Alpine Way

Scenic road chapters

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Jindabyne

   Jindabyne has an odd secret: the town you drive through is not the original one. The old Jindabyne lies underwater beneath Lake Jindabyne, drowned in the 1960s when the Snowy Mountains Scheme dammed the Snowy River, and the whole community was moved uphill to its present spot. On a very dry year when the lake falls, you can sometimes see the old bridge piers. The lake itself is now the town's centrepiece, a big, blue, cold sheet of water backed by the Snowy Mountains and used for trout fishing, sailing and sitting on a bench with a pie.

   Read the complete Jindabyne write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Jindabyne is where the day begins. Next is Thredbo.

2. 2. Thredbo

   Thredbo is a ski village tucked into the upper valley of the Thredbo River in the Snowy Mountains of New South Wales, and in summer it has the slightly stunned air of a place waiting for snow. The chalets are built steeply on the hillside, the lifts stand idle, and the main street is quiet until the mountain bikers arrive. It sits inside Kosciuszko National Park, and Mount Kosciuszko itself, at 2,228 metres the highest mountain in Australia, is only a few kilometres away on foot.

   Read the complete Thredbo write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Thredbo comes up about 179 km into the recorded legs. Next is Dead Horse Gap.

3. 3. Dead Horse Gap

   Dead Horse Gap is a saddle on the Alpine Way, high in the Snowy Mountains, where the road crests the ridge between the Thredbo valley and the country that drains toward the Murray. At about 1,580 metres it is the highest point on this road, and it feels like the edge of something. The trees thin out, the snow gums are bent and silvery, and the wind arrives straight from the Southern Ocean with very little to slow it.

   Read the complete Dead Horse Gap write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   about 204 km into the recorded legs you reach Dead Horse Gap. Nothing on this route is higher. Next is Khancoban, mostly downhill.

4. 4. Khancoban

   Khancoban is a town built for a purpose and still faintly wearing it. It was created in the 1950s to house the workers of the Snowy Mountains Scheme, the vast hydroelectric project that diverted rivers through the mountains and employed tens of thousands, many of them migrants from Europe. Today it is a small, tidy place on the western side of the range, close to the Murray River and the Khancoban Pondage, with a population of only a few hundred. It has what a rider needs, a pub, a shop, a place to eat and a few beds, but not much more, and the larger town of Corryong lies about twenty kilometres further west over the border in Victoria.

   Read the complete Khancoban write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Khancoban closes the day.