Steiglitz Historical Park Walk - April 2019

There are some magnificent old Grass Trees on this walk.

There is a lot of old gold mining history out to the north west of Melbourne and while in some places you need to traipse through the scrub to check things out, or in other spots you need to visit old towns that have now been a little gentrified. There is one place that is very close to Melbourne that you neither have to traipse for kilometres through the scrub or spend time in a gentrified town to check out the old gold mining history though, and that is around the (almost) ghost town of Steiglitz up in the Brisbane Ranges.

There's plenty of parking at the old Steiglitz Courthouse.

And here's my semi-annual attempt at getting a fresh photo of the Steiglitz Courthouse.

Normally when I visit up here I strike out into the bush a fair way but today I decided to concentrate a little closer to the historic town. Parking at the old Steiglitz Courthouse I made another desultory attempt at photographing the old courthouse before setting off on my walk, first up along Stawell Street. Some of the old streets of Steiglitz are still signposted and while the bush is slowly reclaiming the old thoroughfares if you poke around a little there is plenty of evidence of the activity that went on back here 150 years ago. Stawell Street makes its way out of town towards a huge old Pine Tree (which makes a handy navigation point) before dropping into Sutherland Creek.

Bluestones on Stawell Street.

A lot of the old streets are signposted but mother nature is reclaiming them fairly quickly.

This huge old pine tree is a handy navigational reference point if you are walking in the area.

This section of track was the original start (or end) of the three day Burchell Trail, although for some reason Parks Vic have shortened it up a bit and put in a pointless loop and now the trail starts at Fridays Picnic & Camping Area. I now criss crossed Sutherland Creek a bit before climbing up a rocky, Grass Tree lined slope, the track here bypassing a rugged little gorge. Normally this little gorge has a bit of running water through it, but after our dry spell it was more or less bone dry today with only a few rock pools left over from yesterdays rain.

The first crossing of Sutherland Creek.

Walking along Sutherland Creek I passed by this old mine. I've actually visited quite a few old mines lately and this isn't the only one that has been broken into, maybe it's something to do with the price of gold?

My track climbed high above this gorge on Sutherland Creek.

There are some nice Grass Trees on the climb above the gorge.

Things got a little tricky now navigation wise, as I climbed up and around the lip of the gorge I picked up a very old and faint track that branched off towards the top of a small hill. While this old track was a little vague to start with you don’t want to miss it, especially if you are a fan of Grass Trees like me. The Grass Trees that crown this hill are some of the most impressive that I’ve seen for a fair while although Cinnamon Fungas is an issue up here so clean your boots before and after walking here.

There is normally a few pools of water in this gorge, things were very dry on this visit though.

That's my track heading off between the two trees.

Once located the old track is pretty easy to follow as it heads through some some nice Grass Trees.

Dropping down the hill I reached a t junction and picked up another old track that took me back towards Steiglitz through more extremely dry bushland, my outward route along Sutherland Creek visible below me through the trees for part of the journey (it’s that kind of walk). Reaching Wrixon Street I turned left and dropped almost all the way back down to Stawell Street to check out an old well. Now if old wells are your thing then it’s probably worth dropping down here, however for everyone else just turn right and start the climb up Wrixon Street towards South Steiglitz Road.

The country is super dry at the moment.

The old well near the bottom of Wrixon Street...you really need to like your old wells to make the effort to drop down here to check this one out I think.

Heading up Wrixon Street.

My stroll topped out on South Steiglitz Road today, well actually to be precise it topped out on top of some old mullock heaps in the scrub on the south side of the dirt road. Along with the rim of the gorge I’d climbed earlier the old mullock heaps provided a pretty decent view, although the grey sky and parched land wasn’t exactly super scenic. Dropping off the mullock heaps I followed South Steiglitz Road through some more great Grass Trees and then picked up a sign posted walking track heading back down to the Steiglitz Courthouse.

The quiet South Steiglitz Road isn't too bad to walk on.

I climbed onto these old mullock heaps beside South Steiglitz Road to get a bit of a view.

The old mullock heaps.

Heading back towards town I passed by some more Grass Trees.....

....and then picked up this walking track back down to town.

Instead of heading straight back to the ute though I now took a walk through some of the streets in the section of town that still has a few surviving buildings. Now people still live in some of these historic buildings so you need to be respectful when poking around here. Dropping down Regent Street there are not only a few old buildings remaining but also a few information signs off to the side of the road, these information signs have a plan of what the old town looked like back in the gold rush days. This afternoon though the open paddocks of parched yellow grass made imagining the bustling old town fairly hard, even for someone with a fertile imagination like mine.

I dropped down Steiglitz Road for a couple of hundred metres,

There are plenty of hints scattered through the scrub of the days gone by.

The old church at Steiglitz.

Steiglitz

I'm thinking that this is capping an old mine.

After dropping down passed the church and an old pub I turned up Clow Street. Clow Street gives an idea of how busy this place use to be, the bluestone lined street is around 15 metres wide I’m guessing. Heading along Clow Street I passed by the site of the old Blacksmith’s Residence and also the old Grocery Store before swinging back across Meredith-Steiglitz Road and climbing back up to the old court house and finishing off my walk.

Steiglitz

Hmm, I'm old enough to remember filling up at a Golden Fleece.

I think that this was the old pub.

Clow Street, Steiglitz. The old town was built on gold.

The Dirt.
I walked 4.7 kilometres and climbed 172 metres on this easy stroll. Now my fairly dry write up probably doesn’t do this spot justice I’m thinking, if history is your thing then a walk at Steiglitz should be on your ‘to do’ list I think. That said I think Spring is the best time for walking out here, especially if you want to wander into the scrub a bit, at the moment things are very dry and parched looking. While there is no shortage of published walking notes for up here, think Chapman, Tempest, Daly, Thomas, etc. For today’s stroll I mostly followed the notes and map out of Julie Mundy’s book Best Walks of Geelong, the Bellarine and the Brisbane Ranges.

Relevant Posts.
Sutherland Creek, Brisbane Ranges National Park, 2018.
Yankee Gully, Brisbane Ranges National Park, 2014.

The wide bluestone lined boulevard of Clow Street.

This is the site of the old blacksmith's cottage, the chimney might be part of the actual old cottage...maybe? I'm thinking that the currant building might be a little more recent.

The old Steiglitz grocery store.

Climbing back up to the courthouse another pleasant enough stroll was over.