By Yorke Editorial · · 7 min read
The east coast road is the Yorke at its gentlest - a string of jetty towns, crabbing flats and former ketch ports where the only deadline is the tide.
The gentle coast
The Yorke Peninsula has two personalities. The west and south are wild - surf, cliffs, salt spray. The east coast, facing Adelaide across Gulf St Vincent, is the gentle one: calm shallow water, century-old jetties, towns built by the ketch trade and perfected by the family holiday. The coast road south is best driven slowly, with a crab rake in the boot.
Ardrossan to Pine Point
Start at Ardrossan, the east coast's big town, where red clay cliffs tower over a deepwater jetty. Pause at the clifftop, visit the Ardrossan Heritage Museum in the old stump-jump plough factory powerhouse, and if it's clear, take the short drive to the lookout over the dolomite mine south of town.
Twenty minutes on, Pine Point announces the start of serious crab country - on a summer low tide the flats fill with families raking for blue swimmers. The settlement's caravan park and boat ramp make it a favourite quiet base.
The middle ports
Port Julia is the road's best time capsule: a heritage-listed 1913 jetty, an old goods shed that doubled as the community hall, and almost nobody around. Then comes Port Vincent, the east coast's holiday capital, where a 90-berth marina, a sheltered swimming bay and a proper pub earn an overnight stop - especially in squid season, when the jetty glows with fishing lights after dark.
Oyster water
South again, Stansbury was literally named Oyster Bay until 1873, and the bay still grows superb oysters; eat some by the water, then stretch your legs on the foreshore walk out to Pitts Cutting. Wool Bay, five minutes on, hides a clifftop lime kiln from the days when this little port helped build Adelaide.
Into the salt country
The coast road ends its seaside run around Coobowie and Edithburgh, but swing inland and finish at Yorketown, the crossroads town set among more than two hundred salt lakes - some of which turn unmistakably pink in the right season. It's a fittingly strange, beautiful end to the gulf's gentlest drive.
If you time the run for late in the day, have a jig ready: our story on squidding at dusk on the east coast jetties explains the evening ritual you'll see at every stop.