Kapunda Museum

Kapunda Museum would be worth visiting for the building alone: a grand Northern French Romanesque pile built in 1866 as the town's Baptist church, later a technical school, bought by the council in 1967 and opened as a museum in 1971. Few country towns anywhere have a museum home this imposing.

Inside, the Kapunda Historical Society's volunteers have filled two floors with the social, commercial and industrial story of Australia's first successful mining town. Highlights include the printing press that produced the first edition of the Kapunda Herald in 1864, the local hospital's early X-ray machine and operating table, one of Australia's finest collections of early record players, and a motor pavilion housing the town's old fire engine, ambulance and hearse.

Allow more time than you think - this is one of South Australia's great volunteer-run museums. Pair it with the Map the Miner statue and the mine workings themselves for a full Kapunda heritage day.