Melba Gully Day Visitor Area

Melba Gully Day Visitor Area is a compact picnic clearing tucked into a cool temperate rainforest near Lavers Hill. It’s the start of Madsen’s Track Nature Walk, so it works as both a meal stop and a short forest walk. The 1.2 km circuit takes about 35 minutes, with a steeper finish; the walk is the reason to make time here. Tables, gas barbecues and public toilets are at the day-use area. There’s no food business listed, so bring what you want to eat; camping isn’t permitted.

Madsen’s Track loops out from the picnic area through dense ferns, mossy trees and a shaded gully, passing Anne’s Cascades before returning to the same clearing. The official guide gives the loop as 1.2 km and 35 minutes; some visitors finish faster, but don’t mistake the short distance for an entirely easy walk. The latter part gets steep and has steps, and visitors report wet or muddy footing. You can turn back if the rougher section isn’t for you.

Glow worms are another reason to visit: they can be seen on the damp gully banks at several points along the track after dark, though sightings aren’t guaranteed. Keep your torch pointed down, stay on the path and walk quietly, and don’t touch them. It can be very dark here, and phone reception may be absent, so bring a torch and plan the walk before you set off.

The deep green comes from a very wet setting: Melba Gully is described as one of Victoria’s wettest places. Look for myrtle beech, blackwood, tree ferns and moss in the cool, shaded gully. The small rainforest pocket survived extensive Otways logging, and Melba Gully was protected as a state park in 1978; it’s now part of Great Otway National Park.

Before this was a rainforest walking stop, Jessie Fry opened tea rooms here in 1921 and named Melba Gully for singer Dame Nellie Melba. Visitors came by bus through the 1930s and ’40s, until road limits on bus lengths ended the tea-room business in 1948. The Madsen family later offered the property to the Victorian Conservation Trust in 1975, and the walking track carries their name.