Bendigo, Victoria
Bendigo, Victoria
The central Victorian city of Bendigo, built on the wealth gained from the gold mines in the area, boasts many fine historic buildings from the Victorian era. One can also find many modern buildings mixed in with the old, gracious structures of that bygone era.
Soldiers Memorial Institute Museum, Bendigo, Victoria
Buildings such as the one shown above, the Soldiers Memorial Institute Museum, stand out out as fine examples of architecture of the Victorian age. The statue of Queen Victoria herself looks out over several of them. I almost cut off all of her head in the photo below. No doubt she would not have been amused.
Statue of Queen Victoria, Bendigo, Victoria
Bendigo, Victoria
Bendigo, Victoria
After leaving Castlemaine we travelled to the historic city of Bendigo. The ladies wanted to see an art exhibition but John and I weren’t all that keen on that. I took the opportunity to get some photos of this historic old city. The wealth of the city was built on gold. One of the mining poppet heads is shown above. It is now used as a lookout over the city.
Bendigo, Victoria
Bendigo, Victoria
Bendigo, Victoria
Castlemaine, Victoria
Castlemaine, Victoria
We stayed a few days with our friends in Gisborne, Victoria on our way back from Sydney, January 2009. while we were there we went to visit the historic town of Castlemaine, about a half hour drive north of Gisborne. While we were there I managed a few photos of some of the beautiful old buildings. I’d love to spend more time wandering around this historic place.
Castlemaine, Victoria
We spent quite a long time looking through an antique shop. We found a great place to have lunch and we also browsed in a wonderful bookshop for quite a while. I love old bookshops; you never know what wonderful titles one will find. I didn’t find anything this time.
Castlemaine, Victoria
One of the interesting – and curious – things about the bookshop was the large statue of a cat on the roof over the footpath. The photo below shows a close up of the cat.
Castlemaine, Victoria
Mallacoota to Gisborne, Victoria
Leaving Mallacoota, eastern Victoria
We reluctantly left Mallacoota in eastern Victoria after only about 15 hours stay overnight. In the little time we had available we had become enchanted by this small coastal town and vowed we’d return again in the near future for more than just a few hours. A week or more is needed to fully explore this beautiful area. In fact, I could easily spend several months exploring the south eastern coast of Victoria and the adjacent south coast of New South Wales. The photo above was taken through the car windscreen as we left the town.
After about twenty minutes of driving we returned to the main highway and headed west towards Melbourne. We were due to arrive at our friends’ place that evening for dinner, so we had a long day in the car ahead of us. After several hours of driving through beautiful forests on both sides of the road we all agreed that we had seen enough tall trees for a while.
We stopped briefly at the lovely town of Orbost to have morning tea. We found a lovely park on the banks of the Snowy River (see photo below). As we journeyed on the day became hotter. We had lunch in the small town of Stratford and by then it was quite warm. Travelling was okay because of the good air conditioning in the car. After a very long and tiring day in the car we reached Melbourne and had a very quick passage along the freeway, through the tunnel and on over the bridges, tollway and freeways heading north. We arrived at our friends’ home in Gisborne a little late but pleased to stop driving.
Orbost, south eastern Victoria
The harbour at Mallacoota
Estuary at Mallacoota, Victoria
Our evening walk at Mallacoota, eastern Victoria, was right on and after sunset.
The setting sun showed up the beauty of the setting, especially the harbour and estuary.
Estuary at Mallacoota, Victoria