Aussie Towns

This is a series of caches that has been put out along the Kidman Way to celebrate our favorite towns.

The caches are all of a reasonable size and should easily be found.

As this is the main highway all care should be taken to pull of the road in a safe position as not to interfier with the traffic.

Swan Hill 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.

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.

—Thomas Mitchell.