GOLDEN GULLIES by Peter
Wilson, photos by Peter Wilson, Barbara Piaskowska and Caroline VaitkunasHOME PAGE | WHAT WE DO | EQUIPMENT | CONTACTS | RISK MANAGEMENT | PROGRAM | PHOTOS | MAGAZINE | LINKS
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GOLDEN GULLIES by Peter
Wilson, photos by Peter Wilson, Barbara Piaskowska and Caroline Vaitkunas
SEPTEMBER 2011
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The Golden Gullies Walk is a 16 kilometre circuit starting at the Vaughan Springs Picnic Ground on the banks of the Loddon River. Eighteen enthusiastic walkers gathered there around 10:00 am for an early start on a perfect morning for walking. The local frogs certainly seemed to be enjoying the conditions judging by the chorus of froggy noises coming from the river banks.
According to Glen Tempest in Daywalks Around Melbourne (2nd edition) the nearby Glenluce Mineral Springs Reserve was created in 1878 to protect a spring in the middle of the Loddon River. The springs at Vaughan, and the river between Vaughan and Glenluce, were reserved in 1914. Since October 2002 the area has been combined with others into the Castlemaine Diggings National Heritage Park. Having been added to the Victorian Heritage Register in 2003, the park is now the largest non-indigenous protected landscape in Australia.
The first five kilometres of the walk follows the Dry Diggings Track, one of the network of tracks developed and maintained by the Great Dividing Trail Association. The track begins along an old water race and then heads generally south through gullies including Butchers, Sailors and Stones where there is abundant evidence of the activities of those early gold seekers including old shafts, dams, water races and the crumbling ruins of buildings constructed from the local stone.
After a little over five kilometres we left the Dry Diggings Track and headed off track to a lunch spot on the banks of Sebastapol Creek. The creek was dry but some past flood had positioned logs very conveniently to make good seating.
Reinvigorated by lunch we headed downstream, picking our way along the banks of the creek until we emerged on to an old vehicle track that led us north through a gully full of low wattle bushes, vibrant with blossom. Golden Gullies of a different kind.
Another off track section along the banks of a badly eroded gully brought us to the now largely deserted Glenluce and a section of walk along Helge and Italian Hill Tracks until we reached cleared river flats beside the Loddon River. From that point it was up and over a ridge to a point further downstream and then along the river on yet another old water race.
This section of water race was a bit uneven under foot and infested with blackberries and thistles in parts but any discomfort was compensated for by periodic views of the river with its reflections of red gums in still pools and it didn’t seem long before we were back at Vaughan Springs.
Aside from small finds by amateur fossickers the gold nuggets of these golden gullies are a thing of the past. The riches to be found now are the flowers and trees of the forest that have survived the upheaval of being dug over by the thousands of treasure seekers during the days of the great Victoria gold rush era.
