Koorawatha Falls

Just a short drive off the Olympic Highway at Koorawatha, a tiny village in Central West NSW you will find the picturesque Koorawatha Falls. These falls are well known to locals of the area, but not so well known to passers by. They are most definitely at their best when there has been some considerable rainfall.

In the past few days, the area around Koorawatha has experienced excellent rainfall so we were confident that the falls would be looking pretty good when we decided to head out there.

LOCATION

Koorawatha is located just over 27 kilometres from Cowra or 42 kilometres from Young. Koorawatha Falls are about a 4.4 kilometre drive from the highway down Boorowa Street and then onto Falls Road. The Koorawatha Falls are located within the Koorawatha Nature Reserve.

GETTING TO THE FALLS

During the dry, it is not uncommon for there to be little or no water coming over the falls. However when there has been substantial rain, it’s a very different story. This in turn makes the track into the falls a little more difficult to navigate.

The first obstacle you will encounter is a concrete causeway at the end of Boorowa Street. There was a reasonable amount of water flowing over this and the exit was slightly washed out but our BT50 went through it easily.

From here, the track is single lane, although there are plenty of spots to pull off if you encounter another vehicle. There are also a couple of side tracks that navigate around more difficult spots.

^{The track into the falls was rough and rocky in places.}

In many spots, there were sections of track that had medium to deep washouts, but most of these were solid gravel. In other places there were deep and large pools of water, some covering the entire track. The bottoms of these were unexpectedly solid.

^{This puddle wasn’t as deep as some of the others.}

We were able to navigate most of the track using just high range and only needed to switch into low range for a couple of sections.

KOORAWATHA WEIR

On the way into Koorawatha Falls you will come across Koorawatha Weir. This weir was built across Bang Bang Creek in 1913 to supply water to the railway. The water flowed through wooden pipes from the weir to the station. Sections of these pipes can still be seen laying along the side of the creek.

Once we got to the weir, we parked the BT50 and walked the rest of the way. There were tyre tracks in, but they weren’t on the designated track. The walk was only about 700 metres, but it was wet, slippery and muddy so care needs to be taken if visiting in these conditions.

Once there though, the view of the falls is just spectacular. The colours of the rocks and the surrounding bush was just stunning.

Koorawatha Falls - a hidden gem of the Central West — *^{Downstream of the falls the old pipe work can be seen laying on the far bank.}*

If you are visiting the area after good rainfall, we highly recommend taking the time to visit the Falls. Especially if you like a little bit of a four-wheel drive adventure. It really is a beautiful, hidden gem.