After a short 15 minutes' drive from the oil rig monument, we arrived at Chinaman's Well Historic Site. This is not the usual touristy spot, and we were the only ones around throughout the time we spent there.
There are interpretive signs all around explaining the life and difficulties the Chinese faced as they travelled to the Goldfields in Victoria. It all began in 1852 whereby the port of Hong Kong buzzed with dramatic rumours of Australia, a sunlit land where the hills shone with gold and where lumps of gold were being picked up in the street. Thousands of young Chinese left their shops, farms, rice fields and families to try their fortune. Landing in South Australia, Chinese fortune seekers walked more then 800 kilometres across wetlands, desert, hills and plains to their destination, the Victorian goldfields, and a place they called "Big Gold Mountain".
Fresh water was essential for the exhausting journey that that the Chinese took to reach the Goldfields in Victoria. Chinaman's Well was one of several wells used to source water along the route.
Carved blocks of limestone came from the Limestone Quarry which the Chinese immigrants used to construct Chinaman's Well. It is believed there was enough stone excavated at this site to build at least three wells, supporting the belief that Chinaman's Well is one of a series of wells in the region.
How would you move a 1,000kg slab of sandstone 900 metres and then lift it 1.5m off the ground to place it on top of the well? Today we would use a forklift, but in 1850 this was one of the problems faced by the Chinese.
It's always nice to visit such quiet "hidden gem" instead of those popular and highly commercialized tourist attractions.
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