Gulgong is a Central West gold town with more surviving character than its size suggests. Its narrow streets, old verandas, and timber shopfronts still carry the shape of the 1870s rush, when gold discoveries at Red Hill turned a small settlement into a crowded diggings town almost overnight.
This is the best historical add-on to Mudgee. The Gulgong Pioneers Museum is broad and old-fashioned in the best sense. The Holtermann Museum connects the town to one of Australia's most important 19th-century photographic collections, and the Henry Lawson Centre gives literary weight to the goldfields story.
Gulgong is not slick. That is part of its value. Come for a half-day of museums and street wandering, or stay longer if old Australian towns, bush writing, and gold-rush buildings are your thing.