The trip to Victoria is finally here. This was supposed to happen last October but the forecast for the week predicted massive amounts of rain so I opted to defer it until April the following year (2025). After what felt like forever waiting, the trip is finally on and I board the Spirit of Tasmania for the overnight sail to Victoria. The plan is to simply take my time on the trip and take in all I can. I intend staying on as many of the C roads as possible to avoid any of the highways and the rush associated with driving on them and just take in the scenery on the backroads. I have booked accomodation all the way around so I don’t have to pack as much which has left me space to take the drone. Hoping to get some reasonable shots with it on the way. My ride of choice for the trip is my trusty KLR650. I love these bikes and this is my third one. They don’t do anything special but they do do everything without giving you any problems. I like to think of them as the Swiss Army Knife of motorcycles.
Day 1 - Geelong to Echuca
Boarding the Spirit of Tasmania for an overnight passage to Victoria is always a good idea as you get a good nights sleep and are ready to get straight into your holiday as soon as you disembark at the Geelong terminal. This was probably one of the smoothest passages I have done and I was off the ferry by 0630 so it was a great start for the day with the weather forecast to be good for the next few days of the trip so I was a very happy camper.
Heading out of Geelong was stress free with minimal traffic but as I got around 20km inland the fog came in and stayed with me for the next hour of riding. The ride was pretty slow in the dark as it was a fairly thick fog and I had to clean the mist off the visor with the back of my glove every 30 seconds or so just to see the road. Once the sun started to burn it off it was much better and by the time I hit Daylesford it was a glorious sunny day. Stopped in at Sailors Falls on the way as I had been there before and it was a nice waterfall but the surrounding countryside was really parched and the waterfall was dry which was disappointing. Guess that is what you get when you travel at the end of summer.
Pushing on through Daylesford without getting the chance to look around after grabbing a pie and a coffee for breakfast as I was too early for anything to be open was a shame as Daylesford is a really nice place. Next stop was just out of town at Cricket Willow to get a picture of some big cricket bats. This place is open by appointment and visitors can see cricket bats being crafted from start to finish. Cricket was not a game I followed so once the pictures were taken it was onward to old gold mining town of Maldon. This is a really nice town that still holds a lot of the character of days gone by without having become a yuppie town. It also has an old abandoned gold dredge out of town that can be visited. I have had a fascination with gold for a long time and spent time in the Western Australian goldfields with a dry-blower and also in rivers in Victoria with a small dredge trying to pull some gold out of the ground in my younger years.
Stopping in the town of Maldon it is easy to think you are back in the gold rush times. There are fabulous old weaterboard house, stone buildings and the main street shops have maintained the look and feel of bygone days. The first gold was found in Maldon in 1853, in the midst of a gold rush that was happening in Victoria at the time. It was reported by the Chief Commissioner for Goldfields at the time that with weeks of the discovery the population swelled to over 3,000, and by early 1854 it was estimated there were around 18,000 people in the area. Historical records for the area suggest that the Maldon goldfield produced 1.7 million ounces of gold.
The Maldon Dredge located just north of the town at Porcupine Flats harks back to a time when machinery allowed reworking of the earlier deposits visited by the thousands of men in the 1800’s. Work at the site at Porcupine Creek by Mr. George Heywood commenced around 1958 although the dredge was not fully operational until after 1973. It worked with moderate success until around 1978 when it is believed to have been shut down and abandoned because it did not meet electrical standards of the State Electricity Commission. The dragline was brought across from the Yallourn Coal Mine to create the initial pond and help with operations but it is reported to have been of little use and was abandoned where it is now stands early in the operations.
After a coffee and a wander around the area of the dredge at Maldon it was time to push on toward Bendigo as I had a mine tour I wanted to do whilst there. The ride out was nice with minimal traffic, blue skies and enough curves to make a bike rider smile. It doesn’t get much better than this. On the way into Bendigo I had to detour to ‘Birds R Us’ to get a picture of the big rooster I was told they have outside their shop and a colourful specimen it was indeed. Got a photo to add to my collection of Big Things and then onto Bendigo proper. I arrived just after the latest tour of the underground Central Deborah Goldmine had started so I shot into town to get a picture of a big Lotus sculpture and a look around until the next tour commenced. The Big Lotus is near the botanic gardens which looked interesting but time did not allow me to look around them. I did notice a heap of bats in the area hanging from the trees though. I was told there were none there 10 years ago but they are now in great numbers and hanging from all the trees. They make a heck of a lot of noise!
