Kosciuszko National Park
Kosciuszko is one of the best known and best loved national parks in Australia, attracting around three million visitors each year. The park is name after Mount Kosciuszko, which at 2228 metres is Australia's highest mountain. The park is approximately 150 kilometres in length, running from the Victorian border to the west of the ACT's Namadgi National Park. At 690 000 hectares it is the largest park in New South Wales and the Australian Alps.
Recreation
There are many recreational opportunities available in Kosciuszko that allow visitors to enjoy the spectacular mountain scenery. These range from activities around the developed resort areas through to self reliant recreation in the wilderness.
Roads winding through the mountains and across wide open plains offer a variety of driving experiences for cars, coaches, motor-homes and motorbikes.
The various walking tracks will take you past crystal clear streams, glacial lakes, deep gorges, high peaks, historic huts and other culturally significant sites. There are also many scenic camping sites with basic facilities. For details, free publications are available at the visitor centres.
Scenic management trails open to cyclists run through most areas of the park. Do not follow these trails onto private property without permission.
All New South Wales alpine resorts are within Kosciuszko National Park. In winter, many visitors head for the resorts of Perisher Blue, Charlotte Pass, Thredbo and Mt Selwyn for snowplay and a variety of snowsports.
Other activities that visitors can enjoy include guided walks, rafting, canoeing, kayaking and mountaineering adventures.
National Parks and Wildlife Service visitor centres provide up-to-date information. There are free displays and activities as well as a range of books, maps, postcards and other souvenirs. Park use fees apply in many sections of the park. Nearby visitor centres include Snowy Region Visitor Centre in Jindabyne, Tumut Region Visitor Centre, Khancoban Information Centre and Yarrangobilly Caves Visitor Centre.
Cultural heritage
Aboriginal people lived on the plains, river valleys and foothills of the mountains for tens of thousands of years. On the highest mountains, important spiritual ceremonies were attended by groups from south-east New South Wales, north-east Victoria and west of the mountains.
The mountains also form an important part of a complex network of ceremonial, song and story lines which run across the country. While the whole of the landscape is important to Aboriginal people, areas within Kosciuszko continue to have special significance.
Following European exploration, Aboriginal people continued to live and work in the mountains. They worked with the graziers, miners loggers and dambuilders that came to the area. Many sites throughout the park remind us of this rich history of human occupation and use.
Plants
The park contains six wilderness areas covering about 300,000 hectares — the Byadbo, Pilot, Jagungal, Bogong Peaks, Goobarragandra and Bimberi wilderness areas. Its alpine and sub-alpine areas contain rare plant species found nowhere else in the world.
The vegetation varies from herbfields of snow grass and and snow daisies, heaths, feldmarks (consisting of bare, stony ground between plants), and alpine bogs.
Animals
The park is home to rare animal species. The mountain pygmy possum Burramys parvus was thought to be extinct until 1966. The possum is only found in Kosciuszko National Park above 1500 metres and in the high country of Victoria. The southern corroboree frog Pseudophryne corroboree is found in the park's alpine sphagnum bogs .
Geology and geomorphology
One of the parks interesting geological features is Yarrangobilly Caves. Yarrangobilly Caves are a string of caves in a limestone belt approximately 1.5 kilometres wide and 14 kilometres long. The limestone was formed about 440 million years ago from the shells and skeletons of sea animals, before the whole area was uplifted 1200 m above sea level about 40 million years ago.
Yarrangobilly Caves are 4.7 kilometres from the Snowy Mountains Highway, 77 kilometres from Tumut.
The park also contains all of NSW's glacial features. Glaciation was not extensive in the Australian Alps and is not known in Victoria. Cirques and moraines are only found at the highest elevations in NSW on the south-east facing slopes of the Main Range. Club Lake and Blue Lake are cirque lakes; Lake Albina, Lake Cootapatamba and Hedley Tarn were formed by moraine deposits.
More information about Kosciuszko National Park
New South Wales National Parks and Wildlife Service
Snowy Mountains Region
Kosciuszko Road
Jindabyne, NSW Australia
Phone: +61 2 6450 5555
Website: www.npws.nsw.gov.au/parks/south/sou015.html
Snowy Region Visitor Centre
Kosciuszko Road
Jindabyne, NSW 2627
Phone: +61 2 6450 5600
Fax: +61 2 6456 1249
Email: srvc@npws.nsw.gov.au
Website: www.npws.nsw.gov.au/services/retailsn.html
Kosciuszko Education Centre
Sawpit Creek
Kosciuszko Road
Jindabyne, NSW 2627
Phone: +61 2 6450 5666
Fax: +61 2 6456 2324
Email: pat.darlington@npws.nsw.gov.au
Tumut Visitor Centre
7 Adelong Road
Tumut, NSW 2720
Phone: +61 2 6947 7025
Fax: +61 2 6947 3752
Website: www.npws.nsw.gov.au/services/retailsn.html#tumutvc
Skiing information
Sno-Info
Welcome to Thredbo
Perisher Blue Ski Resort Page
The Australian Bureau of Meteorology Up to date information including charts and satellite images.