The Murranji Track or Murranji Stock Route is a

stock route A stock route, also known as travelling stock route (TSR), is an authorised thoroughfare for the walking of domestic livestock such as sheep or cattle from one location to another in Australia. The stock routes across the country are colloquial ...

in the

Northern Territory The Northern Territory (abbreviated as NT; known formally as the Northern Territory of Australia and informally as the Territory) is an states and territories of Australia, Australian internal territory in the central and central-northern regi ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

and it runs between

Newcastle Waters Newcastle Waters is a town and locality off the Stuart Highway in the Northern Territory. It is classified as a ghost town that contains a number of preserved historic buildings, including Jones's Store and the Junction Hotel. Geography no ...

and

Top Springs Top Springs is a town and locality in the Northern Territory of Australia located about south of the territory capital of Darwin at the junction of the Buchanan and Buntine highways. At the 2021 census, Top Springs had a population of 11 Top ...

. The track was primarily operational between 1904 and the late 1960s and it attracted descriptions as the "ghost road of the Drovers" and the "death track". It was used as an entry point to the

Barkly Tableland The Barkly Tableland is a region in the Central East of the Northern Territory, extending into Western Queensland. The region was named after Sir Henry Barkly. The epithet "Tableland" is inaccurate, since the region is neither elevated relative ...

and it is nearby to

Wave Hill Wave Hill is a estate in the Hudson Hill, Bronx, Hudson Hill section of Riverdale, Bronx, Riverdale in the Bronx, New York City. Wave Hill currently consists of public horticultural gardens and a cultural center, all situated on the slopes ov ...

Auvergne Auvergne (; ; or ) is a cultural region in central France. As of 2016 Auvergne is no longer an administrative division of France. It is generally regarded as conterminous with the land area of the historical Province of Auvergne, which was dis ...

and

Victoria River Downs Station Victoria River Downs Station, also known as Victoria Downs and in the past sometimes referred to as The Big Run, is a pastoral lease that operates as a cattle station in the Northern Territory of Australia, established in 1883. It is south of ...

s. It is on the lands of the

Mudburra The Mudburra, also spelt Mudbara and other variants, are an Aboriginal Australian people of the Northern Territory. Language Mudburra is one of the far eastern forms of the Pama-Nyungan Ngumbin languages. Country The Mudburra people live i ...

and Djingili peoples and their rights to this land has been established by the

Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976 The ''Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976'' (ALRA) is Australian federal government legislation that provides the basis upon which Aboriginal Australian people in the Northern Territory can claim rights to land based on traditi ...

and the

Native Title Act 1993 The ''Native Title Act 1993'' (Cth) is an act of the Australian Parliament, the purpose of which is "to provide a national system for the recognition and protection of native title and for its co-existence with the national land management sys ...

. Use of the track declined from 1966 when the

Buchanan Highway The Buchanan Highway, Northern Territory, Australia, runs west from Birdum on the Stuart Highway crossing the Buntine Highway at Top Springs and eventually connecting with the Victoria Highway near Timber Creek. it was unsealed for its ent ...

was completed and it is now rarely used as a stock route and is now an unsealed road. It is 644 km long.

History

The land surrounding the Murranji Track was first explored by Europeans by

John McDouall Stuart John McDouall Stuart (7 September 18155 June 1866), often referred to as simply "McDouall Stuart", was a Scottish explorer and one of the most accomplished of all Australia's inland explorers. Stuart led the first successful expedition to tra ...

who found it impenetrable and it was first used as a track by pastoralist and drover Nat Buchanan in 1886 when taking cattle to The Kimberleys (Western Australia). Buchanan travelled alongside Gordon Buchanan, "Greenhide"

Sam Croker Samuel Burns Croker (20 June 1852 – 20 September 1892) was a stockman and drover in Queensland and the Northern Territory. He was known as "Greenhide Sam Croker", because of his skill in working with greenhide, the untanned hide of an animal. ...

, Willie Glass, Archie Ferguson and Mick Berry. Their journey was successful as they were led through by a Mudburra guide, who showed them where to find water, and the name "Murranji" comes from the name for a species of burrowing frog in the

Mudburra language Mudburra, also spelt Mudbura, Mudbarra and other variants, and also known as Pinkangama, is an Australian Aboriginal languages, Aboriginal language of Australia. McConvell suspects Karrangpurru language, Karrangpurru was a dialect of Mudburra ...

