Mt. Donna Buang - VIC

Away from the famous locations and resorts that pinch your pocket to have fun, I looked into an infamous town to see the snow.

Located 96 kms away from Melbourne city, the Mt. Donna Buang is located ahead of the famous Yarra Valley wineries. This place is ahead of the beautiful Warburton town a passer-by’s beautiful experience of snow on the way to Lake Mountain, Mt. Baw Baw or the very famous Mt. Buller. Note, there are no snow resorts, expensive boutique experience of snow in this place. This is an experience of snow by the nature.

Preparation: - As first timers, there are longs lists of retail engagement that everyone thinks is a must for snows. However, my answer is No. Your 2 layers of jackets and a windcheater should do us good. The snows are not killing cold. A benny, a woollen scarf and hand gloves should be great from your regular closet. What is a must for this experience is a PVC flat heel boot as we call them. You can pick up the starter from Kmart for about $15-$30. Do carry tissues and hand sanitisers.

We left home at 8AM on a Sunday morning, however, I realised snow is most beautiful when fresh. An early morning start at the onset of the sunrise is the perfect time.

The Route – Melbourne City Centre –> Richmond -> Collingwood -> Exit into Eastern Freeways through M3 -> Exit to there right from the Freeway golf Course -> Koonung Reserve -> At Eastlink take the Ringwood exit and head into the Mt. Dandenong Road -> slow down to enjoy the Yarra Valley and get surprised with the beautiful ranches and Kangaroos, horses, Lambs and cows.-> Yarra Junction -> Warburton -> Warburton Holiday Park -> winding roads to the Mt. Donna Buang.

Things to see -> The Mt. Donna Buang is walk to see a handful of things. Prepare to go slow as this is a regular route and would often have a lot of cars, families and children. We stopped at the Rain-forest Gallery and parked the car around. The snow fall is very heavy here, however, the roads are slushy. Get into the gate opposite to the public toilet opposite to the Rain-forest Gallery and follow the snow path. The further you go; there is a natural hot spring and the Donna Buang observation centre. There is a picnic area as well. If you carry picnic, you can grab a bite by the snow. We stayed there for a good 2 hours.

We came downhill back into the Warburton Town centre. There are some beautiful stores like – Warburton Candy Emporium, Earth ware handmade store, Warburton bakery, the fresh Donut food truck, the tennis court and the Green festival Venue Park. We went to grab lunch at the Riverside Café and the Yarra river flowing right there in through the backyard. There were king parrots which have red wings in the tree across the street and few minutes later the lazy sun was covered by the passing cloud till it started raining hails. We sat down to enjoy the rain from across the glass doors over lunch. We grabbed a heavenly slow cooked Lamb shank, Salmon & prawn grill and some delicious coffee.

We picked up from home grown wine as well. We walked around the town, spoke with the locals to learn about their daily life and got into the car to head back. On the way back, there are a couple of organic home farms; we picked up fruits and vegetables way back. 

Let us promote the farmers and their effort to give us fresh produce. It was a beautiful all day experience of snowfall in the Victorian mountains. Yarra Valleys have my sight on for a visit during springs next.