment and water in the Bracks and Brumby Labor governments, chairs the steering committee for the project.

He said Melbourne’s relationship with the Yarra had improved since the days when the city turned its back to its major river.

“People used to joke about the Yarra. Now it’s seen as the heart of Melbourne, and so this is a chance to get people even closer to the river in spots that they haven’t experienced before,” Thwaites said.

“It’s hard sometimes to get people to sufficiently respect the environment, but people protect what they know, and if we have more people doing this walk, I’m sure we’ll have more people caring for the river.”

The trail will be self-guided, with walkers able to use an app that will carry Woi-wurrung language, elder-recorded stories, and cultural knowledge across the whole route. The app will also include a feature for walkers to report environmental damage such as dumped rubbish, weed outbreaks and pest animals.

Melbourne Water executive general manager Matthew Daley said the corporation was working through the next stage of planning to define the route, clear pathways and make sure the proposal protected the river and drinking water supply while enabling community use.

One missing link in the trail, where the river runs through private land between Mount Lofty and Yarra Glen, has proved too difficult to bridge, meaning walkers will need to be transferred to Lilydale by vehicle before resuming their hike.

The walk will conclude at Upper Yarra Reservoir, near the ultimate source of the Yarra. The source is within Melbourne’s water catchments and public access is prohibited.

The Birrarung Valley Walk will be announced at Heide Museum of Modern Art on Monday.