-25.2222°N 134.2233°WHorseshoe Bend Station is a pastoral lease that operates as a cattle station in the Alice Springs region of the Northern Territory.
The property occupies and area of 5936km2 and includes approximately 80km (50miles) frontage to the ephemeral Finke River with a string of semi-permanent waterholes. Situated upstream of Crown Point Station, the homestead is on the Depot sandhills, 23km (14miles) south of the junction of the Finke and the Hugh Rivers.[1] The property includes a 2000km2 desert block that has never been developed. The station was originally a staging post for the Overland Telegraph Line and the North–South Road, with a hotel and post office. The former Central Australia Railway line passed about 72km (45miles) west of the homestead.[2] [1]
The area around the station was hit hard by drought in 1897, so much so that several of the surrounding properties were abandoned.[3] The second owners of the property were the firm of Sargeant and Elliot, who also operated the hotel.[1] They restocked the property with cattle; in 1908 they sent stock in 16 railway cattle cars from Oodnadatta to Adelaide and an unspecified number from Warrina.[4] Mr Sargeant, described as "one of the oldest and best-known residents of the far north", died in 1912.[5]
Pastor Carl Strehlow, the founder of Hermannsburg, died and was buried at the station.[2] He arrived at Horseshoe Bend in 1922 after a 250km (160miles) buggy ride from Hermannsburg while en route to reach medical treatment in Adelaide.[1]
By 2018, Horseshoe Bend Station was reported to be run by Viv Oldfield who also owned other properties nearby including Clifton Hills Station, Andado Station and Pandie Pandie Station.[6]