The hike with new, purpose-built trails makes it easier to access Kosciuszko’s venerated landscape and allows a deeper connection to this majestic country

The kids trooped up the hill towards a snowdrift, silhouetted by a massive blue sky. In the summer heat, it was hard to believe that the snow was still there, that it wasn’t just a mirage of wishful thinking lying beside the track to Australia’s highest peak.

But the white stuff was real: our mob of eight skid and slid, ran back down the slope in a flurry of snowballs. We were halfway along the 22-kilometre Main Range loop, the longest day of the Snowies Alpine Walk, but the kids’ energy was as long-lasting as the snow, as impressive as the sweeping views over rounded mountains, down cliffs and ridges towards Victoria.