The Rise and Fall of Australia's Riverboat Capital: Echuca, Victoria

In the 1880s, one of the busiest ports in Australia was 200 kilometres from the nearest ocean. Echuca sat at the point where the mighty Murray River came closest to Melbourne — and for one wild generation, that made it the beating heart of inland Australia. Hundreds of paddle steamers worked the rivers like floating trains, hauling wool from stations a thousand kilometres away to a red-gum wharf that stretched along the riverbank like a wooden cathedral. Fortunes were made, pubs never closed, and Echuca called itself the Chicago of the bush. Then the railways spread, the riverboats lost their cargo, the droughts emptied the river — and the greatest transport era in inland Australia's history died almost overnight. The wharf was torn down for firewood. The steamers rotted in the reeds. This is the story of Australia's Mississippi — the empire of the rivers, the city it built, and what's left of both. Subscribe to After the Boom. #Echuca #Victoria #Australia