Swan Hill (wikipedia) is a city in the northwest of Victoria, Australia on the Murray Valley Highway and on the south bank of the Murray River, downstream from the junction of the Loddon River. At the 2011 census, Swan Hill had a population of 9,894.

History

In the Dreamtime, Totyerguil (from the area now known as Swan Hill) ran out of spears while chasing Otchtout the cod. This chase is part of the mythology of the creation of the Murray River.Based on evidence from Coobool Creek and Kow Swamp, it appears that Aboriginal people have lived in the area for the last 13,000–9,000 years. The area is inhabited by the Wemba-Wemba and Wati-Wati people. Swan Hill was called “Matakupaat” or “place of the Platypus” by the Wemba Wemba people.The area was given its current name by explorer Thomas Mitchell, while camping beside a hill on 21 June 1836.

Among the reeds on the point of ground between the two rivers was a shallow lagoon where swans and other wild fowl so abounded that, although half a mile from our camp, their noise disturbed us through the night. I therefore named this somewhat remarkable and isolated feature Swan Hill, a point which may probably be found to mark the junction of two fine streams.

The European community grew up around a punt river crossing, which was established as early as 1846. This crossing serviced the growing agricultural area, and was the only river crossing for 100 km. The Post Office opened here on 1 February 1849. In 1853 Francis Cadell navigated the Murray river from its mouth in South Australia to Swan Hill in his paddle steamer, Lady Augusta. He arrived on 17 September 1853, narrowly beating William Randell of Mannum, who arrived 4 hours later in the in PS Mary Ann. This demonstrated the feasibility of river traffic, which flourished until the introduction of the railway.

Burke and Wills

Main article: Burke and Wills expedition

The Burke and Wills expedition reached Swan Hill on Thursday, 6 September 1860 on their journey across Australia from Melbourne to the Gulf of Carpentaria. They made Camp XV, (their fifteenth camp out of Melbourne), in the police paddock on the banks of the Murray River in an area that is now Riverside Park.^[10] The expedition stayed in Swan Hill until Monday, 10 September while they reorganised the stores. Burke dismissed four men; Essau Khan, Brooks, Lane and John Polongeaux. He then hired Alexander McPherson, a saddler from Epsom and Charlie Gray, a former sailor from Scotland who had worked as an ostler for Cobb and Co between Bendigo and Swan Hill and who was now employed at the Lower Murray Inn in Swan Hill. The party was strengthened further by the arrival from Melbourne of journalist, William Hodgkinson, and scientist Georg von Neumayer. The local inhabitants gave the expedition a rousing farewell as they crossed into New South Wales. Folklore alleges Burke and Wills planted a Moreton Bay Fig tree in the garden of the local doctor, Dr B W Gummow. The tree is now approximately 27 metres high and has a branch spread of approximately 44 metres and can be seen in Curlewis Street.

6^th January, Tuesday

Today was another hot one.  We left Bendigo at about 9am.  We didn’t rush as we didn’t have far to go and I don’t think we know how to rush anymore.  We are both as laid back as lizards stretched out in the sun these days and things with us happen when they happen (how things have changed HAHA). The drive to Swan Hill is mainly through farming land, stock feed most of it and all golden at this time of the year as the harvest has all been done. We were going to stay at Lake Boga but they were fully booked, when we rode past we saw that all the caravans were parked just about on top of each other, lots of ski boats, lots of kids and very much a family type holiday place and really not our sort of place at all so we were quite relieved that we couldn’t get in.  Swan Hill is bigger than we expected.  We just had a quick run around to get some info from the visitor centre.  The Murray river runs through town one side is in Victoria and the other side is in New South Wales (pretty much like Echuca and Moama). We are on the Victorian side.  The caravan park we are staying at is lovely, beautiful green grass, lots of shady trees and enormous sites. The owners are very friendly and accommodating not like the old control freak owner we had in Bendigo who complained about everything and was forever in your face.  The caravan park has an onsite caravan repair business and parts. We needed a new caravan rear view mirror on the drivers side of the car as the pressure from the trucks passing in the opposite direction kept pushing the mirror in and it cracked in 2 places.  The guys at the park came and fitted a new better one for us at no extra charge apart from just paying for the mirror, such service (so awesome). It’s really hot here and at 8pm it was 36 degrees.  I had a cold shower after dinner and might hop into the pool later.

7^th January, Wednesday

Another hotty today so another veg out day. There is not a lot to really see and do in Swan Hill apart from a Pioneer village but to be quite honest once you’ve seen one you’ve seen them all, they are much of a muchness and we have seen about 3 so far on our travels so gave this one a miss, too hot anyway.  We took a drive around to see the Agricultural business for this area and a look see of the town. Swan Hill and Mildura (our next stop) is mainly orchard, peaches, grapes, plums and some melons.  There are a few wineries dotted around the place but I think that we will find quite a lot more once we get to Mildura.  Swan Hill is a quarantine fruit area and you are supposed to stop and put your fruit into the quarantine bins that are provided about 5kms before you get into town.  We had the huge amount of ½ lemon in the van which went into the bin. I forgot to tell you that on the way here from Bendigo we passed an old church which had a homemade Christmas tree made out of VB cans just outside the main door (made in the true Ozzie spirit).  It was too hard to stop and take a picture as there was no pull off for the van. I think that we might get some rain tomorrow but still high temps so we might have some humidity as well. We drove to NSW (5 mins away) and then back into Victoria just for the fun of it and NO, we are not getting bored we just do silly things sometimes  :-). It looks like after tomorrow the weather will be getting a bit cooler which would be a nice relief.