Chokem Flat is a free bush campground within the fascinating Castlemaine Diggings National Heritage Park. A huge clearing alongside Fryers Creek provides plenty of room for tents, caravans, RVs, and camper trailers.
The only camping facilities present at Chokem Flat are a brick fire pit and a basic wooden table with no seating.
Dogs are permitted (on leash) at the Chokem Flat Campground.
Parks Victoria has an excellent
Visitors Guide for the Castlemaine Diggings National Heritage Park. The guide provides the following information on the Castlemaine Diggings, as well as lots of other helpful info.
Castlemaine Diggings National Heritage Park harbours fascinating tales of a golden past and
retains much of its gold-rush character - from the evocative remains of house sites and
puddling machines to the gold mines and gullies that yielded fortunes. Between 1851 and
1854 the Castlemaine area was the world's richest shallow alluvial goldfield and home to
tens of thousands of migrant gold seekers. The park is Australia's first National Heritage Park,
declared in October 2002, part of the Box-Ironbark Parks and Reserves network.
Things to do and see
Castlemaine Diggings National Heritage Park is popular
for bushwalking, scenic drives, cycling, picnics,
exploring the mining relics and
gold prospecting.
Picnic facilities are located at Kalimna,
Vaughan
Springs, Garfield Waterwheel, Spring Gully Junction
and Eureka Reef. Vaughan Springs also has toilets and
mineral springs.
Camping is available at
Vaughan Springs, Warburtons
Bridge and Chokem Flat Campgrounds.
The Castlemaine Visitor Information Centre provides
an excellent introduction to the history and heritage of
the park.
The gold rush
Castlemaine Diggings National Heritage Park lies at the
heart of the central
Victorian goldfields. The park is a
rare place where you can see authentic traces of the
great Victorian gold rushes of the 1850s. Sites and
relics harbour secrets and tell stories about how life
really was on the diggings.
Despite the widespread impact of gold mining, the
park contains many significant Aboriginal sites. The
park lies within the country of Jaara people.
The discovery of gold in July 1851 lured tens of
thousands of migrants. By 1852, the population on the
Castlemaine Diggings was 40-60,000.
When the diggers arrived they entered a forest of
towering ironbarks, with trunks commonly over a
metre in diameter.
The diggers uprooted the country, giving the place the
appearance, as one newcomer remarked, of 'a great
cemetery in which all the graves had been opened and
emptied of their contents'.
Almost every gully, flat and hill in the park was named
in the gold rush. Many of the names offer insights into
the ethnic and regional backgrounds of the gold
seekers.
BBQ
Irishtown
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