Welcome Rudy...good luck on your hunt!
I grew up in Stawell and had a mate that lived in Pomonal.
We used to flog around the paddocks in the old paddock bombs...was great fun and taught me a lot about driving.
You may know the family. Their surname is Mackley.
Anyway, I get back to Stawell every now and then, my parents still live there.
So most of my search for gold will probably be based around this area.
The ironbark's is a nature reserve and off limits for prospectors, and there doesn't seem to be any maps of the area.
You can pick up an Ararat gold fields map for about $15, this comes as far west to around Great Western and also includes Moyston. Prospecting is also permitted in the Ararat national park, so that would be a good area to do more research on.
Hopefully you find some of this info useful and being new to this game too , maybe we can learn a bit off each other.
Cheers, Ben