New toilets (background left)
Large bedroom
Accommodation
Hut,
'Walk-in' site,
Water Tank
'Walk-in' site,
Water Tank
Water Tank Level
Mapsheet
Mapsheet 4B, Caroona Creek Conservation Park to Hallett
Guidebook
Southern Guidebook, chapter 6, map 6
Coordinates
Contact
https://www.heysentrail.asn.au (Friends of the Heysen Trail)
This hut is maintained by Friends of the Heysen Trail volunteers and reserved for Heysen Trail walkers and Mawson Trail cyclists.
This hut is maintained by Friends of the Heysen Trail volunteers and reserved for Heysen Trail walkers and Mawson Trail cyclists.
Bookings
No, hut is locked - lock combination is #5418
Fees
None
Facilities
large old school building - 2 bedrooms (one large, one small), lounge and kitchen. Bunks, water, slow combustion stove, cooking facilities, kitchen, sink, toilet
History
The school and residence was built in 1884. A hall was also built adjacent the school. The school was closed in 1947.
FOHT Trail Development team visited the hut on 8/4/2022. Water level in Hut tank approx 90% and Toilet tank aprox 50%.
Hi all traveling people. There is now a Telstra 4GX 700mhz LTE tower located at the top of Mount Bryan summit. If you have a suitable Telstra mobile phone you can do almost anything. Other networks can use it to make 000 emergency calls. Have a great stay in Mount Bryan East.
E2E S2N Carol and Mick
Stayed there Thursday 27th May.
Fantastic place to stay, 2 accommodation areas and a common kitchen. Water tap in sink works!
Plenty of water in school tank but water from toilet tanks is a rusty brown. No longer has a stove which is a pity, and combination lock does not always work … reported to FOHT. Climbing Mt Bryan not a good idea if in clouds unless you have a GPS with track on it as signs can be hard to find in bad weather
FOHT Trail Development Team visited this site 22/04/21. Main water tank level 90%. Smaller toilet tank level 100%.
Great overnight stay on 4/10/2020. Watched the weather come in over Mt Bryan, happy to stay warm and dry inside. Good water levels in main tank.
Great place to stay. The main tank attached to the building provides good water but the secondary tank attached to the toilet block provides ominous brown coloured water. Looked like a lot of dust and dirt may have made its way along the gutters and pipes
I love the throne on top of Mt Bryan.
Beautiful campsite and grounds at the old school – a teacher’s house next to the school and church.
You can just imagine a teacher in the 1890s asking the class “who can tell me where Antarctica is?” and a young George Wilkins eagerly shooting his hand straight up.
I think locals use it, too. When we were there a couple of years ago, a local young couple drove up. When they saw us, they sheepishly got back in their car and drove away.
I think they were expecting some privacy.
Cycling the Mawson trail S-N. Hut was a very welcome break from the 40km/hr winds. Tank was full and water reasonably clear.
Nice hut; stayed here 11June on my E2E walk north. It is split into two separate areas – one is a single large sleeping room with fireplace and the second is multi-room with kitchen, lounge with fireplace and smaller sleeping area. I greatly appreciated the cut up wood out back kept dry in the old overturned tank. It’s great having a fireplace but often a battle to find wood for it so whoever provided wood is awesome!
Stayed here 4 May 2019, one of the best huts on the Heysen Trail, has real character. There is no combination lock located on the door. Slow combustion stove/oven has been removed from kitchen area- only the metal chimney/flu remaining. There are two other fireplaces located inside hut. Rainwater supply working ok to kitchen sink.
Kangaroos are in plague proportion on road out from Mount Bryan, they have migrated South with the dry conditions up North. Drive with care, especially at night.
Does anyone know how long the slow combustion stove/oven in the kitchen has been missing for? Are there any plans to replace it?
Hi. Can you camp at Mt Bryan East school outside of the hiking season?
