Description

Dramatised by the threat of an oncoming thunderstorm at daybreak, one could ask why Strzelecki? The Track was so named from the creek, which the explorer Charles Sturt named on the 18th August 1845 after Paul Edmund de Strzelecki, the Polish scientist who explored much of inland NSW and Victoria.

Strzelecki is probably best known for climbing Australia’s highest peak (in March 1840) and naming it Kosciuszko, after the Polish patriot General Tadeusz Kosciuszko.

The Strzelecki Track became immortalised by the exploits of bushman Harry Redford, otherwise known as the infamous cattle rustler Captain Starlight , when he and two friends drove 1000 stolen cattle down ‘the Track’ from Queensland to Blanchwater Station 30 km south of Lake Blanche in South Australia.

Interestingly, Captain Starlight and his two accomplices were arrested and tried, however, the jury was so impressed with the defendant’s superb droving feat, they found them not guilty. The stunned and angry judge acridly remarked as he glowered at the jury, “I thank God that verdict is yours Gentlemen, and not mine.” Perhaps the thunderstorm is symbolic of the judge’s reaction so many years ago.