Laura Bay


Laura Bay is a bay in the Australian state of South Australia on the west coast of Eyre Peninsula located about southeast of Ceduna.
Laura Bay is an inlet that opens into the northern end of a larger bay known as Smoky Bay and which is located about north-east of the headland of Cape D’Estrees. Its water depth is less than at chart datum. It is described as:
a small semicircular south facing bay, 1 km wide at the mouth, widening to 2 km inside. It is very protected from ocean waves and usually calm conditions prevail at the three shelly beaches, each fronted by a few hundred metres wide sand and tidal flats, and bordered and backed by stands of low mangroves.

The source of the bay's name is reported as being Laura Douglas, the daughter of William Bloomfield Douglas who surveyed the bay for the Government of South Australia in 1858.
Laura Bay was used as a port facility from at least 1894 to at least 1937 for the purpose of loading farm produce delivered from as far away as onto watercraft known as lighters which would move the produce to vessels anchored in deeper water. In 1911, a jetty of about length was built and was used until 1937 when it was demolished.
Since 2012, the bay has been located with the boundaries of the protected area known as the Nuyts Archipelago Marine Park.