Mount Leura is a 313 metre scoria cone surrounding a dry crater 100 m deep and is the central and most obvious component of a larger volcanic complex southeast of the town of Camperdown

Camperdown, Victoria

Camperdown is an historically significant rural town in southwestern Victoria, Australia, south west of the state capital, Melbourne. At the 2006 census, Camperdown had a population of 3,165.-History:...

 located in western Victoria, Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

, 194 kilometres (121 mi) km south west of the state capital, Melbourne

Melbourne

Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...

. The inactive volcano is thought to have last erupted between 5,000 and 20,000 years ago. The name means "big nose" in local aboriginal dialect.

Leura Maar

Mount Leura, together with nearby Mount Sugarloaf

Mount Sugarloaf

Mount Sugarloaf, also known as Great Sugar Loaf, is a mountain in the lower Hunter Region of New South Wales, Australia, overlooking the cites of Newcastle, Lake Macquarie, Cessnock and Maitland. The summit of the mountain is in the Lake Macquarie suburb of West Wallsend and access to the summit is...

, forms part of a large extinct volcanic complex known as the "Leura Maar". The complex includes a broad shallow maar crater measuring 2.5 km by 1.7 km surrounded by a low tuff ring, inside which are the secondary eruption points of Mount Leura and several smaller unnamed mounds and cones of scoria. These may represent eruptions along a north-south fissure

Fissure

In anatomy, a fissure is a groove, natural division, deep furrow, elongated cleft, or tear in various parts of the body.-Brain:...

. The walls of the cone are alternating layers of tuff and scoria with numerous blocks and volcanic bombs. Mount Sugarloaf is a perfect conical mound on the southwestern flank of Mount Leura and represents a final stage of activity of the Leura volcano, when a small vent ejected a large volume of lava fragments in a short time, without a change in the direction of the eruption column. This produced a steep, symmetrical, conical mound of volcanic ash

Volcanic ash

Volcanic ash consists of small tephra, which are bits of pulverized rock and glass created by volcanic eruptions, less than in diameter. There are three mechanisms of volcanic ash formation: gas release under decompression causing magmatic eruptions; thermal contraction from chilling on contact...

, scoria and larger blocks and bombs.

Mining

Numerous quarries operated within the "Leura Maar". Quarries also provide significant exposures of bedding in tuff and scoria and many xenoliths are obtained from these. The scoria at Mount Leura is notable for the inclusions of high temperature megacrusts and xenoliths (fragments of the lower crust and mantle of the earth) which occur here in unusually high concentrations. Most of the quarries now are closed and some are used for dumping landfill.

Tourism

The volcano lies within the 'Lakes and Craters' region, an access road was built in 1932. It allows vehicles the size of buses to access the lookout on top of Mount Leura. On a clear day you can see the Grampians

Grampians National Park

The Grampians National Park is a national park in Victoria, Australia, 235 kilometres west of Melbourne. The Park was listed on the Australian National Heritage List on 15 December 2006 for its outstanding natural beauty and being one of the richest indigenous rock art sites in south-eastern...

 and Mount Buninyong

Mount Buninyong

Mount Buninyong is a hill overlooking Ballarat in Victoria, Australia. Formed from an extinct volcano, it rises to above sea level. The mountain was originally named Mount Bonan Yowing which is said to derive from an Aboriginal word meaning a man lying on his back with his knee raised...

 to the north, Mount Porndon

Mount Porndon

Mount Porndon is a 278 metre high volcano located 13 kilometres southeast of Camperdown in western Victoria, Australia.Mount Porndon is on private land. There is a fire tower on the summit. It is a composite volcano of scoria resting on lava disc and tuff. The area around Mount Porndon is known as...

 to the east and Lavers Hill

Lavers Hill, Victoria

Lavers Hill is a town in Victoria, Australia, located inland from Port Campbell and from Apollo Bay. The township is located approximately south-west of the state capital, Melbourne. At the 2006 census, Lavers Hill had a population of 208.- History :...

 to the south. To the immediate west are the deep volcanic crater lakes Bullen-Merri and Gnotuk while to the east is the crater Lake Purrumbete

Lake Purrumbete

Lake Purrumbete is a volcanic lake located in the Western District of Victoria . Lake Purrumbete is approximately 15 km east of the town of Camperdown.The lake is a popular trout fishing spot and is a wildlife sanctuary....

 popular for its Trout

Trout

Trout is the name for a number of species of freshwater and saltwater fish belonging to the Salmoninae subfamily of the family Salmonidae. Salmon belong to the same family as trout. Most salmon species spend almost all their lives in salt water...

 and Chinook Salmon

Chinook salmon

The Chinook salmon, Oncorhynchus tshawytscha, is the largest species in the pacific salmon family. Other commonly used names for the species include King salmon, Quinnat salmon, Spring salmon and Tyee salmon...

fishing.