What Wimmera River- Barringgi Gadjin loop from Stawell Road to Riverside and back in Horsham.
Where: Horsham township and fringe
How Long: total distance doing both sides of the river was about 12km
10 words: Diverse: suburbia to isolation, historic connections, great views and flora.
Follow a big river in dry country and you walk in many footsteps.
Today, we travel both sides of the Wimmera River – Barringgi Gadjin between Horsham’s two main bridges, following paths well-travelled over 1000s of years.
So, I pay my respects to the traditional owners of this land – the Wotjobaluk Nations – as we travel this river from the main bridge in Horsham to the Riverside crossing, and back.
Barringgi Gadjin was, and remains, a vital source of life and culture for the people of Wotjobaluk Nations, with 100s of cultural sites on and near its banks. Creation stories tell how it formed from the trail of blood of giant emu Tchingal.
Our walk begins at the bridge near the Horsham showgrounds. I cross it and head through Windsor Park along the river’s edge.
Water level is high, color murky brown and the sun shines.
The afternoon’s quiet is interrupted by noisy parrots feeding their young in hollows above the path and bees making the most of flowering gums.
Monster shadows are dramatically cast as I approach the mouth of the Burnt Creek.
I cross this creek – which is looking pretty good with the Wimmera’s overflow – and find and cross a footbridge.
It’s suburbia now, but back in the day this place hosted Horsham’s golf course. No doubt flooding deterred houses back then, but golf courses could take a few extra water hazards, from time to time.
They played golf here from 1924 to the 1950s, with the course accessed by a bridge built from the end of Hamilton Street. There was also a bridge across Burnt Creek near the fourth Tee.
Today the fairways have been replaced with endless brick house-filled blocks.
I head along Mardon Drive to Williams Road on a detour which will ultimately get me back to the Wimmera River.
There is a walk along Burnt Creek 2 – Latus Walk – which follows the back of houses and includes plenty of trees and shade. The ‘creek’ is not one I would drink from, (as are most around here) but the ducks seem happy enough.
The drain crossed, I head towards Williams Road and once over a bridge turn into Cameron’s Road.
This long road – that starts near Dooen Road, crosses the Wimmera River and ends on Stawell Road – is named after my five times great grandfather Angus Cameron.
After moving to the Wimmera 20 years ago, I discovered some family connections from the 1800s. Angus was on the Horsham Borough Council from its inception in 1880 until his death in 1894, including Mayor in 1890.
A blacksmith by trade, he emigrated from Scotland to Geelong in 1853 and then moved to Horsham in 1861. He was involved in the Horsham’s show and hospital and Free Presbyterian church.
He did not drink and, with wife Anne, was active in the temperance movement and described in his obituary as a ‘staunch and zealot trailblazer’.
Eleven years after he died Angus’ granddaughter Flora married my great granddad Alexander ‘Pop’ Dalton.
Today, 115 years later, I am not sure I know of too many devout, abstaining descendants! But with dear old Angus in mind, I blaze my trail along the hot and dusty Cameron’s Road, looking to the big sky and thinking of what it was like back in his day.
Grampians-Gariwerd would still have been sitting there in the background, the sky probably just as blue.
I walk his road, happily channeling Angus, until it comes to an abrupt halt at the edge of the river. It looks like there may have been a crossing at some point, with remnants of old posts, but this is where I leave Cameron’s Road to follow another track along the water’s edge.
There are plenty of trees, some appear to have been planted, and others, predating even Angus, cling with great determination to the riverbank. They bear scars, from fallen limbs or possibly the hands of the Wotjobaluk making use of bark.
There’s a bit of brown water inching its way along, I see my friend Bernard on his bike and one car. But it’s a quiet trail I am blazing today.
The second bridge crossed at Riverside Road, I begin my return on the other side of the river.
There are dozens of flowers – blue devils, callistemon, and possibly a parrot pea, native bluebells and melaleucas.
I see a couple of mountain bike riders and even hear a party from across the paddocks but it’s a peaceful wander along the Wimmera.
The closer I get back to town the better that track and if I want to, I can always opt for the gravel road adjacent to the walking path.
I pass a couple of chairs dedicated to people who have died. Looking over this water is the perfect place to remember somebody special.
At the end of Baillie Street, there’s a heli-pad and the hospital, that Angus had a hand in, stands a couple of blocks away.
The river widens, which makes for some great reflection shots, but the big shallow expanse somehow lacks the charm of a narrower parts.
There is a sign about the old swinging bridge to the golf course and before I know it, I am back in suburbia.
Vegetables greet me as I enter the big empty showgrounds – another Angus legacy – and head back to my car.
It’s been a long and blazing hot 11km trail and my water bottle is empty. Angus would be pleased to know that I am heading straight home for a water.
But sorry gramps, it being Saturday night, I won’t promise complete abstinence. Flora may have been born a tea totaling Scot, but she did marry an Irish Dalton!
52 weeks 52 walks 