Burra have a fascinating self tour around their heritage buildings. Burra is the first mining site in Australia & it was copper they mined for. We set off for the Burra information centre around 9am where we collected a special key which allowed us access to buildings & sites around Burra which are not accessible to the general public. Burra is a beautiful little historic town, we walked along looking at the old church, town hall & some old shops. It was there we decided to head back to our car & drive up to the old mine site, glad we decided to drive it was along walk with lots & lots of little walks to see things. Our key came in handy as the gates did not officially open until 10, John & Jasper jumped out in front and the key opened the gates for us to get in early. Old mines are fascinating, old townships are more fascinating. So much history. Following the mine we headed out to see the old police station & gaol. The gaol story was very interesting, after it was a gaol it became someone's home, odd place to call home, but then it became a Reformatory for Girls which apparently gave the town some good stories of some very naughty girls. The teenage calls Chloe, Indi & Ra thought this was fantastic and both Dads suggested we could leave them there.......
After checking out the mine & local establishments, we decided to head back to camp to have some lunch before heading out again to a couple of sites closer to camp. The Unicorn brewery gave us underground tunnels to walk through & then an old home with some antique furniture & real clothing from the time rounded it out. Of course no trip for me would be complete without a visit to the local cemetery, this is where you find out the real stories, but the little cemetery only had 4 gravestones and not in good condition at all......later that night around the camp fire I got talking to the owner of the caravan park & he explained that the cemetery was washed away during a flood and if I had of walked a little further and looked over the crest of a hill I would have seen all the other gravestones.
Another site we found today was the house which features on the cover of the Midnight Oil album Diesel & Dust which was pretty cool.
Amazing little town Burra, freezing cold & windy but lots to see.
Tomorrow we are off the Mt Remarkable to stay at the Mambray camp ground for the beginning of the bush.
Still having photo issues :(
Today's blog was written by Di
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