Eden to Cooma towing a caravan

I live in bega , hence the name, iv e only used brown mountain , and i have towed caravan up and down it - and my boat ( 22 foot sports cruiser ) best bet is to do it early ( heading up brown mountain ) road is not to steep similar to some hills you may find coming out of eden ( north bound ) Just try to get up the mountain really early - beat any traffic then you can get up the mountain at your pace without the pressure of cars behind you.

If i can get up and down there with the nissan and boat ( total weight close to 5 tonne ) then you should be ok :)

Hi Lesterb,

Over the years have travelled all 3 of the roads that you mention, although not recently, nor have we ever towed anything up them.

That said, probably the easiest grades and curves are on the Imlay Road as it was specifically built for logging trucks. It is sealed all the way. The road through Wyndham and Cathcart may not be sealed and certainly had some tight bends and is (or at least used to be) narrow in places. Its also used by logging trucks. Very scenic but maybe not so good for your rig. Brown Mtn has a couple of tight corners and some quite steep grades.

The easiest road I think would have to be the Imlay Rd, although its a bit longer.

Cheers,

Val

Via Brown's Mountain about 150km with some seriously steep climbing. Via Bombala about 190km with less serious climbing......but bu$$er it LesterB .....why not go up the coast to Cairns and back one of the inland routes....and make a real outing of it. Go on .......you know you want to :-)

The Imlay Road is a good choice, as is the Wyndham/Cathcart road - if you take the extra couple kms thru Bombala (as opposed to hitting the dirt and taking the short cut to Bibbenluke) you will also have a good ride. (the dirt between Cathcart & Bibbenluke is very corrugated, thus the extra 19kms to stay on the bitumen to Bombala is worth it).

We towed our 2.5tonne van thru there about 9 months ago - the corrugations on the trip down the bypass were pretty rough, so chose the extra bitumen on the return trip - much better! The ride up the Great Divide is heaps easier on both Imlay and Wyndham/Cathcart road than it is on Brown Mtn - and much less traffic.

If you want to get to Cooma asap - choose Imlay Road. If you want to see Pambula/Merimbula/Bega on the way, then choose Wyndham/Cathcart road.

Any vehicle that is in good condition and not towing a van that exceeds its manufacturers rating will go up Brown Mountain OK. You may be slow but you will make it. There are quite a few bends where you can swing wide and let faster traffic past. Te maximum gradient occurrs at a couple of places only - near the top and the bottom. The rest is not steep at all, your speed is only limited by the bends.

The road up through Wyndham is a full two lane bitumen road right through to Bombala. The short cut through to the Monaro highway varies. I have generally found it well graded.

Thanks everyone for your replies. We ended up going south to Imlay road and on to Bombala that way. On one hill I was struggling at 50kph so I don't know how I would have gone on Brown Mountain.