In this part of my road trip blog post series, I’ll be talking about our dip down to the Eyre Peninsula and our travels from Melrose to Ceduna, South Australia. Here are the links from the previous legs of the trip:

Part 1

Part 2

Day 13

We had another long drive ahead of us as we departed Melrose and headed west then south down to the southern tip of the Eyre Peninsula. Our first couple of hours of the drive were pretty uneventful as we passed a lot of red rock, a wind farm, and not much else, and we were excited to make a stop in the seaside town of Cowell.

Cowell is a beautiful seaside town right on the water, and our first exposure to the oyster farming that is very popular in the region. We could see some of the action happening at the boat port, where some oyster boats were coming in from a morning on the ocean.

After another hour and a bit of driving, we reached Port Lincoln, which is a port city on the Eyre Peninsula known for seafood, beautiful views, and cage shark diving. We didn’t stick around as we were eager to get to our campsite in Coffin Bay, but picked up groceries after a little driving exploration around town.

Finally arriving in Coffin Bay was exciting and beautiful! As you enter the start of the town, there is a lovely and calm inlet where you can see equipment for oyster farming in the water. We had a calm evening after setting up camp, ready to explore the next day.

Day 14

One of the aspects of Coffin Bay that led to us adding it to our road trip stop list are the wild emus that live around the area. We had seen a couple of emus since arriving in Australia, but we were especially keen to see more of them in the wild.

We had read that though emus sometimes visited the campsite we were staying at, with the crowds during summer holidays we did not think that there would be many around. We decided to take matters into our own hands and look for emus where we knew we could see them, in Coffin Bay National Park on Day 14 of our trip.

Coffin Bay Natural Park was fantastic, and we first drove to near the campground to see the area around the protected inlet. We were excited to see 4 emus crossing the road as we drove through the park to the campground area. After parking, we were even more excited to see some emus cooling down in the water, as it was already very hot outside early in the day!

Our second stop in the national park was Almonta beach, which was a beautiful stretch of sand and big ocean waves. We had a long walk along the beach and had fun trying to spot various marine wildlife, like some interesting-looking sea stars!

It was a particularly hot couple of days in Coffin Bay, so any time we didn’t spend exploring we spent trying to cool down! We spent the rest of Day 14 trying to do just that by going for a swim in the calm, protected water close to our campsite and having a drink in the air conditioned yacht club on the bay.

Day 15

On our second full day in Coffin Bay, we took the drive down to Port Lincoln to have a better look at the town. It definitely has the look of a port city, with a very industrial side to the end of the stretch of beach, but it also has a beautiful boardwalk and pier. We spent the morning enjoying the town, eating the best croissant in South Australia (as advertised), and looking at some of the seafood shops that the Eyre Peninsula is known for.

We spent the afternoon checking out the Coffin Bay market and then went for a seafood platter dinner at one of the restaurants located on the water called Oyster HQ. We decided to get one of the tasting platters so we could try as much variety of fresh seafood as we could. Our tasty platter included oysters, prawns, salmon in a variety of forms, and squid. We really loved eating such fresh seafood in such a beautiful location.

Day 16

We were sad to leave the beauty of Coffin Bay and the Eyre Peninsula, but we were also excited to make our way back slightly north to prepare for our drive across the Nullarbor! Our destination for the day was Ceduna, South Australia, but we had some sightseeing stops to make along the way.

Throughout the road trip so far, we had gathered a lot of tips and tricks for lesser-known places to stop from people we met. One of the recommendations that we received was for the Talia Caves, which was our first stop of the day.

The trip to the caves involved a short drive down a dirt road and then a descent down some steps to an expanse of rock along the ocean. You can walk along the rock to see interesting shapes and divots that have formed from years of being battered by the ocean.

Our next stop was Murphy’s Haystacks, which was a collection of giant rocks located on private land. For $2 a person, you can walk around the rocks and have a closer look, so we did! These were very interesting rocks located seemingly in the middle of nowhere. We imagined what it must have been like to come upon all these rocks for the first time without knowing about their existence before – it must have been quite a surprise!

Our third stop was to check out Streaky Bay, where we wanted to take a look at the coastal town and pay a visit to the local surf shop for a t-shirt. Unfortunately, being Sunday afternoon when we arrived, all of the businesses were closed, and we didn’t get our shirts. We still had a look around town and then continued on our way.

We were excited to finally arrive in Ceduna, a fishing village and last major town before the Nullarbor in South Australia. After having a walk around to explore the town, we stocked up on emergency supplies for the road, like non-perishable food and tons of water. We were lucky to catch a beautiful sunset before getting to sleep early for our big day of driving the next day.

We really loved South Australia. There was so much to do and see, the people were lovely, the wine was tasty, and the food was fantastic. If you have the time, it definitely needs to be a stop on your list when visiting Australia.

Next up: the Nullarbor! Stay tuned for my recap of our giant drive soon. I have been working full time since arriving in Perth so have had less time to catch up on my posts, but hope to get caught up in the next few weeks!