On Walkabout: Around Beechworth, Victoria

Prior Posting: The Beechworth Cemetery

———————————————

There are a number of sights around the historic city of Beechworth that are worth checking out. The easiest place to visit is the Chinese garden constructed on the outskirts of town:

The garden looks fairly new and was constructed to honor Beechworth’s Chinese heritage. Adjacent to the garden is a large lake filled with ducks:

The rumor is that the lake is actually a nice place to do some fishing, that is if you can escape the ducks:

To tell you the truth I’m not even sure if these are ducks but they are an Aussie bird that lives in the lake. A whole flock of them followed my wife and I as we walked around the lake. If we stopped the birds came out of the lake to look for handouts I’m assuming.

After walking around the lake we took a drive along the gorge road that begins on the north side of town. The road begins by driving through some rolling hills and then follows a spectacular gorge that runs along the western side of the town that was panned for gold by the early prospectors. The beginning portion of the road that reaches a few high hilltops, offers a some good views of the surrounding countryside:

Here is a picture of my Jeep on one of these hilltops:

Eventually the road leads to the historic Powder Magazine building that was constructed in 1859 to house gunpowder for the miners:

The building was built in this location outside of town for obvious safety reasons. If you look closely you at the above picture you can see that the building is lined with multiple lightning rods to protect it from lightning strikes. The rods must be doing a good job because the place never blew up while it was in use.

From the hilltop the magazine is located on, it offers a great view of the city of Beechworth:

From this hilltop the road begins its descent into the gorge:

I could almost visualize the gold miners panning for gold along this creek a 150 years ago:

After descending into the gorge the road once again ascended up another hillside offering another great view of the surrounding country:

Before long the road descended back into the scenic final stretch of the gorge:

The road ends back on the south side of Beechworth with this view of a spectacular waterfall:

If you are visiting Beechworth a drive or a hike through the gorge should be added to your itinerary because it is quite spectacular and was a great way to wrap up a fantastic day in Beechworth.