For most travellers visiting Western Australia, the pristine white sand beaches of the south or the breathtaking gorges of the north top the bucket list.
But for Frenchman Bruno Vincent, the inland city of Kalgoorlie-Boulder, 600 kilometres east of Perth, was top priority.
Mr Vincent is a gold prospector from the French medieval city of Dole, 370 kilometres south-east of Paris.
He is travelling in Australia with his daughter Valentine Vincent on a once-in-a-lifetime trip.
Valentine Vincent says the city is important to her father. (ABC Goldfields: Macey Turner)
Ms Vincent said the visit to WA’s gold city was extremely important to her father.
“For him [Kalgoorlie] is a really important town, he really wanted to come here,” she said.
A different kind of prospecting
Using his daughter as a translator, Mr Vincent explained he started prospecting when he was 20 after meeting a man in a river panning for gold.
“I asked him, ‘What are you doing?’, and he explained. Then we became friends,” he said.
The hobby took over Mr Vincent’s life for the next 40 years.
A younger Mr Vincent (far left) prospects in a river in France. (Supplied: Bruno Vincent)
He went on to start a prospecting association and a school holiday camp for children to try their hand at it.
“[We] really wanted to share this passion,” he said.
Unlike Australia, French gold prospecting rarely uses a metal detector.
Instead, Mr Vincent said prospectors study the lay of rivers and used pans to locate gold.
Mr Vincent prospects in the rivers surrounding his home city of Dole in eastern France. (Supplied: Bruno Vincent)
“Mostly we use the eyes and the knowledge, and mostly we are prospecting with the pan,” he said.
Also unlike Australia, Mr Vincent said most of the gold found in the French rivers was like “dust”,’ and flowed down the mountains from Switzerland’s Alps.
“In France, you cannot find a lot of nuggets; it’s just more like powder,” he said.
“The quantity of gold is massive here, compared to France. The gold in France is too small to be detected by the detector.”
It is this scarcity that makes it so special to Mr Vincent.
“Because the gold in France is really rare, and also really hard to find, it’s really precious for us.”Hopes for local connection
Ms Vincent said she had reached out to the Kalgoorlie community on Facebook, hoping a local could show her father the ins and outs of Australian prospecting.
She said her father had no interest in finding and keeping Aussie gold and just wanted to learn the techniques used here.
Bruno and Valentine Vincent visited the Museum of the Goldfields to learn more about the area’s gold prospecting history. (ABC Goldfields: Macey Turner)
“We really wanted to share this moment with a local, but we didn’t have the chance to do that.”
Operations coordinator at Kalgoorlie Tourism Sarah Shepherd said there had been a definite uptick in gold tourists like Mr Vincent in 2025.
“Since the gold price has gone up, there’s definitely a lot more people,” she said.
“We get a lot of Europeans wanting to do gold prospecting, and people from Asian countries as well.”
Sarah Shepherd says many visitors at this time of year are Europeans escaping the cold weather. (ABC Goldfields: Macey Turner)
Ms Shepherd said it was important that people who wanted to try their hand at prospecting did not go alone.
“Go out with an experienced prospector and take more water than you think you will need, and also have an EPIRB [emergency beacon] with you.”
Despite the lack of prospecting, Mr Vincent said he had enjoyed his time in the Goldfields.
“The gold is a dream for every man, and particularly for me,” he said.
While Ms Vincent had not quite caught the prospecting bug from her father, she said it meant a lot that she got to spend time with him.
“He shared his hobby and his passion when we were kids. I have really great memories prospecting in the river with him,” she said.
“So I’m really happy to share this moment here in this city with him, because I know it’s his dream.”