Warrnambool is a regional city of around 32,000 people on the south-western coast of Victoria, Australia, located in the municipality City of Warrnambool. It is at the western end of the Great Ocean Road, but is more quickly reached along the Princes Highway, 265 kilometres and 3 hours from Melbourne by road or rail.
The Warrnambool Botanic Gardens feature wide curving paths, rare trees, a lily pond with ducks, a fernery, a band rotunda, and was designed by notable landscape architect, William Guilfoyle.
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Warrnambool is linked to Melbourne and Geelong by rail and bus services. Trains call at Warrnambool's two stations (Warrnambool in the city and Sherwood Park in the city's outer east at Deakin University) and operate seven days a week. Local buses cover Warrnambool's city and suburbs and extend to the nearby towns of Port Fairy and Koroit. V/Line buses connect Warrnambool with Portland, Mt Gambier, Ballarat and Adelaide.
The word Warrnambool comes from the local Aboriginal name for a nearby Volcanic cone. It has been interpreted to mean many things including “water between two rivers”, "two swamps" or "ample water".
The treacherous coast near the city is known as the "Shipwreck Coast" and evidence suggests the first ships to arrive were among the earliest international explorers. The legend of the Mahogany Ship is strongly linked to the city.
Many believe the first Europeans to discover the area were Portuguese sailors, who surveyed the coastline nearby and possibly marooned near the site of the present town as early as the 1500s. French explorer Nicholas Baudin recorded coastal landmarks in 1802. The area was frequented by whalers early in the 19th century. Matthew Flinders sailed the coast in the Investigator, and Leiutenant James Grant in the Lady Nelson also explored the area.
The first settlers arrived in the 1840s in the Lady Bay area, which was a natural harbour. The area was first surveyed in 1846.
During the Victorian Gold Rush, Warrnambool became an important port and grew quickly in the 1850s, benefiting from the private ownership of nearby Port Fairy.
It was gazetted as a municipality in 1855. It became a borough in 1863. Warrnambool was declared a town in 1883, and a city in 1918.