The first of three viewpoints on the Arkaroola Ridge Top Tour, Coulthards Lookout provides a 270-degree view over the Arkaroola Protection Area, which was gazetted in 2011 and permanently protects the area from mining and development (and gives the area the same legal status in South Australia as a National Park under the National Parks and Wildlife Act 1972).
There’s an elevated steel lookout platform, next to a much older timber platform that has seen better days!
Looking from the north across to the south are views of Radium Ridge, The Armchair, Mount Painter, Barraranna Hill, Acacia Ridge, Arkanoola Village nd Mount Warren-Hasting.
To the north is Radium Ridge, where radioactive metal was first discovered by William Greenwood in 1910; later the Americans came searching for uranium here to arm Oppenheimer’s atomic bomb. The first track into this area was carved out along Radium Creek, below Radium Ridge, by the Department of Mines in 1944. Mount Gee, to its right, was was named in honour of Lionel Carley Egremont Gee, a Justice of the Peace who held various Government positions.
Quite distinctive is Armchair Hill or The Armchair, which has a knob-like appearance as it juts up above the other peaks.
Across the valleys, the most prominent part of the view is a stark, bald, line of domes known as the Armchair, a place of particular significance to another Arkaroola guide, Sharpy Coulthard. It was beneath these peaks that the Adnyamathanha man’s grandfather was born.
Many years later, in 1995, Sharpy walked into Arkaroola Village, on his traditional lands, with a written proposal to run tours in the sanctuary. Almost 30 years on, he continues to do so. One morning before setting out on the Ridgetop Track, I join him on a walk into Mawson Valley, stretching out behind Arkaroola Village.
The Post, 11 May 2025
To the south-east is Barraranna Hill; the two closer peaks are unnamed.
Almost directly south of Coulthards Lookout is Arkaroola Village, with Acacia Ridge to the left of the village and Mount Warren-Hasting behind it.
Getting to Coulthards Lookout
The only way to visit Coulthards Lookout is on the Arkaroola Ridgetop Tour, which leaves from the Arkaroola Wilderness Sanctuary reception. On most days there is a morning (8am) and afternoon (1pm) tour which takes about 4:30min.
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