Chambers Pillar
Why visit?
Chambers Pillar is a spectacular solitary column towering 40 metres above the Simpson Desert plain. It was formed from sandstone deposited and worn down over 340 million years. The adjacent Castle Rock, a mesa located 500 metres to the north-east of Chambers Pillar was formed at the same time and is also dominant in the landscape, which contains several smaller, but similarly developed rock formations, the largest being Window Rock and Eagle Rock.
Chambers Pillar was also an important landmark guiding the region's earliest pioneers on their way from Adelaide to Alice Springs. John MacDouall Stuart was the first white person to see it when heading north on his earliest attempt to cross Australia in April 1860. He named it
