380

258 259 260 261 262

370 340 360 Barkers 390

Creek ROAD 350 MCIVOR GRANGE Axe Creek Catchment Reservoir HARCOURT–SUTTON North Gap

L

360 400

5905 ROAD 5905 350

Creek 360 390 HENDERSON

350 380 ROAD 370

Barkers

527 Main

400 350

RICHARDS

420 470 450

480 500

437 520 540

GIANNARELLI 1

400

ruins

380 360

400 562 420 560

412 400 BLIGHT’S 5904 5904 Channel ROAD

L L 440

GIANNARELLI POLISHING 620

500

520 540 GIANNARELLI 2

560

460

420 640

420 580 JOSEPH JOSEPH

COOPERS 380 420

480

440 380 440 LAYTON440

430 Channel

440 600 640 ELYS LANE 460

ruins 540

653 600

390

480

Eyre Mount Alexander Regional Park 500 400

Target Rock

RESERVOIR ROAD 480 HARCOURT GRANITE

5903 Saunders Aqueduct 5903 400 420 Creek 440 532 420 500 Wabbit Wocks 500 Creek

380 520 480 Langs Lookout 360 440

460 640

Roxana Pass West Spur Lookout 600

600 WIN TV MAST

603 460 440 erroded 620

560 580

660 480

ABC TV MAST 500

420 680 740 520

540 540

La Larr Ba 560 Gauwa Park 520 700 500 Shepherds Flat Lookout

Harcourt BALLANT

580 400 720

480

INIA 600

WEST

390 L 620

640 Black Wallaby Rocks Creek 746 Mount Alexander

460 700 cairn Loddon Catchment 660 560

The Oaks 580 720 Byrnes

680 YOUNG 700

5902 440 5902 540 TRACK

L 500 400

MARKET STREET 520

420

390 ROAD Scorpion Rocks RIDGE PICNIC QUARRY GULLY L L LODGE BROTHERS L Aplite Rock 449

430 Picnic 650 700 410 680 735

660 720 Slippery Rock Dam 450 Gully 640 700 DANNS ROAD WALKING

THOMAS Tingays Dam 470 530 660 510

Creek 620

640

490

ROAD 550 500

560 580

600 Poplar Dam 620 680

600

TRACK 5901 Channel 510 5901 cave 550 South Peak 600 640

540 Knoblocks Dam 620 460 520

380 480 Dog Rocks Saddle 600 500 Dog Rocks 400 440

420 500 580 Whisky

500 520 580 marker post M O U N T A L E X A N D E R 600 Gully 560 540 520 – L E A N G A N O O K – 540

500 620 640

C 560 W A L K I N G T R A C K S 480 480

sealed road, formed gravel road, unformed track . 480

660

Goldfields Track , channel...... School Plantation 500 Dam Channel walking track: major, minor, indistinct ...... DRIVE timbered, quarry site and infra-structure, dam . . . . Sericulture koala fence, koala fence posts only, stone fence . . . Cottage

600 573 5900 creek, contour (interval 10 m) ...... 540 380 560 5900 locked gate, lookout ...... L GN Creek 640

520 MN

580 no public access 0 0.5 1.0 km 620

550 ROCKS 9.5° 644 556 Leanganook OLIVER

530 TRACK 600

Scale ~ 1:18,000 @ A3 Grid 1 km Datum WGS 84 Zone 55H TB 640 Picnic Ground 620

HVHTC, harcourt.vic.au CCM, cartography.id.au South Lookout 540 HARMONY 520 KATOO © CCM January 2014 Main 520 500 COC 520

