Breakfast First
Our whole day was for Sovereign Hill, Ballarat’s big gold rush museum. But first, breakfast at a café nearby: coffee and something hearty on toast, in the sun.
Main Street, 1850s
Sovereign Hill is a whole town rebuilt the way Ballarat looked in the 1850s, right after gold was discovered. Dirt roads, timber shopfronts, gas lamps, and everyone working there is in costume: soldiers, shopkeepers, ladies in long dresses, gentlemen in top hats. It feels like walking onto a movie set.
The Diggings
Further down the hill are the diggings, where the miners worked: big Clydesdale horses, mine headframes, steam engines, workshops and the tents and huts the diggers lived in.
Down the Mine
Then we went underground on the mine tour. You ride down into the tunnels, and inside it’s dark, damp and narrow, with sound and light shows telling the story of the miners who dug here by candlelight. One part has a glowing gold nugget in the rock.
Back up in the sunshine, we climbed up to look out over the whole town.
That was only the morning. Part 2: the gold pour, the redcoats and our night in an old hotel.
Information About Sovereign Hill
A full-size recreation of Ballarat in the 1850s gold rush, with shops, a theatre, a school, a mine and the diggings, all staffed by people in period costume.
PS: Give it a whole day. There are shows and demonstrations at set times (the gold pour, the redcoats, the theatre), so grab the day's schedule at the entrance and plan around it.