The Local Visitors Guide winter 2024

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Investing and Super Agribusiness

Travel back in time with our heritage railway between Castlemaine and Maldon, Central Victoria’s most notable historic gold mining towns. Choose between Excursion or First Class 1920’s carriages and enjoy the scenery of the Goldfields. We operate every Wednesday and Sunday, plus some Saturdays and holidays, with special events like Ales on Rails and Murder on the Orient Express to immerse in.

The Jacksons Lookout walk taking in Yyuna, Argyle and Golden springs is a great option for going just that little bushland bit beyond the more heavily traversed tourist saunters out of Hepburn Springs Reserve - even if you’re strapped for time. The way we did it was anticlockwise, starting out in that time-honoured place of much frequented classic charm that is the Hepburn Mineral Springs Reserve grounds. Lunch first. We admired a squeaky flock of black cockies, and myriad little blue wrens bobbing about, checked the map, then set off on this breezy little 6km trek heading first to Wyuna Spring where my trusty walking companion, Paddy H, took the waters. “Very fizzy. Reminds me of bicarbonate of soda,” he said. Anyway onwards, following the Argyle Creek, breathing in the bushland beauty redolent of so many happy wanderings over so many sunny Sundays.

Read the full story at www.tlnews.com.au -

Jacksons Lookout Loop Walk, Hepburn Springs

It’s been a long wait for the Daylesford Girl Guides but after two years the good news finally came through. They have a builder.

Back in 2022 the local guide group secured $47,000 through Regional Development Victoria’s Living Local Regional Grants Program, for a long-awaited revamp of its historic hall - including removal of asbestos. But guide leader Susan Verbyla says the widespread shortage of tradies meant they had been unable to proceed with the work…until recently. “The grant is covering removal of all of the asbestos, replacement and repair of walls, ceiling, front steps, electrical work, plumbing, painting, carpet and curtains and some exterior work. The hall was in dire straits.” It’s also great news for other community groups who will be able to use the hall for their gatherings as well. The hall’s presence in Daylesford dates back to the late 1950s.

When you’re doing well over 200km an hour, just centimetres from the ground with no seatbelt and no airbag you don’t think about much other than remaining upright.

The niche sport of sidecar racing would have to be one of the most photographic, daring, arguably lunatic and heroic motor sports going. “It’s exciting,” says Daylesford’s Noel Beare, one of the fairly exclusive bunch of folk that belong to Australia’s competitive sidecar racing fraternity. “You don’t think about your house loan or that bill you have to pay.” When he’s racing sidecar, Noel, also known around town in his more sedate guise as a postie, also thinks (or perhaps it’s something more instinctive than thought) about how he’s using his own body weight to counterbalance the ferocious forces happening at those speeds to keep the sidecar upright and hopefully in a winning position. These days when they race, it’s Noel on back doing the “passengering” (read balancing) and son Declan in the driver’s seat.

Read the full story at www.tlnews.com.au - Edition 302

Trenthamites have gathered to raise a glass to a new mural map.

The map is the work of local artist Natalie Davis from Chalkysigns and can be found at the Vic Market Community Cafe in Trentham. The map features Trentham’s iconic spaces and fauna. Vic Market is a new space opposite the historic Trentham Railway Station offering locally made consumables and crafted goods.

Above, from left, artist Natalie Davis with Vic Market’s Kate Mooney Image: Anna from Wild Little Swallows Photography

Lyonville artist Suzi Cheek is not sure how to describe her artistic style. She is still experimenting with landscapes, clouds and still life but also trying seascapes, rocks and forests.

“From an early age I always wanted to be a fine artist. My parents steered me into graphic design. As a teenager I went to the Maryland Institute College of Arts (in the US) where I did a three-month course in drawing the human form from skeleton to skin. I learned to ‘see’ as an artist. It was amazing. As a graphic designer before computers I was trained in all disciplines - illustration, photography, drawing, typography and design. In my 30s I took up watercolours and botanical art for many years. I now work in what was the potting shed at my home in Lyonville. There is lots of natural light and I’m nestled right in the garden which is lovely. There are sparrows nesting in the roof who chatter away constantly. The greatest reward for me is to create a painting that celebrates the beauty around us – a painting that brings joy to others.”

Read the full story at www.tlnews.com.au - Edition 302

It’s the thrill of the chase that makes family history research such an addictive pursuit for professional genealogist, Lynda Collier.

