Bathurst, New South Wales

Bathurst is Australia’s oldest inland settlement, and it looks it — a Victorian courthouse, wide colonial streets and grand old homesteads on the plains around it. Couples marry in heritage halls, at cool-climate cellar doors, and on rural properties with Mount Panorama on the skyline.

Autumn is the season here, when the town’s elms and poplars turn. Orange is an hour west and Sydney three hours east over the Blue Mountains, which makes it an easy weekend for guests travelling up from the city.