Bowen River Hotel

Bowen River Hotel is a heritage-listed hotel at Strathbowen-Leichhardt Range Road, Mount Wyatt, Whitsunday Region, Queensland, Australia. It was built. It is also known as Heidelberg Inn. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 21 October 1992.HistoryPhillip Sommer and his partner John Harvey pioneered the area in 1862. They established a sheep and cattle run on Heidelberg, a selection of ninety five square miles taken up by James Mead in 1861 but never stocked. Sommer had moved to Dotswood Station north of Charters Towers by 1866 and the Bowen River Hotel was operating from his Heidelberg homestead by 1865 with George Burnes as publican.It was constructed on the supply route to Central Western Queensland which passed through the Kennedy District. Licensing information from the Port Denison Times indicates that it was probably one of two hotels built at much the same time in the same area. An inn called the Heidelberg was built at "the lower crossing place" while the Bowen River Hotel was constructed higher up on top of the steep bank of the Bowen River. The building was donated to the National Trust of Queensland in 1974 by Ted Cunningham of Strathmore Station and restoration of the rear wing was carried out by Mr George Stewart at that time. The structure was left exposed to vandals and campers for many years from the 1970s.