“My cousin is an actual detective and he said to me ‘you are a detective too, really’”, says the specialist researcher who lives at Wheatsheaf. Because this niche area of historic research is all about identifying and confirming the links between one human being to so many others back through the annals of time, it also means “bringing to life” characters of the past, one’s own relatives. And this too especially appeals to Lynda. “I spend a lot of time on DNA analysis,” she says. “Even in my own family we’ve got an unknown ancestor, my mum’s great-greatgrandfather. I’ve been lucky enough to test both of my parents for their DNA. Every generation loses 50 per cent of your parents’ DNA, because you only get half-ish from each. And it’s not even. So from your grandparents you might have 20 per cent and 30 per cent respectively. It can vary a lot.”

Read the full story at www.tlnews.com.au - Edition 303

Annual fundraising exhibition

Central Victoria’s premier artist run gallery, the Little Gallery in Trentham, is set to host its much anticipated annual Winter Show Fundraising exhibition in August, showcasing 15 regional fine artists to be announced soon!

Winter Show Opening

Friday 2nd August at 5.30pm - all welcome

Gallery open

Friday to Monday 10am - 4pm

32B High Street, Trentham @trenthamlittlegallery

Today we’re tackling the Andersons Tramway Walk at Mollongghip just east of Newlyn. This 8km (16km return) bushwalk is a bit of a surprise packet. Who could have guessed there would be a “tramway” running through the bush here? This walk basically follows the cleared haulage route that remains, over-grown yes, but still clearly visible as it makes its way to where the township of Wombat once existed. Now there’s nothing left to indicate the fact that a township ever existed here other than a cleared flat section that used to be the town’s railway siding. Adjoining this is the clear remains of where the old Ballarat to Daylesford railway line once ran. The railway tracks have long since been taken up but the rail-line today forms part of what, for bushwalkers, has become the Wombat Station Walk - a 19km long hike from the old Wombat town site to Daylesford via Sailors Falls.

Read the full story at www.tlnews.com.au - Edition 304

Andersons Tramway Walk…plus Mollongghip

The Little Local - thelittlelocal.com.au

10 Stony Creek Road, Daylesford VIC 3460

P: (03) 5348 1884

E: info@stonycreekgallery.com.au

Trading Hours:

Open: Thurs - Mon 10:30 am - 5:00 pm

Closed: Tues - Wed

Michael Parker welcomes his Galleries and Sculpture Daylesford. Featuring original paintings sculptures, including mediums by regional .Paintings .Sculptures .Jewellery .Ceramics

From his earlier days as a rock musician to his years at the prestigious Academy of Art in Dresden, Germany, Daylesford’s Monty Osewald is the sort of vivacious talent whose creative work gets noticed wherever he goes.

“I finished my rock ‘n’ roll career in 1984. I wasn’t getting paid enough in that so I thought, ‘oh I’ll do some painting’. I started doing artwork with a group show at the Works Gallery in Geelong and then a solo show at an artist-run space called Artery in Geelong. I hadn’t painted for years and all of a sudden it just burst out. That went pretty well and I got a show at the Geelong Gallery and was bought up by a Sydney Group called the Sydney Art Bank. In Sydney I bumped into a really famous guy called Kym Bonython, an art dealer and entrepreneur who brought bands like The Beatles out to Australia. He said ‘show me what you’ve got’. He said ‘bring all of it to my place in Kew’.” So Monty did.

Read the full story at www.tlnews.com.au - Edition 303

Free places!

Creswick’s parkrun

Jubilee Lake

Mt Franklin Reserve

Thomas’ Lookout/Cornish Hill

Glenlyon Reserve

Daylesford Mill Market

Lake Daylesford

Wombat Hill Botanic Garden

Trentham Rail Trail

Trentham Falls

Myriad mineral springs

Bush walks

Lerderderg Gorge

Glenlyon Falls (above)

Sailors Falls waterfall/lookout

Markets...

Clunes Farmers Market

Castlemaine Artists Market

Kyneton Farmers Market

Ballan Farmers Market

Maldon Market

Trentham Farmers & Makers Markets

Glenlyon Farmers Market

Creswick Market

Leonards Hill Market

Talbot Farmers Market

Woodend Lions Market

Malmsbury Farmers Market

Daylesford Market

Trentham Station Market

Daylesford Railway Market

Just Google for more info!

World-wide, some truly remarkable things have come out of the Covid pandemic and one of them is the meteoric rise to international success of a new party game developed by a Hepburn Springs couple during lockdown.

