February 28 Chainmans Well

 Before I go on I just want to explain the name, or rather the ending, SE on Kingston - Kingston South East. The SE was added to distinguish it from Kingston on the Murray. To get back to today, however, we drove north-west along the Coorong – a wonderful place if you ever get a chance to visit.  

Approaching the Coorong

People are invited to drive along the beach except from 24 October to 24 December when the Hooded Plovers are nesting; we chose not to anyway. The roads into the lagoon were extremely extremely rough but the views were wonderful.

What looked like a little field of flowers was in fact grasses hosting wee snails

What look like breakers are sand dunes across the water on Younghusband Peninsula

Chinaman’s Well?  In 1852 Hong Kong was abuzz with stories of Australia where it was said that the hills shone with gold and people could pick up lumps of gold off the ground.  I’m not sure Hong Kong was the only place where the gold rush in Victoria was promoted! But in China 1000s of Chinese left home and hearth to make their fortunes in the goldfields of Victoria.  At that time the State government had imposed a 10 pound tax on Chinese entering the State; that was a small fortune in those days. So these brave hardy souls landed in Port Adelaide and travelled, many on foot, 800+ km over 5-6 weeks through extremely challenging countryside to the ‘Big Gold Mountain’ in Victoria. It is thought that the local aboriginal people helped the Chinese locate drinking water and these industrious people soon built wells along the way. A few people stayed on at the well and planted market gardens irrigated with water from the well - the one called Chinaman’s Well. We found it tucked in amongst the coastal bush along a fairly well-signed path.

Wonderful scrubland

Plenty of berries to eat

Great expanses of salt lakes

L: the spot where the lid for the well was cut. R:The well

The Coorong NP  is comprised of two long narrow lagoons over 100 km long and is home to the Pelican Islands where the Australian Pelicans nest between August and March - it is one of eight pelican species worldwide. Of course we headed further along the coast into Coorong National Park to Jacks Point Observatory which overlooking the Pelican Islands.  We out across the water and skyward trying to spot pelicans flying to Pelican islands where they breed from June to March.

Overlooking the Pelican Islands

And there they were the magnificent birds (my favourites). They flew in squadrons towards the islands. All I could do was point the phone and hope because I could see nothing on the screen.  I reckon we saw 100s but often at a distance. These flew right over our heads!

Magnificent

Great walk out to Jacks Point viewing spot through coastal vegetation rich with purple berries and other coastal delights.

Myoporum insulare - of course I tasted the berries.

The sky was filled with ‘mist’ which at first we thought was smoke but as we got closer it was simply the wild wind whipping the sand and salt up into the air. It was quite dense in places. What a sight it was. The wind was kicking up and it was getting late so we turned back.  It had been an amazing day; we both love the Coorong there is so much to explore.