Lighthouses and Lookouts of the Limestone Coast
Ten places to climb, gaze and get your bearings
This is a coastline that earned its lighthouses the hard way. More than thirty ships came to grief along the reefs of the South East — most infamously the steamer Admella in 1859, whose story we tell in The Wreck of the Admella and which you can trace along the Admella Discovery Trail.
The happy consequence for travellers is a coast studded with lights and lookouts, from working towers to volcano summits. Here are ten worth the climb, running roughly south to north from the Victorian border to the edge of the Coorong — with a couple of inland bonuses around Robe and Millicent.
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1
Port MacDonnellCape Northumberland
South Australia's southernmost point, with a historic light station, rugged volcanic rock formations and reliable sunset theatre.
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2
Mount GambierCape Banks Lighthouse
The lonely light above the reefs that claimed the Admella in 1859 — wild, windswept and steeped in shipwreck history.
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3
BeachportCape Martin Lighthouse
Beachport's 1960 tower carries the lamp from the 1878 Penguin Island light, whose abandoned tower still stands just offshore.
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4
Kingston SECape Jaffa Lighthouse
A lighthouse that retired to town: dismantled from its offshore reef platform and rebuilt in Kingston SE as a museum.
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5
RobeRobe Obelisk
Robe's red-and-white daymark of 1855, perched on the crumbling cliffs of Cape Dombey and the town's enduring symbol.
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6
Mount GambierCentenary Tower
The stone tower above Mount Gambier's craters — a short, sharp climb for the best panorama in the city.
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7
RobeBeacon Hill Lookout
Robe's inland vantage point, with the town, lakes and ocean arranged below like a map.
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8
MillicentMount Muirhead Lookout
A platform on an old volcano's shoulder near Millicent, looking across the flats to Canunda's dunes and ranks of wind turbines.
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9
Kingston SECoorong Lookout (Kingston SE)
Where the lagoon country begins: big-sky views over the southern Coorong near Kingston SE.
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10
MillicentCape Buffon Walk (Southend)
A clifftop loop at Southend with fenced lookouts, sea stacks and a trig-point panorama along Rivoli Bay.
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Pack binoculars between May and October: several of these vantage points double as whale-watching platforms when southern right whales cruise the coast.
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Image credits
- Cape Northumberland Lighthouse(GN05387).jpg by State Government Photographer , CC0 via Wikimedia Commons