Sovereign Hill, Part 2: The Gold Pour and Redcoats

Shops and the Gold Pour

After the morning and the mine, we went back up Main Street for the shops: drapers with bolts of fabric, a hat shop, sweet shops, an apothecary full of jars.

Rolls of fabric at the draper’s — The draper

The big show of the day is the gold pour at the smelting works. They melt real gold in the furnace, pour it out glowing into a mould, and a few minutes later, there’s a shiny gold bar sitting on red velvet in a glass box. You don’t get to keep it, sadly.

The finished gold bar on red velvet — The smelting works

Hotels, Theatres and Redcoats

Next, a look inside the old buildings: a hotel dining room set for dinner, the Victoria Theatre with its red curtains, and the apothecary.

Minmin in the dining room — The dining room

Jars on the apothecary shelves — Showtime

A four-poster bed in an old house — Bedtime, 1850s

A pastry in a paper bag — Bedtime, 1850s

Then came the redcoats, the British soldiers who policed the goldfields, marching down Main Street with their drums.

The redcoats marching with drums — The redcoats

The street with the shops — The redcoats

Up the Hill

We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering: a carpenter’s workshop, the coach builders and little cottages up the hill, each one furnished like a family still lived there.

Inside a cottage with a stone fireplace — The cottage

A timber cottage with a veranda — The cottage

A Night in an Old Hotel

Plot twist in Ballarat: our Airbnb was so shitty we checked out after one night (refund secured). I got lucky and found a room at Craig’s Royal Hotel, a grand old hotel from the gold rush days. Fireplace in the room, long carpeted corridors, a stained-glass staircase, and an old cage lift. From worst to best in 24 hours.