Encounter Bay is a bay in the Australian state of South Australia located on the state's south central coast about 100 kilometres (62 mi) south of the state capital of Adelaide. It was named by Matthew Flinders after his encounter on 8 April 1802 with Nicolas Baudin, the commander of the Baudin expedition of 1800–03. It is the site of both the mouth of the River Murray and the regional city of Victor Harbor. It is one of four "historic bays" located on the South Australian coast.
Encounter Bay from Port Elliot, South Australia
Captain Matthew Flinders was a British navigator and cartographer who led the first inshore circumnavigation of mainland Australia, then called New Holland. He is also credited as being the first person to utilise the name Australia to describe the entirety of that continent including Van Diemen's Land, a title he regarded as being "more agreeable to the ear" than previous names such as Terra Australis.
Portrait by Antoine Toussaint de Chazal, painted in Mauritius in 1806–07
1799 Flinders Expedition plaque at Mount Beerburrum, one of the Glass House Mountains in Queensland, Australia.
Flinders in 1801
Church of St Mary and the Holy Rood, Donington, Lincolnshire, where Flinders was baptised, and is planned to be reburied