Erica MTB Park

Overview

Erica MTB Park is a free, state-forest mountain bike network laid out across two trailheads on either side of the small timber town of Erica, in central Gippsland's Baw Baw Shire. The Eastern trailhead at Mill Park (500 m from town) carries mostly blue-graded XC singletrack threading tall mountain ash and fern gullies, while the Western trailhead at Collins Siding (~1 km south of Erica) hosts the harder all-mountain lines — most notably the 3 km black-diamond Winch Line, which can be lapped via a 5-minute Telbit Road shuttle (or pedalled back in ~20 min via the Tyers Junction Rail Trail).

Sources differ on the headline number: Gippsland MTB Club lists six park trails for ~18 km of singletrack, the Bancoora rider guide gives "30 km over both park areas (excluding rail trails)" with ~120 m of vertical, and Visit Gippsland markets it as "around 15 km of XC + all-mountain." The DB currently lists 5 park trails (Bones, Crazy Snake, Link to Silvertop Spur, Wheel Nuts, Winch Line) plus 2 rail trails (Walhalla Goldfields, Tyers Junction). All sources agree on the two-trailhead split, the Telbit Road shuttle, and the rail-trail connections. The trails are hand-cut singletrack, prone to mud after even moderate rain.

Erica is one of seven nodes in the proposed Central Gippsland "G7" Mountain Bike Hub — the same regional plan that includes Blores Hill, Maryvale Pines, Somewhere Good, Avon-Mt Hedrick, Mt Baw Baw and Haunted Hills. The G7 vision (TRC Tourism feasibility study, 2020; advocacy brief refreshed 2022; documentation through October 2025) positions Erica as the network's XC + flow node and a service base for Walhalla / Mt Baw Baw day trips.

Location & Access

• Address: 68 Moore Street, Erica VIC 3825 (existing DB value — verified against Visit Gippsland and the Erica MTB Park Facebook page)
• Region: Gippsland (Central Gippsland / Baw Baw Shire) — could be tightened to "Central Gippsland" but the existing "Gippsland" value is acceptable for the tourism subregion
• Drive times: ~170 km / ~2.5 hr from Melbourne CBD; ~36 km / ~30 min north of Moe; ~25 min from Walhalla
• Public transport: No PT to Erica — V/Line Gippsland line runs to Moe, then ~30 min by car. Car required.
• Parking: Three trailhead car parks (Mill Park / Eastern, Collins Siding / Western, plus Telbit Crossing if shuttling) — all unsealed, free
• Coords: -37.9747225, 146.3788499 (existing DB row; consistent with Erica township)

Best Season & Conditions

• Peak riding season: Dry months (Nov–Apr) work best — trails are hand-cut singletrack on forest soils
• Wet-weather impact: "Prone to be muddy after medium rain" (Bancoora) — substantial: short closures common after wet weather
• Fire-danger / total-fire-ban impact: State forest in tall mountain ash country — closures possible on Code Red / Total Fire Ban days during summer (Nov–Mar). Check VicEmergency / Forest Fire Management Vic.
• Snow / alpine season: Park sits at ~330–478 m so does not regularly snow, but neighbouring Mt Baw Baw / Mt St Gwinear do — wet-cold riding from Jun–Aug; expect mud
• Snakes: Existing season note flags snakes in summer — accurate for tall-forest Gippsland sites
• School-holiday surge: Modest — Erica is a service town for Walhalla / Mt Baw Baw / Thomson Dam trips; busy on long weekends but not a destination park

Managing Body & Trail Builders

• Land manager: Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action (DEECA, formerly DELWP) — State Forest. Erica DEECA office can be reached on (03) 5165 2200.
• Trail builder / maintainer: Gippsland Mountain Bike Club (Gippsland MTB Inc, founded May 2008) — runs the annual Erica Social Shuttle Ride Day and maintains the dedicated Mount Erica trail page.
• Volunteer / dig days: Working bees coordinated through GMTB; sign up via the club site or Facebook
• Donations / membership: Memberships processed via AusCycling — select "Gippsland MTB"
• Club website: https://gippslandmtb.com.au/ (dedicated park page at /trail/mount-erica/)
• Park Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/EricaMTBPark/

History & Background

• Erica was originally settled as "Upper Moondarra" in the early 1900s; the Moe–Walhalla railway opened a station there in 1910 (initially "Harris"), renamed "Erica" by 1914 after nearby Mount Erica.
• The town became the centre of a thriving Gippsland timber industry — at its 1930s peak, 13 sawmills operated in the immediate vicinity. The Tyers Valley Tramway (also called the "Erica Steel Tramway"), built by the Forests Commission of Victoria, ran from 1927 to July 1949 and moved nearly 120 million super feet of timber from sawmills along the Eastern and Western Tyers Rivers down to a siding south of Erica on the main Moe–Walhalla line. It was built specifically to replace tramways destroyed in the catastrophic February 1926 fires.
• The Walhalla railway line closed north of Erica in 1944, and the entire line to Moe closed by 1954. The bed of the line is now the Walhalla Goldfields Rail Trail (Erica–Thomson, 7.3 km — Walhalla Goldfields Railway leases the corridor and does not endorse it as a maintained rail trail) and the Tyers Junction Rail Trail (Collins Siding–Telbit Crossing, ~7 km — the operationally maintained section, integral to the Western Trail loop).
• The MTB park itself has been built on top of the original tramway corridors and forestry tracks, with hand-cut singletrack added by Gippsland MTB Inc since the late 2000s. Existing trail naming reflects the heritage: "Winch Line" recalls the steam winches used on the Tyers Valley tramway's steeper grades.
• Erica is one of seven sites in the proposed Central Gippsland G7 Mountain Bike Hub — TRC Tourism produced the feasibility study in 2020; an advocacy brief was issued in 2022; further documentation has continued through October 2025. The G7 plan would position Central Gippsland as a nationally significant MTB region (>250 km of singletrack within a 60 km radius).

Recent News & Updates (last 12 months)

• 2026-04-19 — Erica Social Shuttle Ride Day held by Gippsland MTB Inc — annual self-shuttle event using Telbit Road; Adults $50 / U19 $40, AusCycling membership required (EntryBoss)
• 2025-10-xx — G7 hub documentation refreshed through October 2025; Erica retained as one of the seven nodes in the network plan (TRC Tourism, Visit Gippsland)
• 2025-05-04 — Erica Social Shuttle Ride Day (previous year's edition) — same format (EntryBoss)
• 2025-xx — Walhalla Goldfields Rail Trail (Erica–Thomson) condition deterioration — recent rider reports flag corrugations, gullies, debris, and a large fallen trunk ~3 km from Erica blocking the trail. Walhalla Goldfields Railway holds the corridor lease and explicitly does not maintain it (Rail Trails Australia)

Note: No park-specific fire/storm closure surfaced in public news for the last 12 months. The most recent major fires impacting the wider region were the 2019–20 Black Summer fires (which did not directly burn Erica) and the June 2021 Gippsland storms.