We woke up at around 6.45am and all of us took our shower except Emeryn before heading to level 6 for our special big breakfast, courtesy from the backpacker’s. The breakfast was more special compare to the normal days and daddy had his fair share on it. Again, we marched to the Federation Square right after our breakfast. Unfortunately Emeryn was feeling a lil’ ill on that particular day. She looked less energetic and weak. We were there early, waiting for our pick up and again the cold, strong wind slapped on our faces fiercefully. Emeryn slept through the journey and she recovered well right after her nap. Perhaps, insufficient rest few days back.
On our last day tour, we went to Ballarat and Sovereign Hill, a recreated 1851 to 1864 gold rush town and mine. We witnessed many unique and old-time designs of houses in Ballarat Town and it was all amazingly superb. The driver dropped some of the passengers to the Ballarat Wildlife but our tour excludes that. We reached Sovereign Hill at about 10.30am. First, we visited the so-called indoor display and snapped a few photos with all the figures there but we missed the show in the theater because we were too busy with the camera and the flashes. There were guides in costume and a whole class of school kids with teacher in period costume experiencing how life would have been at that time. There’s something about Sovereign Hill that is both charming and very relaxing because it really does resemble a small country town - the inhabitants may be in fancy dress, but there are enough streets lined with dusty timber buildings and ragged miners’ tents to make us feel such a way. Besides it’s full of businesses selling items typical of the era - clothing, toiletries, candles, sweets and many of which are made here.
The whole place was very dusty and we were showered with drizzling rain on and off. We saw some horse carriage along the way. We also went to the bowling alley and had some fun knocking down some pins especially Emeryn had lots of fun trying. We continued walking around and later purchased some apple pies for a quick lunch. Subsequently we witness the gold pour demonstration. The town was very well thought out and the gold pour demonstration was really interesting. The gold pour showed how the smelted gold was poured into ingot form and cooled in water for immediate handling. The ingot weighed 3 kilograms. We then watched the marching soldier and then performed how the gun shooting were done.
There are also activities to undertake, such as panning for gold at the diggings area below the main street. Here, crouching visitors agitate wide metal pans vigorously in the hope of retrieving a few flecks of gold. There is certainly gold present, as the management has thoughtfully salted the stream with a modest amount beforehand. Emeryn again was too eager to try but mummy only allowed her to play with it for a short while before we walked away as the water was very muddy. We also passed through Sovereign Hill's Chinese Camp, a recreation of the Chinese miners’ homes and lives in 1850s Victoria. To our surprise, the small temple contains an impressive audiovisual presentation, via suspended widescreen TVs placed strategically within.
Last but not least before leaving Solvereign Hill, we visited the souvenir shop but we came off empty handed even Emeryn requested for a t-shirt from mummy. Poor thing! Before hopping into the coach, we went to the Gold Museum and walked around. We left Ballarat at about 4pm and reached Melbourne again around 5.45pm. This time around, we had McD for dinner. After the dinner, we went back to the room while daddy and kor kor walked around Chinatown looking for some food again. Mummy and Emeryn went back to the room to get a short rest before going out to Chinatown. We walked for 2hours before going back to the room again. Mummy started to feel very ill later in the evening where she decided to rest early that nite leaving Emeryn under the care of daddy and kor kor.
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