The Talisman Gallery — Attraction in Hartley

We’re spending a couple of weeks in Mount Victoria and using it as a handy base for short day trips. Hartley Historic Village is only a 10 minute drive and we were interested to learn about the areas importance during the gold rush. Hartley was ‘the’ place to be from around 1837 onwards and established well before Lithgow was born and took over the civil/administrative requirements of the region. We’ll review the historic village separately - but the highlight was visiting The Talisman Gallery in the old woolshed - Wow. Just wow! We knew the owner designed and produced hand made jewellery - but we didn’t realise there would also be outstanding metal sculptures - both for outdoor and indoor use and also beautiful metal-worked interior design items - many featuring large crystals such as amethyst, rose quartz and citrine - think useful items like mirrors, candle holders, fire irons/pokers and coat hooks. Jewellery is nevertheless more our ‘thing’ as it’s small and travels well. We were also therefore very taken with several of the hand crafted pendants and rings featuring solid boulder opal sourced from an Australian couple in opal country (can’t remember exactly where...QLD?) This isn’t tourist shop tat - not a doublet nor triplet opal to be seen - everything is solid and the back of the silver setting is open - you can see the boulder. The work is authentic - tactile - organic forms feature heavily and the use of natural crystals is sublime. It’s a 2 minute detour off the Great Western Highway running to Lithgow. Easy drive off and back on and even if you’re not keen on a jaunt around the historic dwellings with excellent info signs - it’s worth nipping in to Historic Hartley just to visit Ron and his magical workshop (you can drive right to the...

If you like casual artisan atmosphere, take your family and friends to this amazing spot at the foot of the Blue Mountains. The place is run by a family and there are always young local people working. This makes it a refreshing not staged experience.In the last ten years, I left not once unhappy. The food is always great using good produce. I am glad that we have this trattoria style restaurant in the community . It is authentic and worthwhile. Great spot to end the week with your friends over a good glass of wine in an relaxed atmosphere. The ice cream bar will bribe the kids or finish you of with a smile. Thanks Guys -...

An unusual mix of art gallery and cafe/pizzeria. Pizza was surprisingly good considering the location , and very welcome on a cold day, together with hot chocolate. Wood fired oven and a good selection of pizzas on the menu, both in small and large. Probably a touch more expensive than what it should be, but the complete isolation (compared to Sydney), probably justifies this. There was no art at the time of writing, so can't comment on that...