Port Goolwa, South Australia
Port Goolwa, South Australia
Port Goolwa played a very important role in the early development of the young colony of South Australia. As the areas near River Murray were settled in the 1840s and 1850s, paddleboats started trading up and down the Murray-Darling river system.
They would travel upstream with supplies for the farmers and graziers along the rivers. They would then bring back items produced in these farmlands, mainly wheat and wool. Port Goolwa became, for a few decades, one of the busiest ports in Australia.
A railway was built to Port Elliot and goods transferred to ocean going ships. Some paddlesteamer captains braved the treacherous and ever shifting sands at the mouth of the River Murray just a few kilometres from Goolwa.
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