Boolagoorda Trail (1.4km)

Summary

The Boolagoorda Trail starts and ends at the Hamelin Pool Telegraph Station. It takes the visitor on an easy flat 1.4 kilometre loop walk to a 200 metre Boardwalk.  From there you can experience the world’s oldest lifeforms, known as stromatolites, thriving in the shallow seas.

The Boolagoorda Trail offers the visitor a unique insight into ancient lifeforms as well as much more recent human activity. Near the trailhead is an assortment of station buildings including the Hamelin Pool Telegraph Station. Built in 1884, the station provided a vital link between Perth and Roebourne, until closure in the 1950s. It’s worth paying a small fee for entry into the museum. Just beyond the trailhead is a quarry site where tiny shells compacted over time to form a huge mass. Early settlers cut out blocks which were solid enough for building materials. The old pearler restaurant and St Andrews Church in Denham are built of this shell grit. The trail’s furtherest point is where people can get a glimpse of what life was like 3500 million years ago in the primeval seas. These stromatolites look like mushroom shaped rocks, but are infact colonies of cyanobacteria.  

Notes

Start Point: Hamelin Pool Telegraph Station, 30km west of Overlander Roadhouse, 735km north of Perth

End Point: Hamelin Pool Telegraph Station, 30km west of Overlander Roadhouse, 735km north of Perth

Region: Hamelin Pool, Coral Coast

For more information, a location map and GPS file please visit Trails WA.