You are looking at the most readily-recognisable of the Garden Island Ships’ Graveyard’s 25 wrecks.
Most of this one has either corroded away, become enshrouded by mangroves, or been submerged in silt, but the remnants of its sternpost and rudder still stand tall.
The screw steamer Glaucus was built in Sunderland, England in 1878.
From the 1880s until the early 1930s it worked in Australian waters – initially as a very accident-prone coastal trader, then as a grain storage hulk.
Glaucus’s final accident led to its beaching in a ships’ graveyard, rather than it being broken up and its iron salvaged.
The salvage operation was approved in 1934.
However, when salvagers accidentally holed the hull below the waterline, it was decided the only safe option was a hasty, temporary repair, immediately followed by a one-way trip to the nearby graveyard on 4 July 1935.
Close-up – as pictured below – the 21st century viewer is struck by the juxtaposition of rusting wreck and mangroves.
Viewed from the seaward side, and a little further away – as in the image atop this post – I like the “unlikely” combination of the still-statuesque rusting rudder with mangrove-rimmed tidal creek, suburban sprawl and the Adelaide Hills/Mt Lofty Ranges’ face zone.
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