Place Type
Recreation - Tourist Attraction
Location
656.57kms North of Adelaide - Driving 806 km (10 hours 9 mins)
Address & Contact
Oodnadatta Track
Andamooka SA 5722
Phone: N/A
Email: N/A
Web: N/A
Information
The old Bersford railway siding was one of the sites along the line which had giant water softeners to prepare water for the steam locomotive, It is 50.4 km SE from William Creek. Water for the Ghan was not extracted from the mound springs but from deep underground bores.
Visiting the sidings you can see water softener tanks built to remove the harmful minerals from the bore water that caused heavy scaling on the boilers of the steam-trains. Unfortunately, there is no water softener available at the bore head at Beresford Siding, where there is a great camp besides the dam, although the hot water coming from the bore is irresistible after a few days of bush camping.
Someone has laid a few sleepers for a shower floor and if you don't mind the colour of the water (black) it's a great refresher. The best camp is just over the hill overlooking the large dam that was built to supply water to the steam locomotives but now used as a watering hole for an incredible amount of wildlife including hundreds of cattle, corellas, galahs, ducks, top-not pigeons, eagles and crows.
Bush camping is permitted here.
