Hunting whales at Victor Harbor  Listen

Victor Harbor was the most successful whaling area in South Australia in the early 1800s.  A small ship could harpoon a whale off the coast and tow it to a station on land for processing.  

Whalers came to the area from Britain, France, America and north-eastern Australia. They hunted whales almost to extinction.

Whalers named them the right whale because they were the right whale to hunt. They swam slowly at the surface, making them easy to kill. 

Whaling Stations were located on Granite Island and at the Bluff.  

The last station to operate at Victor Harbor closed in the late 1870s.