A four wheel drive on the beach at The Coorong

Coorong, The (including Policemans Point, Salt Creek and Woods Well)
A beautiful National Park along a narrow 145 km spit of sand.
The Coorong, a narrow neck of sand dunes stretching 145 km along the south-east coast of South Australia, is part of the Australian consciousness largely because it was the location for the children's book (and later film), Storm Boy by Colin Thiele.

In fact the essence of the area is beautifully caught by Thiele in his book 'Coorong' when he writes: 'The Coorong is wilderness. For that reason it is of inestimable value to South Australia and the whole of humanity.

'It is an elemental region, a place of wind and water and vast skies, of sandhill and tussock, lagoon and waterweed, stone and scrub. It is a place of softened contours, muted colours and sea haze - and of glaring saltpans so intense that our brows pucker and our eyes wince. A place of winter storms and summer sunglades, of shorelines soft with sand and sibilant reeds, and of limestone outcrops sharper than teeth. A place to sense the universal in the particular, the infinite in the infinitessimal, the verities of life in blowing seeds and grains of sand.'

Located 152 km from Adelaide (that is the distance of Meningie at the northern end of The Coorong) it is now a 46,745 hectare National Park. The word 'coorong' is generally accepted to be a corruption of the local Aboriginal word 'kurangh' meaning 'neck'.

Geologically The Coorong is a set of complex and ancient sand dunes. The oldest was probably formed about 120,000 years ago. Then there is another dune formation which is about 80,000 years old. Some of that dune still remains on Younghusband Peninsula. The modern day Coorong was formed between 6,000 and 20,000 years ago when the sea rose to form an island on top of the 80,000 year old dune. This produced a lagoon behind the present line of seaward dunes. At the time there were probably many access points from the sea to the lagoon but over time the wind and the sands filled these in creating this unique neck of land.

Walking across The Coorong at the northern edge

Historically there were five Aboriginal tribal groupings living on The Coorong. They are still known as the Ngarrindjeri people (they are the same people who fought over secret women's business at Goolwa. They made bark and reed canoes, lived on the fish and molluscs in the area, and built shelters against the cold Southern Ocean winds.

The Ngarrindjeri people were decimated by the arrival of Europeans. The combination of smallpox (which raged all the way up the Murray River) and massacres saw the numbers of Aborigines on The Coorong drop from an estimated 3200 in 1842 to a mere 511 by 1874.

The discovery of The Coorong by Europeans occurred by accident. None of the sea explorers - notably Matthew Flinders and Nicholas Baudin - located it. Neither did Charles Sturt, the first European to reach the mouth of the Murray River. It wasn't until 1837 that two men, Strangways and Hutchinson, discovered the narrow lake and the following year a Captain Gill, having been wrecked near the mouth of the Murray, rowed a dinghy up the Coorong.

By 1839 Charles Bonney had overlanded sheep along The Coorong and in 1840 a Lieutenant Pullen had surveyed the mouth of the Murray River.

By 1840 there was a ferry across the Murray at Wellington which offered access to the Coorong and by the mid-1840s there was a stock route and a mail run down the coast. In 1856 Sir Charles Todd surveyed a telegraph line from Adelaide to Melbourne which ran the length of The Coorong and that same year a Captain Cadell managed to take a steamer down as far as Salt Creek.

The area's commercial potential was always restricted. Over the last half of the 19th century sheep farmers moved into the area but they were hampered by rabbit plagues and the mysterious 'coast disease'. There was an attempt at salt mining and, in 1892, an oil well was drilled (unsuccessfully) near Salt Creek.

As early as 1914 sections of The Coorong were being set aside as a National Park. However it wasn't until 1966 that the official Coorong National Park was established. In 1968 an additional 6840 hectares were set apart as a game reserve. Today the Coorong is designed as a wilderness to be enjoyed by people who love its peacefulness and isolation.

