Ballarat - only about 60k north of Peterborough and 80k nw of Melbourne - is a lovely, well preserved, town built as a result of the gold rush in the 1800's. They have preserved a lot of buildings in the town as well as part of the original town used by the gold diggers, including a lot of the old mines which you can also visit. Actors and volunteers still dress up and play characters from that time in the old town called Sovereign Hill - most of which cotains the original structures. We stayed at the refurbished George Hotel - very nicely done - and had a lovely but expensive meal at the bistro next door. Fortune shone on us however and before retiring we managed to win A$100 in the hotels slot machine room - another hangover from the mining days.
Ballarat:
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| Main street Ballarat |
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| The Gold Exchange |
Sovereign Hill:
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| Panning for gold!- none left! |
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| A fracas outside the Theatre......... |
In Sovereign Hill we went down the actual mine that was was worked there and got just a flavour of how difficult conditions must have been.The largest gold nugget ever found - named The Welcome Stranger - was found here by two Cornish miners in 1869 - it weighed 2283 oz and measured 12" x 24".....they never worked again! Then it was back to Melbourne - through very English looking landscapes - before leaving for Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast
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