Three female hikers at Bald Hill Lookout in Wollongong, New South Wales, August 8, 1932.
Image credit: National Library of Australia

Bushwalking is a popular pastime for most Australians, but there was a time when women were not allowed to go on these hikes – until some pioneers decided to take a hike.

Many Australians find themselves drawn to exploring the bush on foot. Bushwalking offers a chance to escape the city, build friendships, explore beautiful landscapes and keep our bodies and spirits healthy.

But hiking trails haven’t always been a place where women felt welcome.

In the 1920s and 1930s, some people scoffed at the idea that women could cope with difficult encounters with nature. The bush was considered a place reserved for men.

Furthermore, how could women navigate rocky paths and steep hills with their long skirts and delicate shoes?

But a few brave women marched anyway. The Melbourne Women’s Walking Club was established in 1922 and was the first of its kind in Australia.

Women were criticized and sometimes harassed, especially when they experimented with wearing pants or even shorts.

But the women found comfort in friendship and a shared love of nature. New search highlights the stories of these remarkable women.

The birth of a movement

First Nations people have roamed the Australian landscape for thousands of years. Recreational walking in Europe dates back to the first settlers, although the word “bush walking” was coined much later.

As an Australian academic Melissa Harper showedwalking became a more popular pastime in the early 1900s. A number of men-only clubs sprung up, but women were excluded from them – only on National Day ladies that they were allowed to walk with the men.

In 1922, a group of women decided to start their own walking club – and the Melbourne Women’s Walking Club was born. Women defied societal expectations by bushwalking across Victoria and beyond – sometimes for weeks.

The annual program offered between 30 and 40 walks suitable for a wide range of abilities, as well as a busy calendar of other social events.

Take a hike with the Melbourne Women’s Walking Club

At a time when most women did not have access to a car, club members usually met at Flinders Street Station and then took a train to the start of their hike. Hiking destinations included Wilson’s Promontory, the You Yangs, Phillip Island, the Grampians, Anglesea and Mount Buller.

In the early years of the club, women would wait until they were in the bush, out of the public eye, before taking off their voluminous skirts and donning jodhpurs. In the 1930s, some women even wore shorts.

The women carried a common cart and took meals seriously. For a walking weekend, each woman’s recommended packing list included:

• creamed rice
• stew and precooked vegetables
• canned pineapple and cream
• grapefruit
• eggs and bacon
• steak to grill on the campfire
• six teaspoons of tea
• four teaspoons of coffee
• two crumpets (for Sunday tea)

Women carried homemade sleeping bags for overnight or multi-day walks. Sometimes pack horses joined the journey.

On caravan trips, such as the one depicted in the image above, women were driven into the bush in a specially fitted open van.

Difficult journeys

Not all of the Melbourne Women’s Walking Club’s trips have gone exactly as planned.

Club member Margery Luth recounted in the club journal a particularly difficult walk to Mount Buller in 1938. As they were walking, a hailstorm struck. They stopped overnight to sleep in a shed, but the roof leaked and water flooded. On the way back, the bus broke down and had an accident. Luth, however, found the trip “really enjoyable” and wrote lyrically about observing the bush after dark:

It was a heavenly night (…) all the beauty of the bush was visible, the feathery foliage of the barbels, the shine of the gum leaves, the intertwining of tree ferns and the tangle of the undergrowth.

On another walk in December 1928, a group got lost for two days on the high plains of Bogong in the terrible December heat. Their food supplies dwindled and they ran out of water. The women eventually found shelter for the night in a walkers’ hut, where a woman photographed the group with a big smile.

And tragically, during a bushwalk in 1937, a club member died following an accident. Olivier Sandella young worker at Melbourne Children’s Hospital, fell and hit her head while hiking in the Cathedral Ranges. She died surrounded by her walking companions.

For some women, even getting to the track was a challenge. For example, one new mother, writing in the club journal, expressed how much she missed her hiking friends and joked about starting a “rival walking club” consisting of herself, her toddler. little one and his dog.

Marriage and domestic responsibilities could also prevent women from walking. In 1936, the newspaper’s editor-in-chief spoke of the impending marriage of a club member and expressed her hope that the future husband would not force his wife to “give up tripping with the troops to keep him in holeless socks and juicy steaks! »

A controversial hobby

Members of the Melbourne Women’s Walking Club enjoyed their time in the bush. They formed strong friendships, laughed and sang together. They rejoiced in escaping their domestic responsibilities and the hustle and bustle and pollution of city life.

During a sweltering trip to the high plains of Bogong in 1928, a friendly farmer offered walkers a chance to bathe in his dam. The women only had one pair of bathers between them, but they found a solution: a walker carried the bathers and jumped into the dam, and when submerged in the water, she wriggled out of the bathers. bathers and threw them to the next one. -be a swimmer, etc. The women’s written accounts express their joy at this little shared scandal.

While some observers welcomed women’s disregard for convention, others were very critical.

In a 1932 newspaper article, the Archbishop of Brisbane, James Duhig, described women who walk in the bush in men’s clothing as “absolutely nauseating“. He warned that wearing pants could encourage risk-taking:

I know that young girls dressed as men went places they would never venture in their proper attire.

Other critics have accused women of being attention-seekers or simply following a fashion.

Women often attracted unwanted attention and lewd comments, especially when taking public transportation at the start of each walk. They felt relieved at the start of the hike, safe with friends and away from judgment.

True pioneers

The Melbourne Women’s Walking Club was the first of its kind in Australia. But other women of the time also took their place on the hiking trail. They included Jessie Luckman from Tasmania, Marie Byles and Dot Butler from New South Wales, and Alice Manfield, who led guided walks on Mount Buffalo in Victoria.

Thanks in part to the daring of early bushwalkers, it is no longer controversial for women to walk without chaperones or wear shorts.

But that doesn’t mean women still don’t do it face discrimination And security threats in outdoor spaces. There is still a way to go before everyone feels welcome and safe in Australia’s great outdoors.

Many members of the Melbourne Women’s Walking Club have become committed conservationists. Many of them have played a vital role in advocating for the protection of the natural spaces we enjoy today.

For example, Jean Blackburn, an enthusiastic member of the club from 1934 until her death in 1983, played a leading role in the creation of national parks in Victoria.

The club survived the tensions of the Second World War and a decline in membership in the 1950s. Today, more than 100 years after its founding, the Melbourne Women’s Walking Club is still going strong. In fact, it now has the largest number of members on record.

So next time you’re out hiking, think about the extraordinary Australian women who fought for their place on the hiking trail and paved the way for generations to come.

Ruby Ekkel is a doctoral student at the Australian National University.

Special thanks to Sheila Hirst of the Melbourne Women’s Walking Club for providing archive footage. Images adapted from Melbourne Women’s Walking Club Archives at the State Library of Victoria, the book MWWC Still on track: 100 years of the Melbourne Women’s Walking Club 2021, Climb after lunch: the Melbourne Women’s Walking Club 1922-1985 and the National Library of Australia.

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