Wildwalks is a online library with the aim of helping more people get out and safely enjoy the many great bushwalks and camping opportunities in Australia.  It does not matter if you are new to bushwalking or experienced, there is something here for everyone. 

Wildwalks is developed by small group of people who are passionate about the outdoors.  We want to encourage people to “get out there” and enjoy the great places Australia has to offer. 

Our goal is build a massive database of all the key bushwalking tracks from around Australia.  I am conscious we are a long way from there now, but over the next few years I hope to grow this site.

We are committed to supporting businesses and organisation with similar goals.  Wildwalks just provides information, there are many other hard working people out there who build, maintain and support these tracks and campsites.

We currently get about 280 people looking at 1500 articles a day.

I get many e-mails from people asking how to help out (thanks); here are a few idea.

1. Use our website, maps and notes, get out there and enjoy it.
2. Let us know how things go, use out feedback section at the end of each article.
3. Tell people about the site and what we are doing.
4. Sign up to the site, and tell me a little about yourself, I can also send you a newsletter
   In time and I get more organised I hope to include other ways you can help.

We hope to attract some funding over the next few months, once we do I think you will see Wildwalks grow bigger, better and faster.

A few FAQ's

1) Should I still carry a traditional topographical Map?

YES. I recomened that you still have atleast one set of maps that cover an area, the maps provided by wildwalks cover just the walk, and are limited help in case of emeragncy change in plans.

2) Can I print the notes and maps?

YES. Use the PDF button to generate a nice printable version with a much better map what what is the webpage.

3) Can I print copies for my fellow walkers?

YES. I think that everyone in the walking group should have a copy, please print as many as you want.

4) Can I use the notes and maps for my School, Club or Commercial group.

YES. Again I think that every one should have a copy of the map at the very least, Please to not change or trim the note to hide logo etc.

5) What if I think something is wrong?

Please use the user feedback in each article to let us know how we can improve things, we really love feedback. We know the notes are not perfect, we try hard so please let us know how we can do better.

6) Can I suggest a walk to be included?

YES.  Our goal is to grow and build lots more walks.  I plan to add a "suggest / vote for a walk page" but until then e-mail me your thoughts.  If you want variations on existing walks, please also let me know, we can usually turn those around quickly.  I hope by the end of the year we will also have a very cool "reverse" this walk feature, so that if you want to do the walk the other way round, it will be easy (the map and the tracknotes will be changed as if it was meant to be like that).

7)  Can I download the walk to my GPS?

Not Yet.  We are working on this, We have the data and the technology, but there are a few issues with it at this stage. Firstly we have a problem with people stealing info from our website and putting it up on there own, and this just makes that to easy for them (this data costs us a lot of money to produce, I am happy for people to use it for free, but not to claim it as there own and have no plans to maintain it.) Secondly there are some social/safety issues on using GPS for bushwalks.  I am keen to address these issues and get this GPS data to you sooner then later.

8) Can I view the walks in Google Earth?

Not Yet.  For similar reasons to faq 7, but I hope to resolve this one sooner.  We are playing with this and just to tease you, it is pretty cool.  Once we release this you will be able to do virtual fly overs or all the walks, view the sat image and topomaps, see the photos in the place they were taken and a few other cool things.

9) How can I search for walks on Wildwalks?

Yeah this needs work.  We now have over 250 walks in the greater Sydney area, we hope to have about 500 walks in NSW by the end of the year.  This is a lot of walks and campsites.  We are working on a pretty cool system of search tools to make it easy to find walks that you are interested in.  You will soon be able search on things like distance from home, dificulty, distance, time.  You will be able to search by both text and by a series of visual maps.  It should help a lot.  In time we also hope to add other search criteria like, what animals you are likely to see, the average temperatre range, recent rainfall, and a bunch of other weird things that people use to decide which walks they would like.  Oh yeah and of course a walk rating system based on what you say.

Thanks for your interest

Matt  :)