Sassafras () is a locality and township within

Greater Melbourne Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung/ or ) is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second most-populous city in Australia, after Sydney. The city's name generally refers to a metropolitan area also known ...

, beyond the Melbourne metropolitan area Urban Growth Boundary, 43 km east of Melbourne's

Central Business District A central business district (CBD) is the Commerce, commercial and business center of a city. It contains commercial space and offices, and in larger cities will often be described as a financial district. Geographically, it often coincides wit ...

, located within the

City of Knox The City of Knox is a local government area in Victoria, Australia in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne. It has an area of and in 2020, Knox had a population of 165,147. This municipality is one of only a handful that survived the widespread mu ...

and

Shire of Yarra Ranges The Shire of Yarra Ranges, also known as Yarra Ranges Council, is a local government area in Victoria, Australia, located in the outer eastern and northeastern suburbs of Melbourne extending into the Yarra Valley and Dandenong Ranges. It has ...

local government area A local government area (LGA) is an administrative division of a country that a local government is responsible for. The size of an LGA varies by country but it is generally a subdivision of a federated state, state, province, division (politica ...

s. Sassafras recorded a population of 970 at the 2021 census.

Location

The Sassafras village is located at an altitude of approximately 500 metres, in a

saddle A saddle is a supportive structure for a rider of an animal, fastened to an animal's back by a girth. The most common type is equestrian. However, specialized saddles have been created for oxen, camels and other animals. It is not know ...

on the top of the ridgeline of the

Dandenong Ranges The Dandenong Ranges (commonly just the Dandenongs) are a set of low mountain ranges in Victoria, Australia, approximately east of the state capital Melbourne. A minor branch of the Great Dividing Range, the Dandenongs consist mostly of rol ...

, a few kilometres south of the highest peak of

Mount Dandenong Mount Dandenong, sometimes styled as Mt. Dandenong, is a township and suburb of the Greater Melbourne area in Victoria, Australia, east of the Melbourne central business district (CBD), located within the local government area of the Shire of ...

. The locality of Sassafras extends from Hilton Road in the south, to just north of the village. In the east, it extends down the Sassafras Gully, whilst to the West much of the locality is within the Dandenong Ranges National Park.

History

The area was named Sassafras Gully, after the

sassafras ''Sassafras'' is a genus of three extant and one extinct species of deciduous trees in the family Lauraceae, native to eastern North America and eastern Asia.Wolfe, Jack A. & Wehr, Wesley C. 1987. The sassafras is an ornamental tree. "Middle Eo ...

trees which grow in gully along Sassafras Creek. The land was opened to small scale farming in 1893 and a small township developed. The Post Office opened on 1 June 1901 and has always been known as Sassafras Gully. The Sassafras Primary School was established in 1894, originally meeting in a bark slab hut, before relocating to the Sassafras Mechanics Institute hall in 1895.Smith, Rowan. Heart of the Hills, Published by the author, 201
Copy on Scribd.
/ref> The school moved to its present site in 1915. In the early 1900s tourism began to increase and the township consequently grew. Artist Henrietta Maria Gulliver established a garden estate called Panteg there in 1915. Today Sassafras is a tourist destination with several boutique stores including

Devonshire tea A cream tea (also known as a Devon cream tea, Devonshire tea, or Cornish cream tea) is an Tea (meal), afternoon tea consisting of tea, scones, clotted cream (or, less authentically, whipped cream), jam, and sometimes butter. Cream teas are sol ...

outlets, cafés, toy shops,

antique shop An antique shop (or antiques shop) is a retail store specializing in the selling of antiques. Antiques shops generally have a physical presence in a shop where the wares are stored and displayed, but some antique shops are online, with no phy ...

s and nurseries. The area has had a history of

bushfires A wildfire, forest fire, or a bushfire is an unplanned and uncontrolled fire in an area of Combustibility and flammability, combustible vegetation. Depending on the type of vegetation present, a wildfire may be more specifically identified as a ...

, and areas near the town are known to have burnt since the 1850s, most recently in 1962.

Waterways

Sassafras village is on the

watershed Watershed may refer to: Hydrology * Drainage divide, the line that separates neighbouring drainage basins * Drainage basin, an area of land where surface water converges (North American usage) Music * Watershed Music Festival, an annual country ...

between the

Yarra River The Yarra River or historically, the Yarra Yarra River, (Kulin languages: ''Berrern'', ''Birr-arrung'', ''Bay-ray-rung'', ''Birarang'', ''Birrarung'', and ''Wongete'') is a perennial river in south-central Victoria, Australia. The lower st ...

Catchment and the

Dandenong Creek The Dandenong Creek (Aboriginal Bunwurrung: ''Narra Narrawong'' or ''Dandinnong'') is an urban creek of the Port Phillip catchment, located in the eastern and south-eastern Greater Melbourne region of the Australian east coast state of Vict ...

. Sassafras Creek is located to the east of the township while tributaries of the Dandenong Creek are west and north of the township. Both creeks provide important corridors for native flora and fauna, and are both largely protect by parklands. Sassafras Creek flows generally east until it meets Ti-Tree Creek, where they joint to form the

Woori Yallock Creek Woori Yallock Creek is a tributary of the Yarra River. It rises on the eastern slopes of the Dandenong Ranges, then flows north to join the Yarra River near Woori Yallock Woori Yallock is a town in Victoria, Australia, east of Melbourne's ...

. Woori-Yallock Creek then flows northward to eventually join the Yarra River next to the Warramate Nature Conservation Reserve. Sassafras Creek's

Riparian Zone A riparian zone or riparian area is the interface between land and a river or stream. In some regions, the terms riparian woodland, riparian forest, riparian buffer zone, riparian corridor, and riparian strip are used to characterize a ripari ...

is almost entirely protected by public land, which in this case is Dandenong Ranges National Park. Tributaries of the Dandenong Creek rise on the western face of the Dandenong Ranges and flow west to Dandenong Creek, where it flows southward into the

Patterson River The Patterson River is a partly man-made, tidal river urban river of the Port Phillip catchment in the Australian east coast state of Victoria, located in the outer southeastern suburbs of the Greater Melbourne region. Under the name "Patters ...

and then into

Port Phillip Bay Port Phillip ( Kulin: ''Narm-Narm'') or Port Phillip Bay is a horsehead-shaped enclosed bay on the central coast of southern Victoria, Australia. The bay opens into the Bass Strait via a short, narrow channel known as The Rip, and is comple ...

Patterson Lakes Patterson Lakes is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, south-east of Melbourne's Central Business District, located within the City of Kingston local government area. Patterson Lakes recorded a population of 7,793 at the 2021 census. ...

Natural environment

Sassafras Creek is protected by the Sassafras Creek Nature Conservation Reserve, which is nowadays incorporated into the Dandenong Ranges National Park. Sassafras has many exotic flora largely due to the fertile volcanic soils. Most private land contains exotic flora. The Dandenong Ranges Tourist Track, a walking trail, runs for 15 km alongside the Sassafras Creek, past Kallista and Monbulk to Emerald.Dandenong Ranges Tourist Track – Sassafras to Emerald – 15 km one way
Explore the Dandenongs

References

External links