Ben Bullen is a small mountain village in the Central West

Central West, New South Wales

The Central West region refers to the area west of the Blue Mountains, New South Wales, Australia. It has an area of 63,262 square kilometers....

 of New South Wales

New South Wales

New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...

, 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...

. The cool community is located on the Castlereagh Highway

Castlereagh Highway

The Castlereagh Highway is a state highway in New South Wales, Australia, also extending some kilometres into Queensland. It has been given the route number 55. The highway was recently extended past Gilgandra to include state route 86...

 (almost) halfway between the small towns of Cullen Bullen

Cullen Bullen, New South Wales

Cullen Bullen is located on the Mudgee Road, 168 km north-west of Sydney, 28 km north of Lithgow. At the 2006 census, Cullen Bullen had a population of 198 people...

 and Capertee

Capertee, New South Wales

Capertee is a village 45km north of Lithgow, New South Wales, Australia located on an elevated site above the Capertee Valley. In 2006, the town had a population of 72 people. Situated on the Castlereagh Highway between Lithgow and Mudgee, Capertee is surrounded by National Parks and grazing land...

. The place name Ben Bullen is derived from the local Aboriginal

Indigenous Australians

Indigenous Australians are the original inhabitants of the Australian continent and nearby islands. The Aboriginal Indigenous Australians migrated from the Indian continent around 75,000 to 100,000 years ago....

 word meaning "high, quiet place".

The village was formed when the railway was constructed in the early 1880s. While goods trains still use the railway line the small railway station is closed. Since the closure of the railway station a bus service serves the community.

Ben Bullen is surrounded by picturesque cattle grazing land and the Gardens of Stone National Park

Gardens of Stone National Park

Gardens of Stone is a national park in the Australian state of New South Wales, 125 km northwest of Sydney. At 15,010 ha, it is part of the Greater Blue Mountains Area World Heritage Site.-See also:* Protected areas of New South Wales...

. Farming and coal mining

Coal mining

The goal of coal mining is to obtain coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content, and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from iron ore and for cement production. In the United States,...

are the main local employers.