On to Yackandandah

 Leaving Bendigo I headed towards Rochester for breakfast and a wander around the sights of another silo and street art.

This is also the place where Ron Iddles, a detective, known as a really good cop (has been on TV talking about the cases he solved) came from. His brother is also a well known (?) chef. The people of Rochester decided to have a lane dedicated to the family.

I then headed towards Shepparton and came across ' Mooving Art' which depicts the strength of Shepparton's dairy industry.

It appears that there are 90 cows spread around the area and are painted by established and emerging artists - I didn't see them all!

I then headed on to Yackandandah - a lovely little village. Autumn was really displaying it's colours and the main street was a riot of yellows, golds and reds. It is a very small village, with 2 pubs, Thai restaurant, supermarket, bakery, fancy tea shop (you can book for high tea) and a few little boutiques. 

Dinner at the Thai restaurant was an interesting experience where I was invited by a local to join their table of ten rather than sit by myself. I declined the kind offer and actually got my meal before them!

Friday saw me heading to Beechworth, another gold rush town. I had originally planned to stay here but saw an article stating that Yack was a much nicer place and I can now say I totally agree. There were numerous shops but the main one was the Honey shop where 40 different honey's were being sold - who knew there were so many varieties! 

Saturday was a bright but cool day so it was time to go exploring locally. I took the Gorge scenic walk which was built to sluice sand and gravel in the hope of finding gold. It was lovely walking through the falling leaves beside the river.

Later in the day I took a forest drive and encountered numerous mountain bikers - there was some sort of competition happening. 

A slightly longer drive took me to Mount Beauty, alpine country.