The cliff above Yerranderie

Yerranderie
Ghost town now owned by an architectural conservationist.
Visiting Yerranderie is a labour of love. Having travelled either 101 kms from Goulburn or 50 kms from Oberon the traveller turns north on a dirt road (an old stock route) marked 'Mt Werong' and 'Jerrong' and for the next 1 1/2 hours travels 62 km crossing five creeks (in good weather the road is open to all traffic but in the wet it is strictly for 4WD vehicles) before arriving at the charming old silver mining town of Yerranderie. The journey is worth making. Yerranderie is a remnant of a once-thriving community. In its heyday between 1900 and 1914 it had over 2 000 residents and services including a school, three churches, two butchers, one hotel, a police station and court house and a silent movie theatre. At the top of the hill was the small 'Government Town' (where one of the churches, the court house and the school stand rather forlornly in grassy fields) and below it was the more populous 'Private Town'.

The Post Office (built 1907)

'Private Town' is currently owned by the conservationist and architect Valerie Lhuede who is slowly restoring the old buildings. The Post Office (built in 1907) has been converted to bunk style accommodation, S.C.Meldrum's tailor's shop is now a gift store, the bank is a museum and the bakery is an Aboriginal artifacts gallery. There is also a well preserved boarding house. Lheude's restorations are tasteful and authentic.

Yerranderie is located on the edge of an extinct volcano. In 1871 a part Aborigine Werriberri (known as Billy Russell) found galena - from which silver and lead can be extracted - three kilometres from the town site. The price of silver was such that serious mining did not start until the late 1890s. From 1899 to 1914 the town prospered. A road from Camden via The Oaks and the Burragorang Valley was constructed and mining machinery (much of which now lies rusting in the bush) was brought in by horses.

Between 1900 and 1912 5 381 000 ounces of silver, 9 951 ounces of gold and over 12 000 tons of lead were extracted. The outbreak of war saw miners leave the area and the 1920s were a period of severe industrial unrest with miners going on strike for years. There were a number of attempts to re-open the mines after World War II but they were brought to an abrupt halt in the 1950s when the Sydney Water Board flooded the Burragorang Valley for the Warragamba Dam cutting off access to the town from Camden.

A view of the old houses at Private Town, Yerranderie

Subsequently L.J. Hooker bought the town to acquire the hotel's liquor licence which was transferred to the Sydney suburb of St. Marys. The town was then sold to a company which subsequently sold both the town and the leases to Ms. Lhuede who now flies in from Camden and, with a permanent caretaker and solar electricity, runs the Yerranderie Village Project as a quiet holiday resort and conservation area.

The owners have recently opened Slippery Norris's Cottage, (a fine old miners cottage) as self contained accommodation for six. Slippery Norris died in 1994 keeping the secret of why his nickname was Slippery to himself.

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	Yerranderie Ghost Town Yerranderie NSW Telephone: (02) 4659 6165 or (02) 9955-8083 (contact Valerie Lhuede)