Australia is an excellent walking country. There are a number of reasons why this may come as a surprise; the principle one being that the stereotypical view most outsiders have of Oz as being a landscape of flat, murderously hot nothingness with bongly names, a big red rock in the middle, something colourful under the sea to the east and a melee of imaginatively lethal creepy crawlies every few yards. To a certain extent all of these are true, but as Australia is a land of almost unimaginable scale (the sixth largest country in the world, its largest island and home to one of the lowest population densities anywhere) with a huge climatic range, it is a place where you will find all of the variety such dimensions suggest - and plenty of it. 'Bushwalking' - which is the general term for hiking in Australia - falls into a number of different styles, from decidedly moist rainforest walks to bone-arid desert tramps, which much in between. Another surprise to greet the walker is that there are mountains here, and reasonable ones too. The south-eastern segment of Australia – New South Wales and eastern Victoria – is home to the highest peaks of the Great Dividing Range, which span most of the east (it's tempting to say 'east coast', but on a UK scale they are well and truly inland) the highest of which is Mt Kosciuszko, which sits in its namesake national park at a not insignificant 2228m. These mountains, like most of Australia's physiology, are pretty unique, having been eroded from a much grander range built from volcanic rock into river-valleys, gorges, table-top mountains and - in the higher reaches, Alpine vegetation and glacial lakes beneath fairly benign mountains which are high enough to catch ski-able snow in the winter. To say that nothing is convenient in Australia would be unfair, but prepare yourself for a lot of road-time wherever you go: if you want to explore these highest mountains, the best base is the town of Jindabyne, where you can access numerous trails that will allow you to cover Mt Kosciuszko as part of a number of circuits of varying length. There is even a chairlift from the village of Thredbo up onto the main ridge. If you are used to fellwalking in Britain, you will find little to worry you other than the added height, which will only affect those who are very sensitive to altitude. Also hereabouts is the Jagungal Wilderness Area, The Kerries, Cooleman Caves (a limestone plateau with many distractions which is particularly excellent). Victoria and Tasmania – being in the southernmost part of the country – is wild and windswept, with ragged coastline, Alpine National Park (hardly France but very impressive) where a string of peaks nudging 2,000m form the crest of the Victorian Alps, including Mt Bogong (1986m) and Mt Feathertop (1922m).  Both can be linked in a walk in the Bogong unit of the Alpine National Park. Other areas for bushwalking in Victoria include the pleasingly named Wonnangatta-Moroka Unit of Alpine National Park, Wilson’s Promontory in the south of the state, and the Grampians – low, impressively mangled sandstone mountains – in the west. Tasmania harbors Australia’s famous Overland Track, which includes Cradle Mountain and the wild upland of Australia’s prickly offspring, and is well worth a visit as it throws yet another unique spin on an already distinctive country. Queensland is rainforest territory, with Cairns the natural base for excursions inland and to Hinchinbrook Island, a Jurassic Park of mangroves, mountains and tropical waterfalls. If you are flying into the West – which few will, simply given the density of attractions to the east – there is still much for the walker, though what there is is ferociously remote: the Stirling Ranges, near the remote town of Albany on the south-west coast, is a dramatic and biologically important range of arresting mountains. Further north lies the Pilbara, an arid region of bleak beauty which is mostly visited for industry, while in the North, the legendary Arnhem Land is crocodile central. If you’re looking for a good base to explore a range of attractions, fly to Sydney and take it from there.