Wildlife & Nature

A revegetated forest area on Hindmarsh Island created by community Landcare planting - a quiet bushland walk with birdlife and views to the Murray channel.

One of South Australia's most accessible snorkelling reefs

A protected limestone reef system off Aldinga Beach and Port Willunga, fully protected since 1971 and home to wobbegongs, blue devils, schools of reef fish and dolphins.

A rare pocket of original coastal scrub

One of the last remnants of original coastal vegetation on the Adelaide plains, with sandy walking tracks, native woodland, wetlands and abundant birdlife.

A coastal freshwater lagoon system inside Aldinga Conservation Park, with 166+ recorded bird species including hooded plover, mistletoebirds and rainbow bee-eaters.

A quiet, family-friendly stretch of sand just east of Middleton, part of the Basham Beach Regional Park, with a clifftop walking trail and good rock pools.

Eco-certified marine wildlife tours on the south coast

Small-group wildlife boat tours from the Granite Island Causeway at Victor Harbor, with seals, dolphins and - in winter - southern right whales.

A heritage-listed wetland with small waterfalls, prolific birdlife and Aboriginal scar trees where canoes were once cut.

A wild, remote cove inside Deep Creek National Park

A secluded sand-and-pebble cove on the southern Fleurieu coast, reached only by 4WD track or a steep 3km return walk down from Cobbler Hill - and gloriously empty when you get there.

A riverside nature playground with a wooden boat

Goolwa's premier riverside park features an award-winning nature playspace built around a 10-metre restored wooden fishing boat, right on the Murray River with BBQs, shelters and a shallow swimming beach.

A small reserve south of Strathalbyn with three loop hikes through heathland, eucalypt and native grasses, with summit views over Lake Alexandrina and the Coorong.

Off-grid luxury cabins among the vines

A cluster of eight off-grid, architecturally designed tiny cabins scattered across vineyards around McLaren Flat - including CABN X cabins with private saunas and outdoor baths.

Kayak tours into the Coorong wetlands

Guided kayak tours from Hindmarsh Island into the Coorong National Park - a Ramsar-listed wetland system of lagoons, sand dunes and waterbirds.

A 130-kilometre lagoon and dune system stretching east from the Murray Mouth - one of Australia's most significant wetlands, reachable from Goolwa via the barrage and across Hindmarsh Island.

A 563-hectare bushland park near Mount Compass with three quiet walking trails through native scrub - one of the best birdwatching reserves on the Fleurieu.

Fleurieu Peninsula's biggest wilderness park

The largest conservation area on the Fleurieu Peninsula, with 15 walking trails through eucalypt forest, waterfalls, ocean clifftops and views to Kangaroo Island.

Where Flinders met Baudin in 1802

A sweeping bay on the Fleurieu's south coast, named by Matthew Flinders after his 1802 meeting with French explorer Nicolas Baudin - and today the heart of the Victor Harbor foreshore.

A samphire estuarine wetland on Matthew Flinders Drive at Encounter Bay, with a sealed walking path, shaded shelters, fish nursery and rich birdlife.

A walk-in-only bushland reserve north-east of Mount Compass, on the Heysen Trail - one of the quieter walking destinations on the central Fleurieu.

A sheltered fishing beach a few kilometres east of Cape Jervis, the site of an 1840s whaling station and the shipping port for the historic Talisker Mine.

Whaler's lookout with the best view of Horseshoe Bay

At the end of The Strand, the restored Freeman Lookout perches above Horseshoe Bay on a headland that whalers used as a spotting post in the 1830s. One of the Fleurieu's best whale-watching vantage points in winter.

A 280-million-year-old glaciated river bed

A Permian-era glacial pavement carved into 510 million year old bedrock on the floor of the Inman River - one of the oldest and most accessible glacial sites in Australia.

Walk the wall where the Murray meets the sea

A 630-metre concrete barrage built in 1940 to keep salt water out of the Lower Lakes, the Goolwa Barrage is a favourite wildlife spot where fur seals, pelicans and cormorants gather and visitors can walk right out over the lock gates.

A 170 m timber boardwalk over the Goolwa dunes to a lookout with panoramas of Sir Richard Peninsula, the Hindmarsh Island Bridge and the Coorong.

Victor Harbor's penguin-island

A small rocky island off the Victor Harbor foreshore, home to a little penguin colony and accessed by the iconic horse-drawn tram causeway.