What to Do and See in the Southern Highlands, New South Wales, Australia – Unique Experiences with the Southern Highland Trike Tours
24 October, 2014The Southern Highlands is known for its picturesque towns like Berrima, historic mansions and public buildings. The Highlands is also a popular weekend getaway where one can get in touch with nature and relax among the gentle green hills of the Southern Highlands and enjoy the cool climate.
The Highlands is worth visiting all year round. Spring is tulip time while summer has fragrant roses and autumn, flowering bulbs. Bowral Tulip Festival runs from the end of September until early October; the Autumn Garden Festival is held in May.
Shopping and Dining at Berrima Village
Our first stop at the Southern Highlands was the charming little village of Berrima. Established in 1831, it is the only example of an existing and largely preserved Australian Georgian colonial town left in Australia. Today, Berrima Village is a living museum with dozens of art & crafts, antiques and souvenir shops – there is also a number of small cafes and restaurants. The famous Eschalot restaurant is also located at Berrima Village. Berrima village is most busy during weekends and public as well as school holidays – most shops will also be open during those period.
Some local shops and galleries worth checking out at Berrima includes the Bay Tree Gallery, the Brown Shutter, the Berrima General Store. Mrs Oldbucks Pantry and Mrs Oldbucks Corner.
Exploring the Southern Highlands with the Southern Highlands Trike Tour
Before the trip to Australia, we had thought of the Southern Highlands as a quiet little area with not much exciting things to do and see. So I was pleasantly surprised with the Southern Highlands Trike Tour run by John Ford. A trike is a three-wheeled motorcycle – just think of a tricycle but much bigger and motorised – think **vroom vroom**! This trike is huge and I have never seen anything like this before – according to John, this is a German engineered trike powered by a 1.6 litre Ford engine.
Unlike typical tour buses or cars, your views while on this unique Southern Highlands Trike Tour is unobstructed – no blurry windows to bother with but this also means you are exposed to the elements – wind, rain, sun. Luckily, John provides each guests with an approved Australian Standards Safety helmet fitted with high tech 3 way communications so you can communicate with John and vice versa throughout the journey. All guests are also provided with suitable climate clothing – for example, we visited the Southern Highlands during spring season when it was still a bit chilly and rainy, John outfitted us with layers of thermal wear, windbreaker and gloves – just see how bundled up we were in the picture below! John shared with us that during summer in the Southern Highlands, guests can even experience the Southern Highlands Trike Tour in just Tshirt and shorts!
One thing you can be sure of while on John’s Southern Highlands Trike Tour is that he will help you to take lots of pictures and there are a lot of photo stops and you can request for any along the way. Having being bundled in comfortable thermal wear, I didn’t quite want to get off the trike to take photos – no problem, just stay put in your comfy trike seat and John will take photos of you with the background be it green pastures or interesting signboards!
We went on a Scenic Trike Cruise where we cruised through the beautiful picturesque country side, felt and smelled the country air as our trike wound its way through the open roads – we went deep into the Highlands off the beaten track and seen a lot of things that visitors to the Southern Highlands don’t usually see e.g. large herds of cows, one of the Highlands’ famous pancake shops and the beautiful countryside. We even had a stop to get some hot chocolate and coffee at one of Southern Highlands’ towns -Burrawang. It was an excellent experience as we learned a lot more about the Highlands – its history and fun facts about the place.
John runs different tours tailored to his guests’ needs e.g. if wine tasting is your thing, you can always go on a winery and tasting Southern Highlands Trike Tour. If you want to see nature, ask John to bring you on a Southern Highlands trike tour of the beautiful Kangaroo Valley and see the majestic Fitzroy Falls! Get in touch with John at http://www.highlandtriketours.com.au/trike-tours/book-now/ for more info.
Prices for the Southern Highlands Trike Tour starts from AU$120 for 2 pax for the Scenic Trike Cruise and goes upwards of AU$420 for 2 pax for a trike tour of the Kangaroo Valley and Fitzroy Falls.
This is a video preview of what the Southern Highlands Trike Tour experience is like:
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Short video of our Southern Highlands Trike Tour with @highlandtriketours – driving though countryside and Bowaral town!
Shopping at Bowral
Bowral is now the commercial and retail centre of the Southern Highlands. Here along the main street – Bong Bong Street, you find many historic public and private buildings, accommodation houses, boutiques, coffee shops, and restaurants. My favourite shop has to be the Dirty Janes Emporium – a large warehouse collection of antiques from all around the world. 
I like how Dirty Janes Emporium is run – there are lots of displays of antiques from different seller gathered in a huge warehouse but the sellers ain’t there. There is a central cashier who manages all transactions so you can take your time to browse and not bother with hard selling or bossy sellers. Take all the pictures you want here! 
This is a short video clip of a display of World War II memorabilia which I found very interesting:
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Collection of war memorabilia and old coins at Dirty Janes Emporium @dirtyjanesmkt #dirtyjanes #bowral #NewSouthWales @visitnsw View on Instagram
Another interesting gallery to check out is the Milk Factory Gallery where you get to see artwork and interesting sculptures (as shown in the picture below) – no photography is allowed within the gallery though. I also recommend the Rabbit Trap and Babilonia – interesting boutiques to check out.
This is what the main street of Bowral – Bong Bong Street looks like – no skyscrapers and very tall buildings – the town still retains its rustic charm with its old historic buildings.
Experiencing the Fitzroy Falls
When in the Southern Highlands, you must not miss the Fitzroy Falls – this is a spectacular waterfall – even more impressive than the waterfalls of Jeju island which we visited earlier this year. See for yourself in the video below. What I like about Fitzroy Falls besides its beauty is its accessibility, usually such great natural sights are very far from the tourist centre entrance but Fitzroy Falls is just an easy 5 minute walk from the entrance (free entry)!
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