Malachite
PLACES YOU MIGHT LIKE TO VISIT
IF YOU ARE TRAVELLING AND WOULD LIKE TO SEE A MINERAL COLLECTION, GEMS, FOSSILS etc.
The are many sites in Australia which cater to people interested in gems, minerals, fossils etc. The sites
listed here are sites I have visited over the years and have enjoyed. They provide a pleasant counterpart
to our fossicking activities and deserve to be supported by all lapidary/mineral/fossil enthusiasts.
VIC. N.S.W. QLD TAS.
(NOTE THAT THERE ARE MANY GREAT SITES IN OTHER STATES, BUT I HAVE NOT HAD THE OPPORTUNITY
TO VISIT THOSE SITES YET! SO THIS IS A VERY LIMITED LIST!!!!)
VICTORIA
MELBOURNE MUSEUM: has a great display of ‘Minerals and Gemstones’ as well ‘Fossils & Dinosaurs’ and ‘Meteors and Meteorites’.
Our club has visited the museums ‘mineral vaults’ as well as the public collections and both are worth a look! Club visit to museum
link (photos near bottom of page).
The museum website is at http://museumvictoria.com.au/melbournemuseum/
Portland Gem & Mineral display: this display, located at the ‘Tram Depot’ in Portland in S.W. Victoria is well worth a visit if you are
in the region. For a flavour of the display, take a look at our clubs visit to the display.
The Alan Wood collection: is a private collection located in Mortlake in S.W. Victoria. If is centred around the minerals and gems of
Mt Shadwell, Mortlake. See the Alan Wood Collection page.
N.S.W.
Australian Fossil and Mineral Museum, located in Bathurst, is an excellent museum and well worth a visit if you are in the area.
Some photos of the exhibition are here (photos near bottom of page)! The museum also has a website at with useful information at
URL: http://www.somervillecollection.com.au
LAKE MUNGO N.P.: Located 110km N.E. of Mildura is of geological, biological and cultural significance. As well as having evidence of
at least 40,000 yrs of human habitation is has good examples of erosion features in the lunette known as ‘The walls of china’. Here
you will see distinctly coloured soil layers in the eroded pinnacles and the resultant ‘alluvial fans’.
THE ‘ALBERT KERSTEN MINING & MINERALS MUSEUM’ in Broken Hill has a good display of local minerals reflecting Broken Hills
mining heritage.
QLD
WINTON: AUSTRALIAN AGE OF DINOSAURS MUSEUM is well worth a visit if you are in western QLD. It is located some 24km
from Winton on a ‘mesa’ with great views of the area. The museum shows where the recovered bones fit in the original dinosaur
and you can see the bones being extracted from the rock in which they were found.
LARK QUARRY: located some 110km south of Winton preserves some 3300 tracks showing the only recorded dinosaur stampede
on our planet!
Hughenden: at the tourist information centre you can view a large range of fossils from QLD.
TAS
ZEEHAN The mining musuem is well worth a visit. (No photos on this page due to the policy in place when I visited, which
prohibited any photography.)
HOBART the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery in the centre of Hobart (Dunn Pl., between Davey St. and Macquarie St.) Has a
good mineral/gem collection which is worth a visit if you are in the area.