Coffin Bay (Wikipedia) originally Coffin’s Bay, is a town at the southern extremity of the Eyre Peninsula, a wheat growing area of South Australia. At the 2006 census, Coffin Bay had a population of 584.The town is situated on the western side of the southern tip of Eyre Peninsula about 46 km from Port Lincoln. The population swells during holiday seasons to more than 2,000 people due to its proximity to the Coffin Bay National Park. It is a popular location for boating, sailing, swimming, water-skiing, skindiving and wind-surfing, as well as fishing (rock, surf, angling and boat). Oyster farming is conducted in the quiet waters of Coffin Bay. History The Parnkalla people occupied the area prior to European settlement in the 1830s. British naval explorer Matthew Flinders named the bay on 16 February 1802 in honour of his friend Sir Isaac Coffin, who was Resident Naval Commissioner at Sheerness, where the Investigator was fitted out. The same year, French explorer Nicolas Baudin provided the alternative French name of Baie Delambre. The bay remained uncharted until explored in March 1839 by Captain Frederick R. Lees (d.1839) in command of the brig Nereus. Lees’ thorough charts became a standard reference for mariners through until the electronic era. In 1966, Broken Hill Proprietary Company Limited established a private railway between Coffin Bay and Port Lincoln to convey lime sands. It was closed in 1989, with the track removed in 2001. 1^st March, Sunday The wind blew all of last night, we were up earlier than normal to pack up and get going early. I must admit that we were not sorry to leave Cowell. We did about 220kms to Coffin Bay, so not such a big haul. We stopped off in Tumby Bay on the foreshore to have our breakfast, a nice little picturesque coastal town. It was breezy, overcast and quite chilly. We followed the coast to Coffin Bay and most of it is farm land so not that much to see apart from the odd glimpse of the sea and old broken down farm houses. We arrived in Coffin Bay just on lunch time, the weather had cleared, the wind had dropped and the sun had come out, just for us.  The caravan park is really nice and apparently the kangaroos love it here as is evident with all the roo poo around the place. They apparently come visiting at night so it will be interesting to see how Hugo reacts to them. The caravan park is pretty busy but only about half full, a few fishing people here but not the majority (like Cowell) so it’s a mish mash of all sorts of people. We set up and took a drive to have a look see at the town.  There is no town as such, a few shops spread around the place, no big grocery store or anything like that, a small grocery/liquor store, service station and of course a few fish and chip places and cafes.  It’s not a huge place but there are so many holiday places on the foreshore for rent (most of them empty at this time of the year).  Thankfully it’s not high season so it’s pretty quite.  The weather is not too bad, a bit cool with a coolish breeze, no high winds so very pleasant. Coffin Bay is a very pretty town with heaps of coast line and beaches to explore and plenty of spots for Hugo to swim, I think that we will have fun here. The bay is an oyster farm and you can see all the oyster structures (or whatever they call them) everywhere.  All you oyster lovers would love it here.

2^nd March, Monday It’s a grey day today and quite cool in fact jersey weather. Hugo had an appointment for his Catrophen injection in Port Lincoln this afternoon so we thought we would go early and spend the day there to take in the sites, it’s not far from Coffin Bay, only about 40kms. Port Lincoln is situated on the shore of Boston Bay and is reputed to have the most millionaires per capita in Australia, it also boasts to be the “Seafood Capital of Australia” and judging from the large fishing boats in port I would believe it.  We watched one smallish fishing vessel offloading Tuna and they just kept coming so one can only imagine how much the big boats would bring in.  We thought that we would treat ourselves to breakfast and stopped at a lovely hotel on the foreshore. We sat outside overlooking the bay. Port Lincoln is a pretty town. The town itself is not huge but the suburbs are quite spread out so it gives the appearance of being quite a big place. We drove around having a look at some of the bays and Hugo even got to have a swim. We had a look at the wharf and all the large fishing boats.  Some of them were getting prepared to go out.  I am not sure how long they go out for and Ralph and think that it would be at least 4 days as the crew were loading all their gear and the fish are processed on the boat before they are brought back to port. The vet Hugo went to was really nice (she studied at Murdoch) and gave Hugo heaps of treats so of course she became his best friend. There is a statue of the racehorse Makybe Diva on the foreshore, for those of you who don’t know who this racehorse is – She was a British Bred, Australian trained thoroughbred that became the first racehorse to win the Melbourne cup on 3 occasions, 2003, 2004 and 2005.  Her claim to fame in Port Lincoln is the fact that she was owned by a local Tuna Fisherman and apparently she never set foot here, but all the town claim her as theirirdon B

3^rd March, Tuesday What a beautiful day it was today.  This morning was overcast and coolish but no wind. We decided that we would do the North of Coffin Bay today. The weather turned nice, the sun came out so you can see the colours of the sea. Our first stop was Mount Dutton Bay, the coastline is all so beautiful. From Mount Dutton you can see Coffin Bay Peninsula on the other side of the Bay, it’s all National Park and there are quite a lot of campsites. The one that can be seen from our vantage point is call “Port Douglas”, the same name as Port Douglas where Mike and Barbs live in Queensland. The roads to all these little bays are unsealed but all firm and in very good condition as it’s mainly farmland and of course access to the Bay towns which are all Oyster farmers so they are well used. The little bays are all holiday places, some people live there so lots of beach shacks and boats.  All along this Bay there are private oyster leases to be found so some of the places are not accessible as it’s private property.  There are some nice spots for camping but they have all been taken. From this part of the Peninsula the coast line starts becoming quite rugged and lots of cliffs. From there we drove to Frenchman Bay.  From this bay there are quite a few Oyster boats going out to collect and put their racks back in, the only people we saw here were the local Oyster farmers so we had the beach to ourselves.  From one of the lookouts we could see Emus walking along the beach which is a rarity for us to see. Frenchman Bay is more on the Great Australian Bight than in the Bay.  From there we went to Coles Point also on the Bight, another beautiful outlook looking over Coffin Bay Peninsula and Greenly Beach, not a soul in site. Coles Point was named after the Coles family who settled here in the 1800’s. The drive back to Coffin Bay was through farm land and there were some amazing photo opportunities, I take pictures of anything HAHA.

4^th March, Wednesday Today we just bummed around town in the morning. Coffin Bay is tiny and we took a drive around the little Industrial area, there was one panel beating shop and about 30 huge premises which were different oyster companies, massive sheds etc. the oyster trade really is huge here. We went to the docks where some of the fishing boats were getting ready to go out and one had just come in with a load of leather jacket after being out at sea for 3 days.  We watched them unload and had a chat to some of the other skippers to find out what they were going out for and how long they will be out at sea. It’s all so interesting. We came back to our little home and vegged for the rest of the day and then went to a lovely little local restaurant for dinner, we even ate oysters (don’t get excited, we had cooked ones).  We leave here for Elliston tomorrow morning and every move brings us closer to home.  I must admit that we are looking forward to having a winter and vegging out in front of the fire.  We have decided that we couldn’t live anywhere where the seasons are hot all the time like the tropics as we love the different seasons and their different temperatures and moods.  The temp today is cool but still no wind and no rain, I think that we will be lucky and have mild weather going through the Nullarbor.