The Dalgary Road

The Dalgary Road once ran northwards from Jibberding to Wanarra Homestead, via the Dalgary Rockhole.  It was originally an Aboriginal track that followed a line of claypans, soaks and rockholes along the western side of Mongers Lake. From Wanarra a track crossed Mongers Lake to the Rothsay goldmine. A branch of Dalgary Road ran west to Banawar Soak, then veered eastwards to cross from Wanarra Station to Whitewells Homestead. From there the road headed north through Quandong Well where it struck west to Wanarra Homestead, or continued north to Rothsay or north-west to the Retaliation goldfield on Whitewells Station.

There are two versions of the Dalgary Road . As is the case with station boundaries and boundary fences, it is common in pastoral regions for the official placement of a road on land tenure plans to differ from the actual road, if one exists at all.

The original Dalgary Road was once a navigable track. It was last used regularly when W.J Farrell leased the block known as ‘Kourigee’ and with his daughter Winnie Vincent ran a pig farm there. They used the track to reach their gold mining leases at Retaliation and to supply meat to the miners in the 1930s and ’40s.

The track north from Kourigee through to Wanarra Station is now overgrown and inaccessible. It is not a public road, although it is shown on current official maps and tourist atlases. It traverses privately leased land and pastoral leases.

The other version of the Dalgary Road is a set of straight lines on official land tenure plans. When the land from Jibberding to Kourigee Swamp was subdivided into farm blocks in about 1907, space was left between them for an access road. Most of the blocks were never released and remain Crown freehold on short-term grazing leases. The road was never constructed except for a short section through several private farm blocks.