On a clear day from the top of Mount Buffalo you can see Kosciuszko's peak 140 kilometres to the east.

On other days the weather transforms on its way down: snow up top, rain down the cliff faces and sunshine in the valleys below.

Mount Buffalo was named by the explorers Hume and Hovell in 1824 as, from a distance, they saw the shape of a sleeping buffalo — the highest peak as its head, and the snow-gum plateau as its slumbering back.

"Before this became a national park in 1898 … so many people fell in love with the place and worked hard to get it protected and looked after," says Michelle Doherty, ranger team leader at Mount Buffalo National Park.

The area is a dramatic combination of granite tors — huge weathered blocks that appear to teeter on the cliff edges — and snowgrass plains that are home to wildflowers, butterflies and birdlife specific to the area.

The ecosystem, which is currently under threat from fire, has long been a place for explorers, artists and tourists to revel in the beauty of nature.

One of the early tourism operators was the Manfield family. And their marketing weapon? Guide Alice.

To early explorers, the mountain resembled the shape of a sleeping buffalo. ( Getty: The Print Collector )

Early adventure guiding

Born in 1878, Alice Manfield was about 12 when her family built the Buffalo Falls Temperance Hotel with hard-earned money from the Buckland Valley goldfields nearby.

"The Manfields were seen as a bit snobbish, a bit distant," says Anne Shannon, Alice's granddaughter.

"I suspect they were just really focused on their hard work. They could see there was an opportunity there, and they were going to tap it."

Alice Manfield's tours became a marketing weapon at the Buffalo Falls Temperance Hotel. ( State Library Victoria: Alice Manfield )

The Manfields would pick guests up from the train station and provide accommodation, packhorses for travel and guiding services up the mountain.

"Alice's father, James Manfield, had blazed a northern approach from the Eurobin Valley up the mountain, but that would still have been a lengthy process of about six hours on horseback," says Mandy Munro, a former adventure guide on Mount Buffalo.

But the Manfields weren't the only ones who saw a mountain of opportunity in the area.

Alice, despite her notable skills as a guide and naturalist, knew she had to have a point of difference.

Alice Manfield took some of the first photographs of the Mount Buffalo area. ( State Library Victoria: Alice Manfield )

A pioneer of outdoors wear for women

Alice's trademark was a pantsuit she designed herself to successfully navigate the mountain.

"She's a tall slim woman and her pantsuit was quite close fitting. Back in the day people didn't wear clothes that revealed the shape of their bodies," Ms Doherty says.

Alice named herself 'Guide Alice'. ( State Library Victoria: Alice Manfield )

Alice wore a woollen scarf and hat, wrapped puttees around her legs for warmth and protection, and sported large walking stick.

"I've seen a photograph she took of her mountain boots next to a pair of city shoes," says Stephanie Lavau, environmental sociologist at the University of Melbourne.

"To me that spoke of a certain self-awareness and rebellion against the cultural norms of the time as to how a woman should present herself.

"I'm also struck by how she's made some very active and risky choices about putting her life into Australian nature."

Alice also named herself Guide Alice. Guide first, Alice second.

An expert, a persona, a tourist attraction.

Alice Manfield rebelled against cultural norms of the time. ( State Library Victoria: Alice Manfield )

From 1912 to 1927 she ran her own guesthouse on the mountain, and the requests for her guiding services came from all areas of society.

"She would have mixed with Percy Grainger, Sir Arthur Streeton, Nicholas Chevalier, Nicholas Caire, and the Symes of The Melbourne Age," Ms Munro says.

"Even Sir John Monash claimed that his navigational skills were set from Guide Alice on that mountain."

A notoriously shy bird

As Alice spent more and more time on the mountain, she slowly gained the trust of the notoriously shy lyrebird.

"To the best of my belief, I am the first to secure live photographs of our famous Australian Lyre-bird," she wrote in The School Magazine of Literature for our Boys and Girls in 1921.

With her cumbersome 1920s-era camera she was able to capture Australia's first pictorial representation of the superb lyrebird in The Lyrebirds of Mount Buffalo, published in 1924.

Alice Manfield gained the trust of the notoriously shy lyrebird and captured it in photos. ( State Library Victoria: Alice Manfield )

"I did not hide myself but sat in full view of the bird. I carried out this plan on several mornings and evenings, uttering at each visit, the call of the mopoke owl," Alice wrote in 1921.

"At last, the bird came shyly to meet me, and offered a greeting by trying to mimic my call. To my great joy, I found I had secured her friendship. At last, my chance came, and I snapped the photograph."

The Lyrebirds of Mount Buffalo was instrumental in shifting society's relationship with the Australian lyrebird from one of consumption to protection.

"The mentality of the 1800s was that everything was up for grabs and I know a lot of lyrebirds were killed for the feathers for women's fashion," Ms Doherty says.

"Early exploration was for cattle, for gold, for killing and displaying specimens, but Alice led from the heart. That's what captured people's imaginations and inspired them to come up here."

The old mount claimed her

In 1908 the official road up Mount Buffalo was opened, and the Manfields' prospects on Buffalo started to decline.

"After the road was built, there was a lot of talk about how tourism would really impact the area, so the government built a chalet at the top of the mountain," Ms Munro says.

When the road up Mount Buffalo opened in 1908, Alice was the only woman invited to the official opening party. ( State Library Victoria: Alice Manfield )

The Mt Buffalo chalet, built in 1910, is a stately portrait of early 20th century Australian grandeur.

Vic Railways took over the chalet from 1920-30s and ushered in the age of the Mountain Hotel, which drew huge number of tourists to the area.

But after several years of financial difficulties the chalet closed, and now stands dormant waiting to be opened again.

The Manfield family was given a plot about 1 kilometre away from the chalet.

And when their five-year lease expired, compounded by The Great Depression, they finally had to leave the mountain.

Alice eventually moved away with her husband. Later she went into an aged care facility in Wodonga.

"One day Mum went to visit her and couldn't find her," Ms Shannon says.

"People were looking for her. Eventually Mum said, 'I think we should look up at Buffalo,' and they found her up there in the bush."

Now, day-trippers to Buffalo are fewer but keen naturalists and bushwalkers, in the footsteps of Alice Manfield, have once again taken over the mountain.

Many keen bushwalkers take to Mount Buffalo National Park in the footsteps of Alice Manfield. ( Supplied: Parks Victoria )

"We were not in our teens when my brother William and I first climbed the mountain, the beauties and attractions of which we had so often heard our father describe to others," Alice wrote in 1936.

"From then on mountain climbing and the stillness of the mountain top seemed to get a hold upon me."