Port Victoria

Wardang Island, also known as Wauraltee Island, is a low-lying 20 km2 island in the Spencer Gulf close to the western coast of Port Victoria on the Yorke Peninsula, South Australia. It acts as a natural breakwater, protecting the former grain port of Port Victoria and providing a sheltered anchorage.

The waters around Wardang are popular with recreational divers because of the opportunities for wreck diving.

The Wardang Island Maritime Heritage Trail offers eight amazing dive sites around Wardang . Of the wrecks, five are of schooners and coastal steamers – the Monarch, Australian, Investigator, MacIntyre and Moorara – that carried wheat and other local cargo, and four – the Aagot, Notre Dame, D’Arvor and Songvaar – are larger vessels that transported grain to Europe which are associated with the trading port of Port Victoria in the early 1900s.

Port Victoria was once an important trading port , and was one of the last Australian ports to see large square-rigged sailing vessels operate on a commercial basis.

The Wardang Island Maritime Heritage Trail includes a waterproof booklet for underwater use, plaques adjacent to each of the eight shipwrecks and six land-based interpretive signs located at Port Victoria.

Check out the Maritime Museum for artifacts of some early dives.