Moonlight Head

Moonlight Head is a locality located on the Great Ocean Road in southwest of Victoria on the Southern Ocean. It is believed to be the headland seen by Matthew Flinders from the Investigator during a break in showery weather, on the night of 20 April 1802.[1]

Moonlight Head
Victoria
Moonlight Head
Coordinates38°46′11.5″S 143°14′20.5″E
Postcode(s)3269
Location
LGA(s)Corangamite Shire
State electorate(s)Polwarth
Federal Division(s)Wannon
Mean max temp Mean min temp Annual rainfall
20 °C
68 °F		 7.5 °C
46 °F		 80.9 mm
3.2 in

It is notable for the vertical cliffs up to 50 metres high, which in some places overhang, and expose geological structures such as cross bedding, scour and fill channels and variable sizes of concretions. There is also a sea cave and a massive active landslip, which extends inland for 500 metres.[2] As a consequence amethyst stones, which give the place its name, can be found on the pebbly beach.

This stretch of the coast is renowned for its shipwrecks, with the ship, Fiji wrecked just off the head in 1891[3] and the Marie Gabrielle wrecked on 25 November 1869.[4]

An Aboriginal shell midden was excavated in a rock shelter at Moonlight Head and was found to have been occupied between 1030 BP and 180 BP when excavated by archaeologist David Frankel.[5][6] This was probably one of the places occupied by the Ngarowurd gundidj clan identified by George Augustus Robinson’s Gadubanud informants. The find extended the known period of Aboriginal presence on this part of the Otway coast.[7]

References
  1. Only Melbourne (citing Flinders 1814)
  2. GDSE geological sites
  3. Visit Victoria
  4. Only Melbourne
  5. La Trobe University Staff profiles
  6. Frankel, David. 1991. Remains to be seen: archaeological insights into Australian prehistory. Melbourne: Longman Cheshire.
  7. Lawrence Niewójt Gadubanud society in the Otway Ranges, Victoria: an environmental history


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