There’s nothing like an old fashioned swim in a watering hole and if it’s got a waterfall that's even better, that's what we found at Nethercote Falls. Combine a fresh waterhole, Aussie bush and a bit of heat you’ve got an awesome arvo in the making.

Nethercote Falls is about a 20 minute drive from the ranch, the road takes you from South Pambula up through the cattle grazing farms where it honestly looks like the bush is miles away but as you come up and down the rolling hills there’s a turnoff into state forest (which yep means it’s doggo friendly) and you’ve hit some amazing bush.

You drive down a dirt road which is 2wd friendly, then you’ll hit the carpark where there’s a few picnic tables, BBQs and toilets at the top. The road then takes you on foot down a REALLY steep hill, apparently you used to be able to drive down the hill but the road has been closed due to the rain and erosion. From what we’ve read online the whole site was closed to the public for some time due to the dangerous conditions. It seemed really safe to us when we explored out there but you need to have some level of fitness to make it back up the hill. The walk there and back seriously made us feel like we’d been at a good workout at the gym if that’s any consolation and mate beats a gym any day!

As you trek down the path, you’ll hit the Yowaka River which can be a little tricky to cross if you don’t want to get your feet wet. We managed to wrangle over some fallen logs others had put in place for passage.

Now don’t be like us and think you need to follow the river bed around, we could hear the falls but thought oh if we follow the rocky river bed around we’ll get there… umm yeah we spent way too much time trying to climb rocks to which we couldn’t get through anyway. There is a proper walking track just through the bush on the other side of the river, which we found on our second trek down.

You then follow the path through the beautiful bush, we’d recommend keeping your doggos on leads through the bush as there’s signs up that warn about baiting of the feral animals in an area wide cull effort. Eventually you’ll make it to the falls, and they’re stunning - see photos. There’s a picnic table down there so you could take lunch, or maybe have a small campfire for a cook. The day we went it was still a little cold so we didn’t go for a swim, albeit we did convince one of the dogs - Brucey!

The water is clear and fresh, there’s rock pools everywhere, flowing water and stones just soothe the soul. You could spend all day out there exploring different parts of the river, it would make an epic camp spot too but not sure campings allowed.

This one is high on the hit list! Highly recommend!

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