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Mining gold ~ Shaft and drive Mines

Explore the Mine Tunnel	Gold Mine Tunnel The mine tunnel at Old Mogo Town, 1850's Gold Rush Theme Park, was developed to allow visitors to view the original mine shaft in safety. Walking through the cool darkness visitors can experience what it is like to be underground. The formwork in this mine is made of ironbark and inside there is a selection of old mining tools and lamps on display. You can stand at the bottom of the shaft and look up at the sky. Children are always eager to find "the other end" around the next bend! Visitors who are unable to make the easy climb from the entrance of the mine may choose to come in on the flat area of the drive. This route is even useable for assisted wheelchair access.
Shaft and Drive Mines Most mines in the Mogo area are shaft and drive mines. The "colour" (gold traces) was followed, usually to the top of a ridge where the top of the gold bearing quartz reef could be found. Once the right location was identified a shaft was sunk. While it was being dug samples were constantly monitored to assess whether it was worth continuing. This accounts for the incidence of multiple shallow shafts around a gold mining area.	Numerous shallow shafts. Eventually, when the shaft was deep enough, a horizontal drive would be brought in to meet it. As the mine was worked, the shafts would become important for ventilation.
Mogo Mine Shaft and Poppet Head	Poppet Head and Winch Poppet heads sit over mine shafts and are used to winch ore laden buckets from below. In less hilly areas, shafts are the only entrances into the mines and therefore the only way to get ore out. Draught horses and steam engines (where available) were the most common means of lifting the heavy buckets out of the shafts. The bucket shape frame shown here would have held the ore in hessian sacks. Types of buckets used
Ore Carts on Rails Where the geography was suitable and an investment was feasible a mine tunnel was built. Hand barrows may have been used initially to move the ore out to the processing area. Ore skips running on rails would have been used at more established tunnels. Skips on rails used to move the ore	There were different gauge rail systems.
Hand Tools used by Gold Miners.	Mining was Hard Work Miners spent up to ten hours working hard, on the end of a pick, in often poor conditions. One of the things that is most difficult to swallow about the early gold mining period is the digging of hard rock by miners often using little more than a variety of picks and cold chisels. Mogo of the 1880s would have consisted of series of small settlements wherever the mines were being worked. These small work camps had no luxuries and were much the same as conditions experienced by timber getters.

Experienced Tour Guides. Learning about Australia's history can be fun and our tour guides are full of fascinating stories and anecdotes. Much of the information about the goldrush days has been passed down from generation to generation. Looking down to see the horizontal drive
Family Fun and entertainment	School and tour groups ~ Educational Tours	Looking up the shaft to daylight

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Discover Australian Gold Rush History at Mogo
between Batemans Bay and Moruya on the South Coast of NSW Australia.



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