Things to see:  

Pelicans abound on the edges of The Coorong

Bird Watching
Central to the appeal of the Coorong is the fact that it has some of the most spectacular birdlife displays anywhere in Australia. The lakes which characterise this low-lying area abound in birdlife. Huge cranes, swans, pelicans, sandpipers, terns, white-faced herons, ibis, kites, galahs, rosellas, wattlebirds and currawongs. An endless variety of freshwater and saltwater birds. It has been estimated that there are more than 240 species of bird which use The Coorong as their home. Some migrate from as far away as Siberia, China and Japan.

Fauna
Equally important are the fauna. In the region it is possible to see western grey kangaroos, echidnas, wombats, possums, a variety of snakes and the waters are still rich in mulloway, mullet and bream.

Exploring The Coorong
There are a number of lookouts which offer excellent views over The Coorong but the real challenge is to get across The Coorong onto Younghusband Peninsula and to then clamber across the dunes (at various points a 4WD will get you across - the best place is 42 Mile Crossing - but the roads are still very difficult) so that you can experience the extraordinary sense of being on the long beach which is so integral to the area.

Woods Well
An inconsequential settlement Woods Well is famous for murder surrounding a certain Malachi Martin. Martin drove the mail coach between Kingston and Encounter Bay in the early 1860s. He stopped at the inn at Woods Well and obviously developed a passion for the innkeeper's wife. Strangely the innkeeper disappeared and Martin married the widow. Then the maid, a woman named Jane McNinamen, disappeared. Her body was subsequently found shoved down a wombat hole. Martin was arrested for the two murders and was hanged on Christmas Eve, 1862.

Policeman's Point
Policeman's Point is literally nothing more than a caravan park and a motel. It was named because it became a camping ground for the mounted police. At low tide it smells decidedly unpleasant as a result of the salinity of the lake.

Salt Creek
Salt Creek is nothing more than a Mobil service station with a dining room and a Shell service station with overnight and holiday accommodation. It is also the location of the Coorong National Park Information Centre which has suitable maps and information. Of particular interest is The Lakes Walk, a 30 minute walk which allows the visitor to experience the full range of flora in the district. There is a useful brochure with both a map and a description of the plants. The ranger in charge of The Coorong can be contacted on (08) 8575 7014..

The Old Oil Rig
At Salt Creek there is a replica of an oil rig because it was here, in 1892, that a group of entrepreneurs, believing that a compacted vegetable substance (known as 'coorongite') was an indication of oil further down, drilled Australia's first oil well. They were not successful.

Chinaman's Well

Chinaman's Well
Some 16 km south of Salt Creek is Chinaman's Well. It is a simple well dug by one of the thousands of illegal Chinese gold prospectors who were shipped ashore on The Coorong with the expectation that they would walk from South Australia across to the goldfields in Victoria.

42 Mile Crossing
At the 42 Mile Crossing it becomes very obvious that The Coorong is not so much a waterway as a series of mudflats, low-lying vegetation and lakes. This is a very important place for anyone who wants to understand the nature of The Coorong which lies to the north of Kingston S.E. and to the south of Salt Creek. The road crosses the lakes and leads to a car park where, if you have a 4WD, you can continue over the sand dunes to the beach. The interesting thing is that from the top of the sand dunes (which are like small hills) you have wide and panoramic views which allow the visitor to appreciate the structure of The Coorong. It is easy to see the beach, the very high sand dunes, a series of low lying marsh and scrubby areas, and finally the mainland. This is the essence of this complex system.

	Tourist Information
	Coorong Cottage Industries Meningie Coorong, The SA 5264 Telephone: (08) 8575 1770
	Hotels
	Coorong Hotel Princes Hwy Policeman's Point Coorong, The SA 5264 Telephone: (08) 8575 7064 Rating: **
	Caravan Parks
	Coorong Caravan Park Princes Hwy Coorong, The SA 5264 Telephone: (08) 8575 7045 Rating: **
	Lake Albert Caravan Park Narrung Rd Coorong, The SA 5264 Telephone: (08) 8575 1411 Rating: ***
	Restaurants
	Coorong Hotel Princes Hwy Policeman's Point Coorong, The SA 5264 Telephone: (08) 8575 7064