Restaurant Cape Schanck
Barragunda Dining
165 Boneo Rd, Cape Schanck VIC 3939
Chef Simone Watts's farm dining room on a 1000-acre regenerative estate at Cape Schanck, one of the Peninsula's most compelling new voices.
Gunnamatta Ocean Beach
Photo · Peter Foster, courtesy of Visit Victoria 
Photo · Peter Foster, courtesy of Visit Victoria 
Photo · Peter Foster, courtesy of Visit Victoria 
Photo · Peter Foster, courtesy of Visit Victoria 
Photo · Peter Foster, courtesy of Visit Victoria 
Photo · Peter Foster, courtesy of Visit Victoria 
Photo · Peter Foster, courtesy of Visit Victoria 
Photo · Peter Foster, courtesy of Visit Victoria
Gunnamatta is long, wild, and remote-feeling despite being accessible from the main road. Powerful surf, huge skies, and almost nobody on the sand outside peak summer. This is not a swimming beach in any sensible sense - the rips are serious, the waves are powerful, and the water temperature is cold most of the year - but it is an extraordinary beach for walking and watching the power of Bass Strait.
Surfers love the consistent beach break and you will always see a few sitting out the back if the swell is up. Everyone else comes for the experience of standing on the sand with nothing but ocean ahead of them and feeling properly small.
A good late-afternoon stop for the light. Stay on the sand; do not enter the water unless you know exactly what you are doing.
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Where to eat, drink, or stay nearby
The best explore pages should lead somewhere next.
Suite Cape Schanck
The Cape Retreat
41 Trent Jones Drive, Cape Schanck VIC 3939
Twelve guest suites and shared living spaces at a Cape Schanck retreat with Bass Strait and nearby golf-course outlooks.
Spa Cape Schanck
One Spa at RACV Cape Schanck Resort
Trent Jones Dr, Cape Schanck VIC 3939
The Peninsula's best resort-style day spa, proper scale, serious treatment menu, and a cliff-edge location that nobody else on the Peninsula can match.
Keep going
More ways to use this side of the Peninsula
Attraction Ashcombe Maze & Lavender Gardens
Ashcombe Maze holds Australia's oldest symmetrical hedge maze, a circular rose garden, a lavender labyrinth, and a small café that sells lavender everything, ice cream, scones, shortbread, tisane, from a room that smells exactly like the fields outside. The gardens are at their peak in spring when the lavender is up, but the maze works in any season and the café is reason enough in autumn. The place is deliberately low-tempo. You walk the maze, you sit in the lavender, you drink tea, and you leave feeling like you have stumbled into a slightly older, gentler version of the Peninsula. It is a good rainy-afternoon reset and an even better spring morning plan. Pair it with Flinders Sourdough on the way through or Flinders General Store afterwards. Bring the kids. Bring older visitors. Do not try to be cynical about it, the charm wins.
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Beach Bushrangers Bay
Bushrangers Bay is an ocean beach reached through coastal heathland from the eastern carpark at Cape Schanck Lighthouse. Parks Victoria describes this route as a 5.4-kilometre return walk taking about two hours, before extra time for stops. The sandy, narrow, unsealed paths include steep stairs. The dramatic rock formations and Southern Ocean views are the reason to come. This is an unpatrolled beach with unpredictable rips, strong currents, rocky reefs and large waves; Parks Victoria does not recommend swimming, and emergency access is limited. Stay on established paths and keep out of signed Hooded Plover habitat. Bring water and check Parks Victoria's current conditions and fire advice before setting out. Dogs are not permitted; assistance dogs are subject to Parks Victoria's entry requirements.
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Walk Bushrangers Bay Walk
From the eastern carpark at Cape Schanck Lighthouse, this walk leads through coastal scrub to Bushrangers Bay. Parks Victoria describes a 5.4 km return trip taking about two hours. Allow more time for stops and the return climb: the sandy, narrow, unsealed path includes steep stairs. Dogs are not permitted; check Parks Victoria entry requirements for assistance dogs. Swimming is not recommended. The beach is unpatrolled, with strong currents, rips, rocky reefs and large waves, and emergency access is limited. Check Parks Victoria changed conditions and current fire advice before setting out. Stay on the track, follow signs protecting nesting shorebirds, and allow enough daylight for the return.
Open the guide →Further reading
Journal pieces that deepen this stop
Trail Guide 6 min
Cape Schanck - The Complete Guide
22 April 2026
The 1859 limestone lighthouse, the boardwalk to Pulpit Rock and Pebble Beach, and the 5.4km return walk to Bushrangers Bay. Cape Schanck lighthouse grounds are free from 6am - lighthouse tours are ticketed. Here is everything.
Investigation 7 min
St Andrews Beach Golf Course - The World-Ranked Course Anyone Can Book
14 April 2026
If you want one golf story that explains the Peninsula properly, start here. Tom Doak architecture, genuine global ranking, and public-access bookings that turn prestige into a real weekend.