Travel Feature: Ararat, Victoria

Words and pics Andrew Harris

A rush revealed

Vic's goldfields may conjure images of a romantic, grimy pursuit of a better life, the so-called 'digger' hunched over a creek, panning for alluvial gold. In fact, it was an extremely violent place, where veterans of the Californian Gold Rush were a law unto themselves, and where tensions between close-knit Irish, Chinese and English miners frequently turned bloody – it's no accident that every gold-founded town in central and western Vic had its own jail.

Few people are familiar with the crucially important contribution the Chinese made to the state, and fewer would know that Ararat is the only town in Australia founded by them.

A CHILLING REMINDER
From a distance, a bluestone fortress on the hill above the district hospital, overlooking central Ararat; from the inside, an eerie, morbidly fascinating place described by one inmate as 'hell'. 'J Ward Gaol for the Criminally Insane', as it's known these days, has no permanent residents, save for a caretaker and George, an apparently innocuous ghost, content with occasionally slamming a few doors, eliciting a scream or two.

Tours run four times a day, Monday, to Saturday, (10am, 11am, 1pm and 2pm), and six times on Sundays and school holidays (extra tours at noon and 3pm). It's best to arrive 10 minutes early to ensure you're not locked out and left behind. Night tours are also available, but require prior arrangement.

Taking the 11am tour is Ron Duffin, a long-time policeman working in and around Ararat. When he retired, his interest in local history got the better of him. And it's just as well, because before J Ward was shut down in the Vic mental-health privatisation sweep of the early 1990s, Ron had professional dealings with the institution. He knows it well.

J Ward's history is a layered cake, reflected in the mish-mash of past and present evident in the building itself, and in the sorts of stories Ron tells us on the tour. He constantly moves around the decades, telling how life was in the 1920s, 50s, and 80s, as our footsteps echo through the buildings and out into the courtyards. J Ward was always a smelly, noisy, un-private place. Prisoners (1861–1886) and patients who were later called 'clients' (1887–1991) were required to do their business in public, and were at various points in history fumigated with sulphurous pesticides and treated with electroshock therapy.

Calling the tour 'spooky' would cheapen the experience. Ron maintains that it's purely historical, and that's the chilling part: when he evokes the wails of straight-jacketed clients and details their violent reasons for internment, there's no embellishment.

COSMOPOLITAN ARARAT
The Vines Cafe and Bar is an ever-reliable source of thoughtful, nourishing gourmet fare, situated at what the cafe has termed (it's written on a chalkboard) the 'Paris End of Ararat'. It could well be the end of town with more import: The Vines is across Barkly Street from the police station and the courts.

As I savour a bowl of linguine with creamy pumpkin, chilli and cheese, the movers and shakers come to meet and eat. A day later, on the way back to Melbourne, over a gruyere-and-blue-cheese souffle, I watch a regional news team shoot a quick story in front of the courts. I figured I'd like to see how it all panned out, so I weaken and order a feather-light but sinful passionfruit-topped pavlova.

Close to The Vines Cafe and Bar is the Gum San (Cantonese for 'gold mountain') Chinese Heritage Centre. Many Chinese who journeyed to the Vic goldfields came from the region of Canton (Guangzhou). It's for this reason one of the richest alluvial gold deposits ever found (discovered by a group of about 700 prospectors) was named the 'Canton Lead'. Tens of thousands on descended on the region upon hearing of the Chinese miners' discovery, and present-day Ararat was built.

More than three tonnes of gold were unearthed within the first three months. The deposits were eventually exhausted and, along with the vanishing population, the memory and awareness of the thousands of Chinese – who walked 350km from Robe, SA, to avoid the racist poll-tax – evaporated. Several of the Chinese who remained in Ararat married Europeans, and to this day many of their descendents have no idea about their heritage.

Following Ararat's entrance into a formal sister-city relationship with Taishan, Canton, The Gum San Chinese Heritage Centre was built. The showcase of Chinese culture and its place in regional Vic cost around four million dollars and involved many donations of labour and materials from the Australian government, China and the Australian Chinese community. Its gleaming tiled roof is hard to miss on the drive through Ararat into the Grampians, and that's for good reason. After a 12-minute introductory video, I felt I gained a holistic understanding of the golden history of central and western Vic. I definitely didn't learn this stuff at school.

SAVOUR THE LOCAL FARE
For hungry travellers in and around the Grampians, dinner at The Kookaburra is a must. Buzzing any given night, the restaurant specialises in the kind of high-quality locally produced meals everyone will salivate over, from the seasoned gourmet to the routine pub-goer. Chef Rick Heinrich believes in full portions of flavoursome, filling food, and along with his wife, Vonne, he's been delighting diners in Halls Gap - one of the Grampians' main towns - for over 28 years.

I choose the succulent grilled barramundi, served on a bed of green salad, with roast potatoes and tartare sauce. I finish up with some of the Kookaburra's outstanding house-made chocolate-and-cherry ice-cream and make a mental note to take a walk the next day.

EXPLORE THE GRAMPIANS
The central area of the Grampians National Park offers exceptionally accessible, sweeping views from sheer cliffs, overhung by precariously placed granite ledges. The ledges are fitted for your safety with solid metal railing, but the serpentine roads up to them aren't, and all speed-caution signs are best obeyed.

Starting from the mountain hamlet of Halls Gap, I turn onto Mt Victory Road. On my left, through the trees, I can see the massive granite hillside Elephant's Hide. Ten kilometres from Halls Gap, I turn right into Mt Difficult Road, continue for 5km, and into Boroka Lookout car park.

A number of other travellers are milling about, enjoying the view with quiet reverence. For many of them, this is probably their first such perspective on the Grampians, and it's my first of the day, with Halls Gap below and the blue hill-top reservoir of Lake Bellfield above.

Back down Mt Difficult Road, right onto Mt Victory Road for 2km, and left into the Reid's Lookout car park, are more superb views. This time it's Victoria Valley, Lake Wartook and the Mt Difficult Range spread out before me. It's from the rocky perch of Reid's Lookout, in summer, that a ranger keeps an eye on the horizon for approaching bushfire.

A 2km return drive from the Reid's Lookout car park takes me to The Balconies. The aspect is much the same as from Boroka Lookout, but this time contextualised by trees charred during the 2006 bushfires, bright green mossy re-growth and birdsong.

Though many Grampians trails are still closed and awaiting reconstruction, there's enough to keep fresh-air fiends busy for at least a week. As one avowed fan of the peace and picture afforded by The Balconies told me, "It's like being in heaven."

Ararat and the Grampians: Fast Facts