Padthaway Conservation Park

The woodland the vines surround

North-west of Naracoorte, the Padthaway district is best known for its vineyards — but beside the vines survives a rare remnant of what this country looked like first. Padthaway Conservation Park protects a block of woodland where South Australian blue gums, manna gums and rough-barked stringybarks rise over an understorey loud with birds.

The Banksia Loop is the park's signature walk: an easy, level circuit beneath the canopy, at its best in early morning when honeyeaters, parrots and fairy-wrens are busiest. Western grey kangaroos graze the margins around dawn and dusk.

There is no camping in the park itself, but the township of Padthaway sits just outside the boundary. The park makes a green pause on the drive between Naracoorte and the Riverland — and birdwatchers can complete a South East wetland-and-woodland double by continuing to Bool Lagoon to the south.