. Use of the track was limited until, in 1904, one of Sidney Kidman's drover's, Blake Miller used it and it became a popular shortcut; despite this at least 11 drovers are known to have died along its route. It was notoriously difficult to transport stock on this track because of the lack of waterholes, with dry stages of up to 180 km, dense scrub (thorny lancewood and

bullwaddy ''Macropteranthes kekwickii'', commonly known as bullwaddy, is a species of woody tree or shrub native to the Northern Territory in Australia. Description ''M. kekwickii'' is a dry-season deciduous tree that grows up to six metres high, with sma ...

) and

limestone Limestone is a type of carbonate rock, carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material Lime (material), lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different Polymorphism (materials science) ...

soil. When moving cattle the limestone soil had the effect of making a drumming sound; this often spooked cattle. The main water sources were soakages named the Bucket (Wirntirrkuji), the Murranji and Yellow Waterhole (Binjacootra). The Bucket was named for an iron bucket left there by Buchanan.

Ernestine Hill Ernestine Hill (born Mary Ernestine Hemmings, 21 January 1899 — 21 August 1972) was an Australian journalist, travel writer and novelist. Known for her various travels across Australia and her writings about the diverse landscapes and cul ...

wrote about the history and development of the track for

Walkabout (magazine) ''Walkabout'' was an Australian illustrated magazine published from 1934 to 1974 (and again in 1978) combining cultural, geographic, and scientific content with travel literature. Initially a travel magazine, in its forty-year run it featured ...

in 1949. Major improvements were made to the track during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

with government bores being built and bulldozers being used to smooth the road; writing about these improvements

Hilda Abbott Hilda Gertrude Abbott (; 9 September 1890 – 26 May 1984) was the wife of the former Administrator of the Northern Territory, Charles Lydiard Aubrey Abbott. She is best known her contribution to the Northern Territory's Red Cross branch. Earl ...

said "since then the cattle have walked like gentlemen through wide, scrub-bordered boulevards". Abbott also said of the track more generally: One of the most famous trips on the Murranji Track was by Edna Zingenbine in 1950 who was the first female "Boss Drover" and made headlines throughout Australia. In the 1950s it was also frequently travelled by Bill Tapp who established a droving business which used it regularly. It was also travelled by Ellen Kettle in 1962 as pictured above.

Graffiti

The tanks along the Murranji Track are also home to a significant collection of

graffiti Graffiti (singular ''graffiti'', or ''graffito'' only in graffiti archeology) is writing or drawings made on a wall or other surface, usually without permission and within public view. Graffiti ranges from simple written "monikers" to elabor ...

, these date from the late 1930s to the 1960s and are a unique form of documentation along the track. All of these messages are faded and some have completely disappeared but many still survive. The graffiti primarily consists of messages, insults, poems, laments and drawings of the Murranji drovers. There are also a number of signatures including one by Owen Cummins the "Territory's own man from Snowy River". The remaining drawings were photographed and traced onto plastic sheets by archaeologist and historian Darrell Lewis. The graffiti have been replicated in Lewis' detailed history of the track in ''The Murranji track: ghost road of the drovers'' (2007).

Resources about

* Lewis, Darrell (2007). ''The Murranji track: ghost road of the drovers''. Rockhampton, QLD CQU Press. * Australia. Office of the Aboriginal Land Commissioner & Kearney, William & Australia. Department of Aboriginal Affairs & Northern Territory. Administrator & Australia. (1987).
Murranji land claim
''

Notable drovers on the Track

Beetaloo Jangari Bill Beetaloo Jangari Bill or Wirinykari / Weingari (c. 1915 – 1986) was an Australian Warumungu and Gurindji man who worked as a labourer and became an elder of his people. His knowledge of Aboriginal traditions was used to assist numerous grou ...

Nathaniel Buchanan Nathaniel Buchanan (1826 – 23 September 1901) was an Australian pioneer pastoralist, drover and explorer. Early life Buchanan was born near Dublin, and was of Scottish descent the son of Lieutenant Charles Henry Buchanan, and his wi ...

* Owen Cummins * William Linklater * Edna Zigenbine

Coordinates

* The Track begins at Murrunji, nearby the Queensland border: * A midway point is the Murranji Bore: * It ends at Peak Knob:

References

{{reflist Historic trails and roads in Australia Australian outback tracks Roads in the Northern Territory Pastoralists Indigenous people