Navarre

Navarre is located centrally in the Shire midway between the Shire's two main towns, Stawell and St. Arnaud.  It is a rural town surrounded by some of the Shire's most viable agricultural land. The township is linear in shape following the Stawell-Avoca Road. The landscape of the town is flat with the land in the immediate district flat to undulating. The main road running through the town is very wide, providing for a service road for residential properties, a wide median strip which incorporates a gazebo and BBQ and a two lane road for the main road.

Navarre has a community co-op as its retail hub which acts as post office, service station, general store and licensed bottle shop. Navarre has a well developed and well used public hall, a primary school and a recreation reserve with clubrooms, toilets and grandstand.

History

Navarre began in 1848 when Robert Beazley established an inn beside a stock route on the boundary between Woodlands and Decameron runs.  Robert Mackay opened a second inn in 1850.  With the advent of the mount Alexander goldfield in 1851 the settlement became a wayside stop for diggers and the Southern Australian gold escort.  The township was surveyed and by 1855 renamed Navarre after a tenth century Spanish kingdom in the Pyrenees. 

A Government Camp Reserve included police and a Court of Petty Sessions.  The township was proclaimed on 13th September 1861.  Seven years later, the township included a store, hotel, postal service and school.  Navarre enjoyed a revival in 1914 with the opening of the new Ben Nevis-Crowlands-Navarre railway extension where farmers and timber cutters used the line to send away their produce until it closed in 1952.

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