Historic Sites in Australia

Port Arthur Historic Site, 90 minutes south-east of Hobart on the Tasman Peninsula, is the most complete convict settlement in Australia. Between 1830 and 1877 it held repeat offenders in a place built to be escape-proof: a narrow neck of land guarded by dogs, and seas all around. The shell of the four-storey Penitentiary, the Separate Prison where silence was enforced, the church ruins and the commandant’s house sit in gardens on a sheltered bay. The ticket includes a guided walking tour and a short harbour cruise and is valid for two consecutive days; the evening ghost tour and the boat trip to the Isle of the Dead cemetery cost extra. The memorial garden remembers the 35 people killed at the site in 1996, and staff ask visitors to respect it quietly.

Nearby, the Coal Mines Historic Site is free and almost empty, with ruins of the solitary cells where convicts were punished underground. Allow a full day for the peninsula, or stay overnight.

Half an hour north of Hobart, the village of Richmond has the 1823 Richmond Bridge, the oldest bridge still in use in Australia, and Richmond Gaol, older than Port Arthur. In Hobart itself, the Cascades Female Factory in South Hobart tells the story of convict women, and further north, Woolmers and Brickendon estates near Longford show how assigned convicts worked farms. Maria Island, a ferry ride from Triabunna, has the Darlington probation station and wombats grazing between its buildings.

Sydney was the first colony, and its convict-built core is still walkable in a day. In The Rocks, under the Harbour Bridge, the lanes and sandstone warehouses date from the early 1800s; Cadmans Cottage (1816) is one of the oldest buildings in the city. Up Macquarie Street, Hyde Park Barracks, designed by the convict architect Francis Greenway and finished in 1819, housed male convicts and now uses an audio tour and everyday finds from under its floorboards to tell their stories. Next door are the Sydney Mint, once the Rum Hospital, and across Hyde Park the art deco Anzac Memorial, free to enter.

In the harbour, Fort Denison (Pinchgut) was a convict punishment rock before it became a fort; harbour ferries and tours stop there. Cockatoo Island, also convict-built, mixes prison barracks with a huge 20th-century shipyard, and the ferry from Circular Quay takes about 20 minutes; you can camp there overnight. Upriver, Old Government House in Parramatta Park (1799) is the oldest surviving public building in Australia; the RiverCat ferry from Circular Quay makes the trip part of the visit. At Kamay Botany Bay National Park, the Kurnell side marks where James Cook landed in 1770 and first met the Gweagal people.

From Sydney, flights also reach Norfolk Island, whose Kingston settlement is one of the 11 convict sites and has the most complete Georgian buildings in the Pacific.

Melbourne grew rich on gold in the 1850s, and it shows. The Royal Exhibition Building in the Carlton Gardens, built for the 1880 international exhibition, was the first building in Australia on the World Heritage list; you can see inside on guided tours from the Melbourne Museum next door. The Old Melbourne Gaol holds Ned Kelly’s death mask and runs night tours. On St Kilda Road, the Shrine of Remembrance is free to enter; at 11am on 11 November a beam of sunlight falls on the Stone of Remembrance inside, and an electric light recreates it every half hour on other days.

An hour and a half west, Sovereign Hill in Ballarat rebuilds a gold rush town with costumed staff, working blacksmiths and gold panning in the creek. It is the best family day out on this page. The Eureka Stockade rebellion of 1854 took place nearby. Bendigo has grand boulevards from the same boom and the Central Deborah mine, which runs underground tours. In the west, Kalgoorlie still mines gold around its Super Pit, and in the outback Broken Hill and Coober Pedy, where people live underground, keep the mining frontier alive.

The national capital is where Australia remembers. The Australian War Memorial combines a shrine with one of the best military museums in the world, and entry is free. Stay for the Last Post Ceremony at 4.30pm, held every day, when the story of one of the names on the Roll of Honour is read aloud. Across the lake, Parliament House has free entry and guided tours, and you can walk on the grass of its roof. Old Parliament House, now the Museum of Australian Democracy, sits below it, with the Aboriginal Tent Embassy on the lawn outside, in place since 1972. Allow two days for the national institutions, which also include the National Gallery and the National Museum of Australia.

Fremantle Prison, built by convicts in the 1850s, held prisoners until 1991, so its cells still carry graffiti and the gallows are intact. Choose between the day tours of the cell blocks, the torchlight tour after dark and the Tunnels Tour, which takes you down ladders and by boat through flooded tunnels under the prison; book the tunnels ahead. The prison is a short walk from Fremantle station, 30 minutes by train from Perth. Rottnest Island, offshore, was an Aboriginal prison for most of the 19th century, and its Quod building is a memorial site.

In the Pilbara, Murujuga on the Burrup Peninsula near Karratha has more than a million rock engravings, some tens of thousands of years old: emu tracks, kangaroos, human figures and faces. It was added to the World Heritage list in 2025. The Ngajarli boardwalk in Deep Gorge is the easiest way in; Aboriginal ranger tours explain what you are looking at. In the far north, Port Essington on the Cobourg Peninsula has the ruins of a failed 1838 British settlement, reachable only by 4WD, boat or plane.

Kakadu has the most accessible rock art in Australia. At Ubirr, a short loop passes overhangs painted with fish, turtles and X-ray figures, then climbs to a lookout for sunset over the floodplain. At Burrungkuy (Nourlangie), the Anbangbang shelter has the thunder spirit Namarrgon and has been used for at least 20,000 years. Both are open in the dry season and reached on sealed roads from Jabiru; rangers give free talks from about May to October. Our national parks guide covers the rest of the park.

Mungo National Park, part of the Willandra Lakes Region, is where Mungo Lady and Mungo Man were found. The main sight is the Walls of China, a lunette of eroded sand and clay that glows at sunset; you can only walk onto it with an Aboriginal Discovery Ranger tour. Mungo is about 110 km from Mildura on unsealed roads that close after rain.

In south-west Victoria, the Gunditjmara people built stone channels and weirs at Budj Bim at least 6,600 years ago to trap and farm eels. Guided tours run from the Tae Rak visitor centre at Lake Condah, and the volcano that made the landscape is in Budj Bim National Park. Elsewhere, look for the rock art shelters of the Grampians, the stencilled hands at the Art Gallery in Carnarvon Gorge, the engravings of Ku-ring-gai Chase north of Sydney and the guided tours of Mutawintji near Broken Hill. Near Laura on Cape York, the Quinkan galleries at Split Rock are some of the finest in the north.

Convict and colonial sites are easy: most are in or near cities, open from about 9am to 5pm, and sell tickets online. Look for combined passes from the state heritage bodies, and if you are a National Trust member at home, ask about reciprocal free entry at National Trust properties. Ancient sites are different. They are in national parks, often hours from a town, and they make much more sense with an Aboriginal guide, who can tell you the stories that are allowed to be shared. Book ranger-led and Aboriginal-owned tours at Kakadu, Mungo, Budj Bim and Murujuga ahead, and check seasonal closures: the Top End’s sites are best from May to October, and Mungo’s roads close after rain. For distances and transport, see our getting around guide, and for when to go, the best time to visit guide.