600 500 480 Mud Brick Dam

500 460 Forest 480 480 460

ROAD 580 630 600 460 LEANGANOOK TRACK 480 440 can be muddy 580

Harcourt 560 Coliban Catchment 560

LANGS ROAD McQUILLIANS

5899 540 5899

520 HOWARD

500 WAY 480

GRANGE ROAD 400

430 616 460 540 600

A79 470 520 580 500 258 259 260 261 560 FARADAY - SUTTON 56 µ 01/02/2019 262 General Mount Alexander is approximately 125 km north-west of . It rises 350 metres above the surrounding area and provides a rich purple background to the fertile Harcourt valley below. The mountain The Oak Forest A Boer War Memorial? stands at a level of 744 metres above sea level. (By comparison Mount In the late years of the nineteenth century the proprietor of a tannery Local residents casually referred to the summit cairn as a Boer War Dandenong is 633 metres.) The underlying rock is granidiorite. Most of led a long campaign to promote planting of the Valonia Oak in order Memorial. People with a precise interest in history will have noted that the mountain is included within the boundaries of the Mount to secure the supply of tan for his Tannery at the Castlemaine suburb the cairn was constructed over twenty years before the Boer War. Alexander Regional Park. Non-perennial creeks that rise on the of Winters Flat. In August 1900 the Lands Department planted the However, there is value in the oral history as it fixes this as the site of Mount Alexander mountain include Forest Creek, Picnic Gully Creek, Eyre Creek, Axe oaks, together with a variety of other species, Ash Trees and Atlas the district celebrations for the relief of Mafeking. The Mount Alexan- Creek, Myrtle Creek and Whiskey Gully Creek. The mountain, known as Cedars being the most successful. der Mail reported "inspired by a right spirit the young men of the Lanjanuc to the Jaara Jaara/Dja Dja Wurrung people, was the location By 1912 it was realised that the Valonia Oaks would not successfully district have arranged to commence next Friday to prepare a huge Contemporary and Historic Notes of a sacred ceremonial ground and used as an outlook. establish here as the drainage is inadequate. Other varieties of oak bonfire on the summit of Mount Alexander." Twenty men spent four were more successful, among them the Holly Oak, Cork Oak, English days, to build the pile, reckoned to be the largest in the Colony. On Walking Tracks Map Flora & Fauna Oak, Algerian Oak and Bristle Tipped Oak. The Oak Forest is significant June 6th 1900 the bonfire was lit in the presence of a large number of The regional park is home to many types of eucalypts including as a community recreation area. It has been used as a venue for films, locals and was visible for a very great distance. manna gums with their distinctive smooth textures and hanging picnics and concerts. In 1910 the first plantation of Pinus insignus (or ribbons of bark, messmate, long-leafed box and yellow box. Other Pinus radiata) was established south of the Oak Forest. Strong demand Sericulture Ruins examples of flora are acacias, native grasses, herbs and wildflowers by Harcourt Fruit Growers led to the subsequent expansion of the The site of the Mount Alexander Silkworm Farm can be found on an such as austral cranesbill, ferns and mosses. The fauna includes koalas, plantation to provide wood for packing cases. These plantations were east-facing slope at the south end of the Mount. The area was eastern grey kangaroos, black wallabies, echidnas, the rare tuan or harvested for the final time following the leasing of the plantation overplanted as a pine plantation but was cleared in 1997. A granite brush-tailed phascogale, sugar gliders, brushtail and ringtail possums, areas to Hancock Victorian Plantations. The area occupied by the pine cottage in a ruinous condition, and foundations of a granite snakes, lizards, frogs, owls, eagles, cockatoos, rosellas, parrots and trees has been revegetated with native species and is to be a workroom, are all that remain of a complex of buildings which altitudinal migratory currawongs and robins. Plentiful hollows in the recreation park for mountain bike events, horse riders and walkers. included a magnanerie - a French word describing the place where old trees for nesting and dead wood on the ground for shelter make silkworms are bred and fed. The whole venture was organised and Mount Alexander an excellent native animal habitat. A Koala Park was Transmission Facilities financed by the Victorian Ladies Sericulture Company Limited. A established in 1943. The park was stocked with koalas from Phillip The mountain has a number of transmission sites. The transmission wealthy English widow, Mrs Bladen-Neill organized this venture. Three Island and managed by a committee of local residents. This park was towers are among the tallest structures in . The Win TV years of unsuitable soil, lack of summer rains, dramatic winter frosts later relocated and enlarged. It was abandoned in 2009. Leanganook transmitter was built in 1961. The national broadcaster ABC TV built a and the ravages of rabbits and possums were disastrous for the young picnic facilities are located near the entrance to the former Koala Park. repeat/ transmitter tower in 1963. That mast was dismantled after mulberry trees. The enterprise was abandoned in February 1877. Mount Alexander hosts a unique member of the