Holiday houses in Nelson

A small, scenic fishing and holiday town less than three kilometres shy of the South Australian border, Nelson is the best kind of border town. Situated at the mouth of the beautiful Glenelg River, Nelson is a popular boating and paddling destination, with watercraft hire available locally. You can even paddle from Dartmoor, 75 kilometres upriver, down to Nelson, staying at some of the seven wilderness campsites reserved solely for kayakers and canoeists in Lower Glenelg National Park along the way.

Nelson also sits on the Great South West Walk, a spectacular 250-kilometre loop trail weaving through several national parks and green spaces that can be broken up into shorter strolls. The trail links Nelson with a long sandy beach backed by the coastal wilderness of Discovery Bay Coastal Park. Attractions also abound across the state border, from historic towns to a wetland of international importance.

The warmer months from November through March are generally the most pleasant for water-based activities in Nelson, where temperatures can reach the single digits Celsius during the winter months. The warmer months also tend to receive the least rainfall, making them ideal times to book one of the area’s holiday houses. Late winter and spring is the best time to admire wildflowers in the heathlands. This coincides with the top time for whale watching from the clifftops at Cape Bridgewater, a 45-minute drive southeast of Nelson, where you can also see a fur seal colony and dramatic blowholes. A short hop further east, in Portland, January’s Hooked on Portland festival takes over the foreshore for two days of entertainment and activities for all ages, with plenty of local seafood served up during the summertime festivities.

Piccaninnie Ponds

Part of a flooded limestone cave system just inland from the Southern Ocean, the gin-clear Piccaninnie Ponds are just a 10-minute drive west of Nelson across the South Australian border. Serious cave divers come to this conservation park to admire features such as the Cathedral and the Chasm. You can also snorkel, or enjoy a bushwalk around the ponds, with lookouts over the water.

Princess Margaret Rose Cave

The spectacular limestone cave system known as Princess Margaret Rose Cave is one of the highlights of Lower Glenelg National Park. There’s a campground near the entrance, where you can book a tour of the caves, formed over thousands of years and featuring beautiful stalactites, stalagmites, and rare helictites. The cave is a 20-minute drive north of Nelson.

Dingley Dell

Just 25 minutes’ drive west of Nelson, outside the historic town of Port MacDonnell, lies a small conservation park. At the centre is Dingley Dell, a cottage purchased by renowned British-Australian poet Adam Lindsay Gordon in 1864, who wrote his first published poem while living here. The grounds are free to wander; contact the South Australia National Parks and Wildlife Service to arrange a tour of the cottage.