These huts were built by the families that drove their cattle up onto the High Country every spring and many of these families still visit the huts. However, the main visitors are bushwalkers in summer and cross-country skiers in winter. Many huts were burnt down in the disastrous 2003 bushfires but many of those destroyed have been re-built thanks to the National Parks and Kosciusko Huts Association. The huts are usually built to a simple pattern in locations that provides shelter from the westerly winds with morning sun on the front of the hut and close to water and firewood.
There are also two old homesteads in Kosciuszko National Park – Old Currango built in 1873 and Coolamine built in 1883. These are off the Alpine Track (2 kilometres and 5.5 kilometres respectively) but are well worth visiting as they tell a story of the hardship and remoteness that the grazing families endured in the 1800s and early 1900s. They were built of solid slabs or weatherboard cut and milled on site and were surrounded by barns, shearing sheds, meat house, etc.