One aspect that makes the success of That Sound Game so remarkable is that the two women behind it, Nat Delaney-John, left, and Cam Jasson, right, have backgrounds that could hardly be any further from the games scene. Cam is a construction sector project management consultant whose professional dedication saw her awarded the Property Council of Australia’s Future Leader of the Year Award ’23, while Nat, who dreamt up That Sound Game, is a taxidermist. That Sound Game is a fast-paced, interactive and very noisy party game, with the goal to get your team to guess as many answers on the category card as they can in a minute. Players can use any combination of sounds and movements, but their hands must be behind their backs.

The Bullarto Hall recently became the temporary home of what may just be one of the world’s biggest jigsaw puzzles.

Measuring 5.5 x 2 metres and weighing 19.05kg, the puzzle was too large for Bullarto residents Eddy and June Pleban to set up under their roof so they brought it to the hall to assemble across trestle tables. “Eddy bought the puzzle for me 10 years ago as a joke. It came with a hand truck,” June, pictured, said. “I started and finished one panel, which was 4000 pieces but then put it aside. The whole thing has 32,256 precisioncut pieces and consists of just six colours plus black and white which adds to the already incredible challenge.” It wasn’t until the pandemic lockdowns that June pulled out the puzzle and had another go. Seven panels and one year later, the retrospective work featuring 32 individual, brightly-coloured images by famed (deceased) American artist Keith Haring was finished.

• Extensive

• Rustic

• Accessible

• Coffee,

• Parking

• Activities

• All

When bodily stresses intervened, artist and designer David Dawson went from making a living as a builder to creating Blampied’s unique Overwrought Garden Art workshop, gallery and display garden.

“Even when I was a kid I always loved working with my hands – Lego and plasticine. I used to work with wood and I ended up working as a builder. But it got too hard on my body so I had to look at another means of making an income. I started out making some wrought iron gates. I took them to the Seymour farmers’ expo and they sold. I got orders and I thought ‘that worked!’ But I didn’t just want to make wrought iron though. I wanted to make really unique organic designs with trees and leaves and birds, and so I looked into different ways of making different shapes and came up with laser cutting. If it’s metal we make it. Garden art, sculpture, wall art, garden furniture, gates, privacy screens, bird baths, fire pits.”

Read the full story at www.tlnews.com.au -

Numbers you might need

Emergency – Fire, Police, Ambulance - 000

Daylesford Taxis – 5348 1111

Springs Medical Centre, Daylesford – 5348 2227

Daylesford Hospital – 5321 6500

Daylesford Police – 5348 2342

SES – 132 500

Daylesford Regional Visitor Information Centre – 5321 6123

Places you might need

Daylesford Post Office – 86 Vincent Street

ATMs in Daylesford:

Bendigo – 97 Vincent Street

Westpac – 45 Vincent Street

Commonwealth – 36-40 Vincent Street

ANZ - 52 Vincent Street

A secret you might like!

OK, not really a secret but the Wombat Hill Botanic Gardens are well worth a look. It was in 1860 that the Borough of Daylesford asked for a piece of the paddock at the Government Camp on the top of Wombat Hill. Trees were planted and in 1883 the council asked Taylor & Sangster, to develop a professional landscape plan for the gardens. Check out the Grotto and Fernery.

Aurora Australis

Melissa McGeary

A300 to Mt Franklin 4km to Castlemaine 30km to Bendigo 68km

Jacksons Lookout Tower

SPRINGS

C316 to Glenlyon 9km to Malmsbury 27km to Kyneton 31km

to Malmsbury 27km to Kyneton 31km

View Hill Rd

Rosella

Smith Barkas

Parker

Jamieson Trewhella

Little

Vincent Nth

Langdon

HEPBURN

Daylesford Malmsbury

Barkas

Vincent Nth

Rosella Ln

C317 to Trentham 25km to Woodend 45km to Melbourne 113km via Calder Fwy

The Little Local - thelittlelocal.com.au

Barkas

Parker Trewhella

Frazer

Grenville

Stanhope

Stanley

Queensberry

Orford Daly

Camp

Duke

Vincent

Bridport

Harts Ln

Langdon Crt

Millar

West

Perrins

Fulcher

Tierneys Ln

Grenville

Lake Road

A300 to Blampied 8km to Newlyn 15km to Creswick 24km to Clunes 41km to Ballarat 39km

C141 to Sailors Falls 3km to Ballan 30km to Melbourne 109km via Western Fwy

Jubilee

LAKE DAYLESFORD

Hoaths

C141