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Bus Tours
All bus tours require bookings. Book online here.
Numbers are limited. If a cancellation is necessary please do so ASAP to allow others to access the tour.
Bus tours will depart from the north end of the Eastbank Centre in Nixon Street Shepparton. Please report to dispatch marquee in Nixon Street prior to boarding your bus. Departure times may have to be slightly staggered: there may a few minutes wait.
Dhurringile Mansion Tour
SATURDAY 30 NOVEMBER 2024
Our region’s signature mansion, created in 1877 by one of the four Winter brothers, northern Victoria’s answer to the squatters of the Western District. James Winter became the local squire, but hardly lived in the Italianate mansion, dying outside London on a visit in 1885. Home to German officer POWs in WW2.
Tour the immense 68 room mansion currently being decommissioned as a minimum security prison.
Tally Tour
SATURDAY 30 NOVEMBER 2024
Afternoon tea provided at Tallygaroopna Soldiers Memorial Hall.
See the slab hut of early squatter Sherbourne Sheppard (after whom Shepparton is named), a small private graveyard, and wander around the exterior of Hamilton Coldwell’s 1906 homestead, designed by well-known local architect, John Augustus Kenny Clarke.
This proud little Memorial hall, topped by its trophy WW1 German trench mortar, was opened by Acting Prime Minister Dr Earle Page on 9 June 1924. At £2500, it cost the small community £1000 more than Shepparton’s famous statue. See the RSL ‘dugout’.
Dookie and Nearby Tour
SATURDAY 30 NOVEMBER 2024
Time is allowed for lunch in Dookie, or enjoy your own in the CWA Gardens.
A rare opportunity to see one of the municipality’s few squatter-built homesteads, the evocative first stage erected by Humphrey Grattan in the early 1860s. The wonderful stable/coach house is suffering the ravages of time and its vernacular construction.
Very popular for weddings due to its picturesque rural setting outside Dookie, on land donated by vineyard owner John Curtain, this impressive cruciform (cross-shaped) 1898 church is a prominent local landmark. The presbytery is the municipality’s only Catholic monastery.
Be guided around this historic cemetery situated on the western slopes of Mt Major, with panoramic views providing a striking backdrop to the graves. With burials dating from the 1870s, it is one of two cemeteries in the Dookie area, the other being Cashel or Dookie East.
Walk around the exterior of this impressive (and impressively sited) two-storey house built in 1886 as the country residence for North Melbourne MLA John Curtain, who had taken over the Chateau Dookie Vineyard when other major shareholders withdrew. Meticulously restored.
The National Bank constructed this bank and residence in 1878, initially called Dookie South and part of a flourishing town for 15 years. It was used as the Dookie bank manager’s residence, a Presbyterian manse 1902 - 1922 and then became a private residence. Some areas are not wheelchair accessible.
Irrigation Tour
FRIDAY 29 NOVEMBER 2024
Time is allowed for lunch in Murchison, or bring your own. The Murchison Heritage Centre and Christ Church will be open. Tour includes rough terrain: wear closed, suitable footwear.
Just outside Greater Shepparton, but vital. The first major diversion structure built for irrigation in Australia and seen as a ground-breaking ‘national’ scheme, it raises the river level so that water can be diverted to irrigation in the GV.
Only the handrail of this impressive wooden structure, Flume No 4, is visible. It was constructed to carry the new National Channel across a natural drainage depression south of Murchison en route from the Weir to the Waranga Basin storage.
The 1885 pump was the solution of the local water authority, the United Echuca and Waranga Waterworks Trust, to the pent-up local demand for irrigation to fill its channels while a weir was still being debated. Archaeological site only.
A rarely-seen section of the Cattanach Canal (1957) cut through a rise just before the Canal enters the Waranga Basin. Here the depth of cut is the greatest on the Canal, up to 19m, resulting in impressive low cliff-like walls.
Lesser Known Shepparton Heritage Places
FRIDAY 29 NOVEMBER 2024
A bus tour that takes in the less well known heritage places in Shepparton. These places show case industry, technology and residential development. All of which demonstrate a particular character that resonates with the history and the development of Shepparton and region with commentary by our heritage professional, Deborah.
Caniambo Country Tour
FRIDAY 29 NOVEMBER 2024
Visit Geoff Wall’s rustic farm-museum. See the progress from the horse teams to the evolution of grain stripping to the modern header. Visit Gowangardie cemetery and observe 7 Pine Lodge School sites, also the Pine Lodge rail station and shops site. Light lunch provided by CWA at Caniambo Hall.
St. Germains Discovery Tour
SATURDAY 30 NOVEMBER 2024
Lunch at Undera Hotel. Please book on 5826 0286.
St. Germains pastoral ‘run’ of 31,570 ha was first licenced to Henry Walker in 1844. Later the run was controlled by the four Burchett brothers from 1851 to 1864. One of the brothers died aged 41 years and was buried north-east of the homestead where the grave-stone is still evident. The ‘run’ was cancelled in 1884 and 403 ha. was bought by Merrigum grazier William Bray who built the homestead.
Typical of the first buildings of local selectors in the 1870’s, this rare survivor was relocated to the current site in numbered pieces by the Starritt family.
View this interesting Horsham/Avoca style school building erected in 1884. No wheelchair access in some areas.
Internment Camp 1 Tour
SATURDAY 30 NOVEMBER 2024
Visit site of World War 2 internment Camp. This camp was set up in 1940 when war was declared and German nationals currently in Australia were arrested as suspected security risks. Camp 1 was part of the Tatura group of seven camps.