Back at the Central Deborah Goldmine I got on the next underground tour and after completing it I would recommend this as something anyone in the area should do. The guide Baz was really knowledgeable and it was incredible to see and understand the extent of the underground works that exist under Bendigo. It is hard to believe how the miners in the old days managed to do so much with just hand tools and hard physical labour. Conditions were harsh and a miner did not live very long back then.
The last leg of the day’s journey passed through Rochester where there was some silo art that I wanted to see. I have visited many of these old silos that have been painted with murals and am always amazed at the detail the artists get on their works and this one was also an amazing piece of art. Completed in July of 2018 by the well known Australian mural artis Jimmy Dvate they became the 22nd silos to be painted in Victoria. A feature of Jimmy Dvate’s works are locally threatened endemic species and for this mural he chose the Azure Kingfisher and the Squirrel Glider.
The Squirrel Glider is painted on the taller silo and was once thought to be extinct since 1939 until genetic testing confirmed their ongoing existence in the area. The smaller silo depicts the Azure Kingfisher. Inhabiting vegetation alongside waterways and wetlands the blue plumage on top and brilliant orange underparts make it one of the smallest and most brilliant of Australian Kingfishers. If you take the time to walk behind the smaller silo you will find a brilliant mural of a Platypus. This endemically threatened species is the only living species of Platypus to be found in Australia today. Some fabulous artwork that was definitely worth the visit.
A great days ride saw me arriving at Echuca around 4:00pm. Nice stress free ride with plenty to see and no rush to get anywhere. This is how I plan the trip to be for the next 10 days I hope. Booked a cabin in a caravan park at Echuca which was nice and comfortable so I am fresh to go for the next days adventure.
Day 2 - Echuca to Shepparton
Up early and ready to go I headed into Echuca to look around. The plan was initially to do a Discovery Tour of the old wharf precinct and then go on a paddle steamer for a 1 hour cruise. Arriving there just before 0900 I found everything closed with no vessel trips until 1130. This would not have left me enough time to do the other things planned for the day so I simply took a walk around and then hit the road. I will have to come back another time and spend a couple of days here to see the attractions. The area has been nicely restored to it’s heritge era and the paddle steamers looked good on the river in the early morning light. I was taken by a barge with logs strapped across the hull. These were used in the past to haul logs up and down the river by leaving the logs in the water and lashing them alongside the barge using the cross beam logs.
Hitting the road again my first stop was the Picola Silos to view the artwork there. Completed in late 2020 by Jimmy Dvate the works took only four weeks to finish. The artwork main feature is the Superb Parrot and as you walk around the silo the flora and fauna of the local Barmah forest are shown. The level of detail is amazing on such big pieces.
Leaving Picola I headed on to the Goulburn Valley town of Koonoomoo to visit ‘The Big Strawberry’. The weather was glorious and just right for riding. Sun was shining and there was very little wind around. Perfect, and the KLR650 was just humming along.
Visiting the Big Strawberry which is an operating strawberry farm, I took the standard obligatory picture of the big strawberry and then took myself inside to indulge in a strawberry ice cream and a strawberry milkshake. The ice cream and milkshake were nothing special which was disappointing but the restaurant area was nice.
The shop has most everything strawberry available from jams and wines to stuffed toys other bits and pieces.
Next stop was Katamatite to check out the silo art work and a big eagle sculpture that was said to be in the town. The first stop was the big eagle sculpture in the Lions Park on the side of the main road and a quick coffee at the picnic area while I was there.
The eagle is a metal sculpture by Andrew Whitehead and was constructed to bring attention to the eagles that are in the area. It has a wing span of 3m with feathers made of mower blades and claws from baling hooks it is truly an impressive piece of work.
Just up the road the GrainCorp silos have been painted to show the rich history of the area which today no longer exists. Painted by Tim Botwell in July 2023 the silos portrays the original inhabitants of the area, a steam passenger train that serviced the area in the early settlement days and a horse team drawing a scoop used to create the irrigation channels which were important to developing the region for farming.