Brassicaceae family being replaced in 1992 by a 157 metre high structure on top of which called Southern Shepherd’s Purse (Ballantinia antipoda). This tiny plant is installed a UHF TV antenna. Other masts are the PMG (Telecom) Target Rock grows in small patches of moss on granite outcrops in damp locations. repeater station, built in 1959, a mobile-phone master-transmitter, Target Rock is a notable feature of the north-west slopes, marking the Ballantinia antipoda has become extinct in all other documented sites antennae for Community Radio, and the Taxi services. site of a rifle range utilised by the militia between the Boer War & in Victoria. The plant is nationally recognised as a threatened species. World War I. Clearing of the pine trees in 1998 has enabled us to locate Lookouts this rock. Upon the flat vertical west face of Target Rock can still be Facilities & Recreation Lang’s Lookout commemorates the efforts of James H Lang, to have a seen the outline of a circular target – probably painted with bitumen. Mount Alexander has many recreational walking tracks, ranging in tourist road constructed across the top of the range. In 1928, Lt-Col. From 1899 this was used a target for a rifle club formed in Harcourt as degree of difficulty from the easy to the challenging. Picnic, barbeque, Lang, in his Buick piloted by Alan Lang, and Cr J R Duggan in his a response to the outbreak of the Boer War. camping and toilet facilities are to be found at Leanganook picnic area Chevrolet, accompanied by the Hon H S W Lawson, proceeded across at the south-end of the mount. Picnic and barbeque facilities are to be the mount in a zig-zag fashion to prove that such a road was feasible. Granite Quarries found at the Oak Forest. The nearest RV dump site is located at Bridge The road thus pioneered is now known as Joseph Young Drive, in Large-scale quarrying of granite on the mountain started in 1859 with Street Harcourt. Orienteering and abseiling opportunities abound. honour of a long-serving Metcalfe Shire councillor. A large outcrop of stone supplied to the Melbourne to Echuca Railway. Cornish quarry- Cyclists find the mountain to be a rewarding challenge. The quiet granite boulders on the western slopes of Mount Alexander is known man Joseph Blight had arrived in the colony in 1855 and achieved peaceful environment is all-encompassing. as Dog Rocks. The manager of Sutton Grange Station, Lockhart some success in quartz reef mining at Eureka Reef. He then turned to Morton, named these rocks in 1846 because they were the favourite quarrying at Mount Alexander, at first providing stone for the railway. The Explorers lair of packs of dingoes. This is now a popular abseiling site. Shepherd’s He began to work the Blight’s Quarry site in 1862. A 36-ton block of When Major Thomas Mitchell was surveyor general of New South Flat Lookout also attained its name in the pastoral, pre-gold rush era. granite for the Burke and Wills Memorial in the Melbourne General Wales he mounted an exploring expedition into what he later Mountain-top lookouts provide splendid views of the surrounding Cemetery was sourced here in 1863. At the time it was the largest described as "Australia Felix". From a long way off he set his north-east country-side; the grazing properties of Sutton Grange and the block of stone ever quarried in the Colony. Harcourt Granite has a course by reference to this mountain, this friendly hill, and on 28 vineyards and orchards of Harcourt. Mount Ida at Heathcote, Mount reputation as a first-rate building/dimensional stone. It is used for September 1836 with an aboriginal named Tommy, "rode with ease to Macedon to the south and the ranges to the west can be building and monumental work, with waste stone being cut for spalls. the summit, and found it to be but thinly wooded so that I could take seen. Quarry sites are easily recognisable by the great piles of cut stone my angles around the horizon without difficulty." He named it Mount discarded on site. A close look at the drill marks gives an indication of Byng after John Byng, 1st Earl of Strafford, a Field Marshal during the Trigonometric Station the age of the quarry. Smooth holes were produced by air compressor Peninsular War, but soon changed it to honour Alexander the Great, In the days before Global Satellite Positioning the distinct features of drills, while more "ragged" holes date from the era when the holes emperor of ancient Macedonia. Overlander Edward John Eyre camped each region were used for the accurate surveying of land. The summit were "drilled" by two men; one holding/turning the drill (in reality a on the north-west slopes of Mt Alexander on 8th February 1838 of Mt Alexander is an ideal spot to commence a survey. A survey long-shanked cold-chisel) and the other being the striker. The age of having become bushed in the vicinity of Mt Alexander on a five- mound was here in 1867, consisting of a "flagstaff in the centre of a the site may also be gauged from the mature gums and pine trees month-long journey from Goulburn to Adelaide with a mob of cattle. pile of stones." The solid granite cairn was built in 1876. A socket in the growing between the blocks of discarded stone.

Harcourt Valley Heritage and Tourist Centre harcourt.vic.au Cartography Community Mapping cartography.id.au November 2014