Siberia to Niagara

After an early night in Siberia I woke at dawn. 

There isn’t much left of Siberia.  Just a few rusty cans and broken glass.   Gold was discovered here in 1893 resulting in a rush to the area.   Initially the town was named Waverley.  However the Australian Postmaster General was concerned about duplication of names, consequentially the locals elected to call it Siberia.   Rumour has it the name was derived from the harsh condition in the area.  There was no water and a number of miners died of thirst.

The two most notable features are the small cemetery maintained by the Outback Graves Organisation and a colourful bougainvillea.

From the grave markings it appears few died of old age!

Mabel Kirkham planted the bougainvillea in 1908 as a memorial to her infant boy after he died withing 24 hours of his birth.  At that time a baby who died within 24 hours of birth was classified as stillborn and not entitled to be buried in a cemetery.  Apparently Mabel stated part of her heart was buried under the bougainvillea.  Subsequently the Kirkham family moved to Port Augusta in South Australia.

We left Siberia heading east on an unsealed road.   Vehicles travelled 500 metres apart to avoid the chocking dust clouds.   Eventually we reach the Goldfields Highway stopping at the ruins of Goongarrie Train Station

Before turning NW onto a dirt road leading to Goongarrie Homestead.  Until 1995 this was a working station.  It was then purchased by the State National Parks and converted to a conservation park.  The Homestead consists of three buildings and a camping ground.  Water and toilets are available, although closed when we visited.

After lunch at Goongarrie we headed NE stopping briefly at the town of Menzies before continuing to our campsite at Niagara Dam.

The dam has an interesting history.  Like much of the region, water was scarce.  Gold had been discovered at nearby Kookynie and water was also required for the railway between Kalgoorlie and Menzies.  It was decided the water problem could be resolved by building a dam at Niagara.  Construction began in 1898.  Local stone was used but the cement had to be transported by camel train overland from Coolgardie approximately 200km away.  The dam is 228 metres long, 18 metres high and 7 metres thick with a holding capacity of 141,000 cubic metres of water.

However on completion it turned out to be a ‘white elephant’ as a huge underground aquifer was discovered at Kooknyie.  Consequentially there was no requirement to build the 10km pipeline from the dam to Kookynie.

 

There are three camping areas.  Two above the dam and one below.  Flushing toilets were a bonus.

The infrequent rainfall usually results in a deluge resulting in trees dead animals, etc all being swept into the dam.  The prevent this the original builders constructed a heavy iron railing fence across the water course. 

Tomorrow we head for Kookynie.

Jenny,  The Super Pit is approximately 3.5km long, 1.5km wide and 600m deep. The structure is big enough to be seen from space.  It has been producing gold since 1989.  The life of the mine keeps being extended as more gold reserves are discovered.  Current estimates have the gold in the ground at 9.7 million ounces valued at $26 billion.  It’s located in what is known as ‘The Golden Mile’.