A few kilometers further on the small farming town of Tungamah has the distinction of being the first of the North-Eastern silos to be painted. The artwork by Sobran Simcock of Western Australia was completed in a couple of sessions. Initially in February of 2018 the Brolgas dancing was created using 60L of paint and 142 spray cans over an 8 day period.
Sobran returned again in September 2019 and subsequently completed the other silos birds which include the Pink & Grey Galah, Cockatoo and others.
One of the best things about the silo art in North East Victoria is that they are all very close together making it just a short journey to the next one. This time it was a stop at St. James to see the work of artist Tim Bowtell. The silo art tells the story of George Coles Senior who purchased his first store in 1882 in the town of St. James and from there went on to grow the business into the Coles stores we know today.
Te next town was Devinish where the silo art was created by Melbourne street artist Cam Scale. The art work pays tribute to the fifty young men and women from the Devenish community that enlisted in WW1 and to honour the seven Devenish diggers that died in battle over the years.
The first art works completed for Anzac Day in 2018 were the WW1 nurse and a modern female military medic. The stage 2 artwork which is a tribute to the Australian Light Horse was unveiled for Anzac Day the following year.
The day was rolling on and I wanted to visit the Museum of Vehicle Evolution (MOVE) in Shepparton which closed at 4:00 so I hightailed there as quickly as I could. Arriving just on 3:00 I managed to spend an hour there and was not disappointed. I love visiting Motor Museums and this one was one of the best I have seen. There was a huge range of vehicles including trucks, busses, cars and motorcycles all displayed with plenty of room to move around and most of the displays have a link to the area and an interesting history for each of them. I was super happy they had a range of International trucks as I love the body styling on these. Pure heaven for a guy like me and a credit to the organisers. The pictures below are just a few of what is on display there.
Day 3 - Shepparton to Wadonga
A short run to Wadonga today to spend a day with my son Andrew. But first a run out to a small farm around 20km out of town to get a picture of a dragon sculpture I have been told is out that way. On the way out of the caravan park I also found a couple of big things, ‘Big Ernie’ who is a mascot of sorts in a sales yard and a Big Orange at a fruit growers shed. These Big Things are everywhere once you start looking for them.
Heading back through town again I was amused a a heap of French themed cow sculptures in the main street median strip and at other places throughout Shepparton. They are a part of the Moooving Art’ public exhibition to pay homage to the importance of the regions dairy industry. If you search for them I have been informed that there are over 90 scattered throughout the town. A few of them are shown below. There is also an interesting stone sculpture of a local motorcycle racer from Maroopna called Jack Findlay. Jack won the 1973 Isle of Man Senior Time Trial riding a Suzuki and in 1975 the Formula 750 World Championship on board a Yamaha.
From Shepparton it was a run out through some very dry farmland to the Winton Wetlands to see what is there. Again this area was really dry and parched and the wetlands were really only a small lake in the distance. There were some interesting sculptures on a 900m walk trail that represent the native animals and indigenous culture of the area which were quite clever. Finished the walk trail, had a coffee and some fruit and back on the road again.
Pushing on from the Winton Wetlands the next stop was Glen Rowan, Ned Kelly country. Glen Rowan was the site of Ned Kelly’s last stand and the town is pretty much a memorial to his exploits.
There is the Big ned Kelly statue in the main street, museums, old style moving picture shows, and the small township has an olden era theme reminiscent of the time of Ned Kelly. Certainly worth a visit if you are in the area and looking for a bit of Australian history.
I wanted to do a quick visit to Myrtleford on the way to Wadonga. Way back around 50 years ago when I was about 20 I worked in Myrtleford for a couple of seasons picking tobacco. Back then I had a great time up there and the entire region was given over to tobacco farming so I was interested to see what was there now since smoking is no longer in fashion.
Rolling into Myrtleford the first thing that struck me was how green and lush the area was after riding through all the dry farmland since leaving Shepparton. The streets are lined with beautiful old oak trees and others and all of the tobacco fields have given way to grape vines for as far as the ey can see. The town was nice and clean and has become somewhat of a tourist hub now, a far cry from when I was here 50 years ago.
Having done a quick lap of Myrtleford I pushed on to Rutherglen, a famous wine growing region and home to the Big Wine Bottle that I particularly wanted to get a picture of for my collection of big things. It was getting late so I did not stay long there and pushed on to Chiltern for the night which was not to much further. I am taking a day off for visiting my son and his wife there before moving on again.
