Images: Georgia Geelen
Nor’ West Bend Station has seen a lot in its time – paddle steamers, wool bales, droughts and floods. Now, on a wide, peaceful curve of the Murray near Morgan, one of its heritage buildings is welcoming a new era as the Riverland’s latest cafe and bar, NWB Station.
Set just metres from the water’s edge, the new spot is all about simple, relaxing river days. Grazing snacks, flowing cold drinks, and nothing between you and the view but lawn, river gums and the gentle ripple of the Murray.
Out the front, spacious lawns roll down towards the river. Bali-style huts – shipped over and stored for years before finding their perfect home here – fill the grass, offering shaded nooks to settle in for an afternoon and feel completely immersed in nature.
There’s plenty of outdoor seating, people can spill out onto the lawns, and boaties can even pull up directly out front, with boat access and houseboat mooring making it an easy stop for people cruising the river.
Behind the new spot is Lisa and David Goodland and their daughters Bree and Zoe, a family who fell hard for the region, then decided to build their whole life around it. The family bought the land back in 2020, and for a while, they were going back and forth, working full-time during the week, then packing the car every Friday to spend weekends up there.
“It was our holiday place, but we kept thinking ‘how can we set up something here so we don’t have to go home?,” Lisa shares.
It’s no surprise that the Riverland, with its breathtaking natural beauty and tranquil stretches of river, eventually proved too hard to resist. Last year, the pair sold their house, quit their jobs and moved up to Nor West Bend full-time to throw everything into restoring the station and opening the cafe and bar. The cafe is – without question – a labour of love – but David’s background as a builder certainly came in handy.
“It’s very much all of us,” Lisa says. “I make the dough every morning, my mum is cooking the chips, and my girls are running the food out and behind the tills. It’s a proper family project.”
“The Bali huts we’ve had for years, we already had them in storage, and the theme evolved around them. We did pretty much everything ourselves,” she admits.
The menu keeps it easy. Non-alc cold drinks, three beers on tap and a tight selection of wines sit beside crowd-pleasing snacks. The from-scratch, wood-fired pizzas lead the lineup.
“We’re keeping the menu simple at the moment because we’re new to this,” Lisa says. “We’ve started with five pizzas – a margherita, pepperoni and a few favourites – and we’ll add as we go.”
Coffee is on the way, with a machine on order and plans to bring proper barista-made brews into the mix once they’re up and running. Service ends late afternoon, just in time to linger over your last drink until sunset. “We want it to stay a relaxed, family-friendly river spot,” Lisa explains.
But as much as NWB Station is about pizzas and leisurely afternoons, it’s impossible to ignore the place itself. Steeped in history, visiting the cafe is entering one of the Murray’s most historic stretches of river, filled with beautiful limestone buildings.
Before colonisation, Nor’ West Bend Station was known by its Aboriginal name, Tanami – “never die” – a nod to the water that sustained people here for thousands of years. In the mid-1800s, as European settlement spread, Nor’ West Bend became a sheep and cattle station that – at its peak – carried around 14,000 sheep, 3000 cattle and 90 horses.
By the late 1800s, with the booming river trade and the arrival of the rail line, Nor’ West Bend had transformed into one of South Australia’s busiest river ports. In 1878 the township was officially settled and renamed Morgan.
Today, the broader station complex is owned by Kevin and Sue Pedder, who have spent more than two decades carefully restoring the area using original stone, old irrigation pipes, and other remnants of its past.
The new NWB Station cafe and bar sits within this tapestry of history and stories, the now-bar area was once a wool barn. Being a heritage spot, the couple had to go through rigorous approval before they could go ahead with their plans. But three weeks in and it’s already paying off. The community have been quick to celebrate its rich past – and enjoy its new life.
“Every day that we’ve been open so far, people have been coming in and sharing stories about the site’s past,” Lisa says.
“We couldn’t have expected this many people to show up, tables are full, lawns are full, huts are full, houseboats, boats, it’s been great.”
NWB Station is a casual river hangout well worth the trip North. Soak in the River over hot chips and a beer, and look out at the same bend in the Murray that hosted wool barges, riverboats, school kids and shearers over the past 170 years.
“It’s such a beautiful spot,” Lisa says. “We just want people to be able to come down, relax and enjoy the river. That’s really what it’s about.”
The history of Nor’ West Bend Station was sourced from the Visit Morgan website here.
Nor West Bend Station (NWB)
Where: 9230 Goyder Highway, Stuart
When: Fri 12pm-5pm, Sat & Sun 11am-4pm
For more info, click here.
