If you love playing dress-up and have wondered what life was like back in the golden era of the Victorian Goldfields region, then dust off your tweed jacket and drive up for the Ballarat Heritage Festival. The nine-day festival takes place from May 21 to 29 and features a program jam-packed with historic experiences like tweed rides and steam train shuttles, as well as delicious food and drink experiences.
We hope you've been oiling your facial hair because the annual beard and moustache competition is making a triumphant return. Got a perfectly styled moustache, or a beard enough to get accidentally zipped up into your pants? Submit your photo then head to Hop Temple on May 28 for live entertainment, craft beer and delicious food as you await the results.
Over both weekends of the festival, a selection of some of the region's finest makers will gather for the Craft Lab to share their heritage trades, traditional practices, lost skills and cultural rituals. You'll get an opportunity to try first-hand the practices of crafts like weaving, knife making, silverwork and more, and you can listen in on talk and panel discussions with passionate makers.
New to the festival this year is the Food Edit, a collection of delicious local food and drink experiences with a heritage twist. The specially curated events range from vintage wine dinners, baking workshops, explorations of goldfields food and more. And it wouldn't be a heritage festival without a tribute to historical steam shuttles, so book in for a journey behind two steam locomotives. Go all out with a return trip, or just book a one-way journey from Newport to Ballarat or from Ballarat to Southern Cross Station.
To learn more about the festival and to buy tickets, head to the website.
Wondering what else you can do while you're in Ballarat? Check out our guide to the ultimate weekend getaway in the glittered city.
