WITH a long weekend came plenty of opportunities for the Australian Fossil and Mineral Museum to show off a newly-acquired collection.
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Bathurst Regional Council's museums coordinator, Emma McLean, said there were more than 750 visitors to the fossil museum over the three days.
The impressive number followed the launch of the Albert Chapman collection of minerals, which was opened to the public for the first time on Saturday.
Ms McLean said it was "part design and part luck" that the exhibit, which had generated a lot of interest since it was announced, opened over the long weekend.
"The timing was largely about logistics - it took some time for the specimens to be packed up and transported from the Australian Museum," she said.
"Each specimen was placed inside a specially designed nest inside its own individual box, and those boxes were then transported inside special crates in order to keep them safe. The cabinets were re-modelled and the collection re-curated for its time in Bathurst.
"This whole process took about six months."
The Chapman collection will be at the museum for more than a year, with it on loan from the Australian Museum while renovations are carried out at the Sydney cultural facility.
Ms McLean said the collection would potentially interest everyone in the community.
"For people who are interested in minerals, it is incredibly significant in its quality, rarity and important cultural heritage," she said.
"For everyone, it is an incredible display of amazing colour, form and shape that exists in the natural world."
