Walking Trails Support Group

Our work is rather different from that of other Friends groups who focus on one or two parks. WTSG has done trail work in 12 conservation areas over a period of 20 years.

Our small membership (about 30) has developed about 200 km of walking track on public, leasehold and private land.

This walking track system is now maintained on an annual basis, by members and friends. Pedestrian counters are maintained in the Barossa region.

There is skill in developing walking tracks that do not erode and make for low maintenance and low liability problems. Our Walking Track Handbook, distils and embodies the experience and advice gleaned in this field over many years. We give advice to any who seek it and the Handbook is free.

Our message is 'Work with the landscape – people don’t need tracks, but the land does'.

• Our main aim is to provide sustainable and low-risk walking access in interesting natural areas. We have focused on a number of parks in the Flinders Ranges and Barossa regions.
• A second aim is to provide walkers with information about the landscape they are walking through. Distance markers provide a fix for items described in leaflets, which are made available at trailheads. All our country has stories to tell, whether geological, Aboriginal, flora and fauna or settlement history. It all adds to the experience. Each trailhead has a leaflet dispenser.
• A third aim is to encourage an increase in our membership; the maintenance work is simple, can be vigorous and but is always undertaken in nice places. And maybe in places you haven’t been to before. Membership is a mere $5.00 per annum.