GREAT OCEAN WALK

7 or 8 Day Walk

You can choose to walk the Great Ocean Walk by splitting the trail up into different combinations of day walks, or it can be done in it’s entirety either as a 7 or 8-day walk, and which you choose may depend on whether you are camping and carrying a heavy pack or doing the walk with support. We have listed it as a 7-day walk but you can also walk it over 8 days using the routes and hike-in campsites and distances listed below.

Bear in mind that there are other drive-in campsites at Blanket Bay, Aire River,  Johanna and Princetown so you can alter the day’s walks according to whether you have a  support vehicle or are using off-track accommodation.

Maps & route planning

It is highly recommended that all walkers buy a map to help plan their route and carry one with them once on the Great Ocean Walk. 

Whilst the trail itself is reasonably well marked there are a few points at which a map is invaluable to make sense of the listed trails, particularly on Day 2 in the Otways forest, and of the low- and high-level options on sections that are tide-dependent. Maps also are vital in the event of having to exit the trail unexpectedly – you’ll need to get your bearings and perhaps work out where the nearest road or shelter is. The definitive map for the Great Ocean Walk is the one shown below, which is a detailed topographic map on a 1:25,000 scale and shows all the surrounding area and useful route notes and information on campsites, altitude profiles, etc. They can be purchased locally in shops and information centres but this should not be relied on as they often run out of stock. For more information on maps, click here.

You can usually purchase the detailed GOW map from the visitor centre in Apollo Bay or the local newsagents there or try your local map store.