NanOpasTravels: KANGAROO ISLAND

Kangaroo Island separated from mainland Australia around 10,000 years ago, due to rising sea level after the last glacial period. Known as Karta ("Island of the Dead") by the mainland Aboriginal tribes, the existence of stone tools and shell middens show that Aboriginal people once lived on Kangaroo Island.

SOME HISTORY:
CRADLED in the sailor’s arms, the small child made no sound as Robert Russell, second mate of the three-masted Duke of York, waded ashore in still waters at Nepean Bay.

As Russell stood the toddler down on the stony ground of Kangaroo Island, Elizabeth Beare, aged two — youngest child of four of Thomas Hudson Beare, 48, and wife Lucy, 32 – became the first free settler to set foot in the new colony of South Australia.

The date was July 27, 1836, 180 years ago on Wednesday, and five full months before Governor John Hindmarsh proclaimed the South Australian colony at Holdfast Bay, on December 28, 1836.

Today few people realise Kangaroo Island, Australia’s third-largest island — after Tasmania and Melville Island — was the centre of the first free European settlement in Australia.

Two wooden structures, part of the original jetty, stand in the shallows at Reeves Point, one kilometre north of Kingscote as the only reminders of where little Elizabeth Beare was placed ashore.

New Jetty which was built in another area of Reeves Point Reserve.

Flinders Chase National Park: The national park first acquired protected area status as a ‘flora and fauna reserve’ declared on 16 October 1919 under the Fauna and Flora Reserve Act 1919, an act whose specific purpose was:^[1]

…to establish a Reserve on Kangaroo Island for the Protection, Preservation, and Propagation of Australasian Fauna and Flora, and to provide for the Control of such Reserve, and for other purposes.

We had to purchase a two day pass to enter the National Park, the first day we drove to Remarkable Rock which was wonderful to see, but we could not get a good photo of the destinct round rocks as we were there when a bus load of travellers there at the same time so have copied a photo from the internet.

Cape du Couedic Lighthouse

Kangaroo Island is the third largest island off the coast of Australia, being approximately 4,500 square kilometres in area, 155 kms long and 55 kms wide.
The first Europeans to arrive on Kangaroo Island in 1802 were a group lead by Matthew Flinders looking for water and fresh meat (which they had been without for four months) near the present day Penneshaw. They hunted the small kangaroos and gave the island that name.
A year after this French explorer Nicholas Baudin passed on the opposite side of the island naming the south western point Cape du Couedic after his friend and famous French sea captain Charles Louis, Chevalier du Couedic de Kergoualer (1740-1780).
This coastline off Flinders Chase was to become the final resting place for 14 ships which came to grief on the rocky shores.
An underwater reef with and two islands - the Casuarinas (The Brothers) extended some 35-40 km south of Cape du Couedic on Kangaroo Island.
The need for a lighthouse in that area had been a great one for many years, as the treacherous waters already boasted a number of casualties.

Weirs Cove to where fresh supplies were offloaded by boat for the lighthouse keepers.

The goods were hauled up the cliff with a flying fox, including animals & people.

Our next venture was to Admirals Arch which has been made easier to get to by a series of wooden stairs in a spiral to view the Arch and NZ fur seals on the rocks.