Rio Vista was the home of William Benjamin Chaffey, the Canadian-American engineer who transformed the Mildura district from scrub into one of Australia's most productive agricultural regions. The elegant Victorian timber mansion sits on the riverbank and now houses a museum dedicated to the Chaffey brothers and the irrigation colony they founded. It is the most important heritage site in Mildura.
The collection inside covers the Chaffey story in detail — the brothers' earlier success in California, their agreement with the Victorian government in 1886, the engineering works that brought Murray River water to the land, and the waves of settlers who came to farm the newly irrigated blocks. The house itself is well preserved, with period furnishings and a garden that runs down to the river.