Ballarat Begonia Festival

Ballarat is a city of 120,000 people about 120 km north-west of Melbourne. Gold was discovered in the 1850s and Ballarat boomed in the next few decades. No gold left today, but it's the third biggest city in Victoria and a lovely tourist destination with a lot of character. It has old, well maintained buildings, lots of parks and lakes ... and begonias.

Ballarat Botanical Gardens has specialised in tuberous begonias since the 1890s and has a collection of plants stretching back to 1901 from breeders all over the world. Gardeners among you will know that there are around 200 types of begonias but I have a long-held and particular passion for tuberous begonias. I try hard with ones I have: I lift the tubers in winter, feed them religiously when I repot them, and have mid-to-reasonable success each year.

The Ballarat Begonia Festival was my opportunity to learn more. COVID and Darwin have thwarted me from attending the annual Begonia Festival in March, but this year was the year. It was also an opportunity to catch up with some old friends who now live in Ballarat. Begonias and old friends — bliss!

Without further ado, here are some glorious tuberous begonias on display in the conservatory at the festival.

Of course, there are also wax begonias and wing begonias and long-cane begonias, and so many more!

Outdoors, the Botanical Gardens have a lovely collection of summer and autumn flowering begonias, beautifully set off by salvias, dahlias and sunflowers. Tuberous begonias were also used in the water features in the gardens.

In the booming 1880s, wealthy locals who had made their money from the goldfields gifted marble statues made in Italy (as well as by a local sculptor) to the gardens. There are statues from mythology, poetry and history, including one of William Wallace ... whose benefactor was clearly a Scot. There is also an avenue with busts of Australian prime ministers, but I will spare you those.

The Botanical Gardens are located next to Lake Wendouree. A trout hatchery on garden grounds breeds and raises brown trout and rainbow trout, which are sold to customers across Victoria — but some are also released into Lake Wendouree for local anglers. Our friend volunteered at the hatchery for a while, but felt he had done his bit after clearing tons of algae from fish races, tanks and ponds, and scooping out dead fishlings from buckets.

What would a visit to the country be without a drink at a local winery? Michael Unwin Winery is just down the road from the lake and we had a lovely time with some sparkling, some pinot noir and some shiraz (did I mention that Ballarat is a cool climate region?) and with the many dogs that live at the winery, including a few greyhounds. There's a dog-racing track in Ballarat, and I noticed many people in the town with greyhounds adopted after their 'careers' have ended. The little black fluffy dog? That's Sherry, our friends' German spitz, who was very indignant about these large canines intruding on her owners.

The lake has a very nice restaurant on its shore, from where we could watch the sun set over the water. Well, and eat dinner, of course.

Lake Wendouree has a circumference of about 6 km. Our cycle around the lake early in the morning was slightly chilly (Ballarat gets very cold in the winter) but we saw plenty of black swans and the occasional musk duck. Musk ducks are curious birds with a large leathery flap under their chins during breeding season. We also cycled through the wetlands near the lake ...

... and arrived at a small lake near our friends' house with a pair of resident black swans and their brood of fluffy cygnets.

We were clearly a sad disappointment to the swan family when we were not forthcoming with food, so they paddled off to seek more generous benefactors.

I have come home from Ballarat with a few (!) more begonias so let's see what the next few months bring in the garden. As we're heading into winter — not very much, probably.