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Toora was first established in the 1870s after tin was discovered in the
southern foothills of the Strzelecki Ranges. Timber and dairying industries soon followed, as well as the line known as the Great Southern Railway in 1891. The township’s skyline is still dominated by the now-closed milk and butter factory, which provided employment to many of the town’s people for more than a century. |
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 Overlooking Toora from Silkocks Hill Road Lookout |
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 Stanley Street |
 Stanley Street from the Royal Standard Hotel |
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Toora’s main thoroughfare Stanley Street is recognised as one of South Gippsland’s most significant historic precincts and features a number of memorable buildings including the Royal Mail Hotel, the National Bank and the former Bank of Victoria. Sections of the Australian film Strikebound chronicling a turbulent period of Wonthaggi’s coal-mining past and an episode of the television drama Halifax f.p. were both filmed in Toora. On the corner of Stanley and Gray Streets is what used to be the Toora branch of the Great Southern Co-operative, which also had other branches at Foster and Welshpool. Further along the street is the double red brick Toora Post Office which was opened in 1915. |
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| Toora also features a corner pub with a return verandah, a heritage pear orchard, post office, supermarket and a boat ramp nearby. |
 Royal Standard Hotel |
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The Toora district has an active arts and crafts community and its own Creative Arts Centre. One project involving local artists and residents saw most of the power-poles in the town painted in a remarkable variety of colours and designs. Stanley Street is also known for its Victorian- and Federation-era shopfronts beside other shops of more recent provenance as well as for its northern vista of the rolling foothills of the Strzelecki Ranges. The town has a heritage pear orchard and the pretty Sagasser Park across Victoria Street was developed by the Toora Lions Club for the community and for visitors’ use with a playground and barbecue facilities. A newly recreated wetlands area alongside the railway reserve seems destined to be drained once more by the South Gippsland Shire, despite strong local support for its retention. Toora has a heated swimming pool, public tennis courts, and a football oval with sweeping views of the hills and lower-lying farmlands.
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| The park and gardens are a real credit to the people of Toora, there is a children's play ground, electric barbeque, tables and chairs and a toilet block at the southern end of the town. | |||||||||
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The floating Toora boat ramp on Corner Inlet is located past the recreation reserve as is the bird hide, which gives those with an ornithological bent a great chance to see some the many water and sea birds that return to the Inlet every year. The Inlet itself is an internationally recognised wetlands area and is one of mainland Australia’s southernmost mangrove ecosystems. A kilometre or so out of Toora to the north of the South Gippsland Highway, past the stand of magnificent mahogany gums, is the Silcocks Hill Road lookout, which provides a splendid vantage point over the township, the Inlet, Wilsons Promontory and Bass Strait.
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