Julian Barnett
Yes, the hut is also on the Mawson Trail and shared by mountain bike trail riders, so this one is open all year.
Two cyclists travelling a loop on the Mawson Trail S-N-S. great spot to spend a night. Good water. No lock on the door. Thank you!
Don and Frank
27/9/2018 Stayed in hut overnight a nice stay, water was OK thanks.
We came across the old school house as well as old church and homestead was such a peaceful pleasure to look at the places thank you was bloody awesome can we camp overnight there ?
The lock wouldn’t open using #5418 when we tried on 20 July 2016
Thx for letting us know. Are you sure after entering the combo you pressed the lock together? This normally releases the lock. We’ll confirm that and the current combo and reply later.
Hi Mark, we can confirm that the combination hasn’t been changed, and that the combo locks needs to be pressed together after entering the combo, this will release the lock. This is a common way that combo locks are used. I’ve experienced the pain of not realising this before too :/ We were there about a month ago during a trail audit and checked the lock twice to verify it was working as expected.
Stayed here night of 26/9/15. No padlock on door. Plenty if firewood around. Multiple rooms. Gorgeous old building. Cleaned up a bit. Water reasonable.
Glad I was going N to S overt Bryan!!
The Scouts stayed here for the annual hike Easter Venture 2013, which was held in and around the Caroona Creek Conservation Park.
Great base of operations for the Rovers, Theme Team and Radio Activities.
Thankyou Friends of the Heysen Trail for providing such a fantastic facility.
We wondered if a couple of solar powered push button style timer lights would be useful in the kitchen and/or the toilets?
Noted that there appears to be some termite damage in the floor of the kitchen and the toilets need some TLC (broken seat lids and the pong is quite overwhelming!). Didn’t notice a padlock if there was meant to be one?
Edit: The kitchen sink was also leaking into the cupboard and all over the floor when we first arrived. Attempted an emergency repair with some tape which seemed to do the trick.
Thank you for doing that.
Cheers
Took the kids up to Mt Bryan East Schoolhouse for a bit of school holiday camping and trail walking. Schoolhouse in good condition, as usual, but if I were staying there, I’d remember to take loo paper, it seems to disappear very easily. Did a drive around to re-stock the woodpile! Getting toward the end of the hiking season and the snakes are out, saw a fairly sizeable Brown in Tourille Gorge, so take care!
Will let the relevant maintenance person know, thanks for bringing to our attention.
Hi Peter, the maintenance person for that section has advised that they were of the issue, and was scheduled to repair it yesterday, but the fixing has since been delayed until next week.
He wonders if it is because some people are confused by the padlock’s operation, that being that once the combination is entered one has to push the lock together to open it. This is a common feature of combo padlocks, but not one people are always familiar with. Apparently this is not the first time it had happened.
Once again, thanks for letting us know!
some smart person(s) has broken into the building, badly damaging the door and leaving the schoolhouse open
It’s a nice hut indeed!
Will let the relevant maintenance person know, thanks for bringing to our attention.
The Schoolhouse was fantastic to stay in. Very grateful to the Freinds of the Heysen for maintaining such a great facility for hikers. We camped there this past weekend (28 and 28 July 2012) and it was clean, bug and rodent free and warm in the cold nights when the fire was going.
Only issue that we had was that some smart person(s) has broken into the building, badly damaging the door and leaving the schoolhouse open….very poor behaviour!
Cheers
Peter Ilee
Thanks for that Julian. And I’ll also shift my source into the unreliable file.
Alan
Not true we were there on Tuesday and there was only the combination lock. Forestry can’t take this one off us as it’s not on there land
I’ve just heard a rumour that the combination lock on Mt Bryan School has been replaced by a normal padlock. Can anyone confirm this? Not another case of appropriation by Woods and Forest? Like to know if I need to take a hacksaw on my next visit there.
Very nice hut, some firewood available. In good condition when Aesir Rover Crew visited on September 1st. BYO candles.