Page 439 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - Australia

WESTERN VIC T ORIA  437

the building’s restrained interior. The Chinese on the Gold Fields
The building is now the Visitors’
Information Centre. Buda The first Chinese gold-seekers landed in Melbourne in 1853. Their
Historic Home and Garden was numbers peaked at around 40,000 in 1859. They worked hard in large
occupied from 1863 to 1981 by groups to recover the tiniest particles of gold, but the Europeans
two generations of Hungarian became hostile, claiming that the new arrivals were draining the
silversmith, Ernest Leviny and his colony’s wealth. In 1857, several Chinese were murdered. The state
family. The house displays an government tried to quell hostility by introducing an entry tax
extensive collection of arts and on Chinese who arrived by boat – the Chinese then landed in
crafts works. The property is neighbouring states and walked overland to Victoria. At the end
of the gold rush many stayed on to work as gardeners, cooks and
also noted for its largely intact factory hands. There is still a large Chinese community in the state.
19th-century garden, a unique
survivor of its period.
Castlemaine is also home to
many writers and artists from
Melbourne and has a lively
collection of museums, cafés
and restaurants.
P Buda Historic Home
and Garden
42 Hunter St. Tel (03) 5472 1032. Open
noon–5pm Wed–Sat, 10am–5pm Sun
& public hols. Closed Good Fri, 25 Dec.
& 7 teahouse and upper garden
area. ∑ budacastlemaine.org.au

eBallarat Chinese workers on the gold fields
See pp438–9.
explore a unique period of gold before being exhausted
Australia’s history. Blacksmiths, in the 1920s.
rSovereign Hill hoteliers, bakers and grocers in The nearby Gold Museum
full period dress ply their trades is part of the Sovereign Hill
Bradshaw St, Ballarat. Tel (03) 5337 on the main streets, amid the complex. Its changing exhibits
1100. Open 10am–5pm daily.
Closed 25 Dec. & 8 7 diggers’ huts, tents, old meeting focus on the uses of gold
∑ sovereignhill.com.au places and the Chinese Village. throughout history.
Among the most absorbing Sovereign Hill opens in the
Sovereign Hill is the gold fields’ displays are those that reproduce evenings for an impressive
living museum. Located on the gold-mining methods. The town’s sound and light show, which
outskirts of Ballarat (see pp438–9), fields produced an estimated re-enacts the events of the
it offers visitors the chance to 640,000 kg (630 tonnes) of Eureka Stockade (see p438).

Actors in period costume walking along the main street in Sovereign Hill