The timber bridge once carried horses, buggies, trucks and tractors on the Sydney Rd, as the highway was called before the waters of the lake lapped over it in 1933.

It was located just south of Bowna, a township of about 100 people and which also disappeared about the same time.

Also inundated was a pub on the Albury side of the creek, the Ivy Hotel.

Wodonga resident Bill Burns recalled yesterday the 1967-1968 drought, when he photographed the still-intact bridge.

Moves to demolish the bridge later in 1968 were thwarted when the drought broke and it went underwater again.

In another drought in 1981 the North Albury Apex Club dismantled most of it because it was judged unsafe.

But many people who saw it as a historic item weren’t pleased, although Apexians said they were doing the community a favour for free.