Day 512 | Old Mt Bryan East schoolhouse: even a free mattress
41 km | zzOz total: 16,623km
I’m not one who usually fossicks over old ground, more the door closer, done that, move on.
I’ve been saying the Mawson Trail is the best introduction to off-main-road bike touring in Australia and it’s worth testing that theory again, after all this was the initial trail on my Grand Tour, second time around I imagined only a few weeks would be involved and as I was heading to Adelaide it was on the way, I gotta get there somehow.
Tonight I’m snug in my second permanent walled structure in as many nights, the old Mt Bryan East schoolhouse, restored in 1995 and fitted with bunks, tonight even a Queen sized mattress. I’m in the old teacher’s quarters, it all closed in 1947, but it’s clean and well maintained, a full tank of rainwater, table and chairs, another wood fired stove this time with operational oven.
More or less similar facilities as Hallett Railway Station except out here you are well away from the Barrier Highway, you are on your own.
One of the features of this part of South Australia is the large number of abandoned stone farmhouses, all the way down from the border near Birdsville are piles of rocks, Mulka Station, Lake Harry ruins, all the Ghan railway relicts, Simmonston and the roofless stone farmhouses which would number in the scores, signs of overoptimistic pioneers.
There’s a story associated with all this enthusiasm for the rural life: in 1865, ie, quite early on, the Assistant Surveyor for South Australia, a guy named Goyder, wandered around much of SA and worked out where farming, ie, cropping, was likely to succeed and where it would be too dry, the country only fit for sheep. He based his report on careful observation of the changes in vegetation, he must have had some indicator species such as saltbush, etc. He drew a line now called the Goyder line on a map from just north of Eucla in the west that curved across the state, I’m pretty much on the demarcation here.
It was a scandal.
There were a few good years, he was severely criticised, people ignored his advice and later as his observations came to bear they had to walk off the land: his line proved quite predictive in the 150 years subsequently.
It seems he’d hit the 200 mm average annual rainfall line surprisingly accurately.
I’ve crossed the line a few times in my travels, there’s some straggly wheat in the fields initially but away from the line it’s starting to look much more thick on the ground.
It’s starting to really get in the wheat country as I approach civilisation.