The Fleurieu Peninsula is a peninsula located south of Adelaide

Adelaide

Adelaide is the capital city of South Australia and the fifth-largest city in Australia. Adelaide has an estimated population of more than 1.2 million...

 in South Australia

South Australia

South Australia is a state of Australia in the southern central part of the country. It covers some of the most arid parts of the continent; with a total land area of , it is the fourth largest of Australia's six states and two territories.South Australia shares borders with all of the mainland...

, Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

. It was named after the French explorer and hydrographer Charles Pierre Claret de Fleurieu

Charles Pierre Claret de Fleurieu

Charles Pierre Claret, comte de Fleurieu was a French explorer, hydrographer and politician. He was Minister of the Navy under Louis XVI, and a member of the Institut de France, as well as the brother of the botanist Marc Antoine Louis Claret de la Tourette.-Ancien Regime:Fleurieu was born in Lyon...

 by the French explorer Nicolas Baudin

Nicolas Baudin

Nicolas-Thomas Baudin was a French explorer, cartographer, naturalist and hydrographer.Baudin was born a commoner in Saint-Martin-de-Ré on the Île de Ré. At the age of fifteen he joined the merchant navy, and at twenty joined the French East India Company...

 as he mapped the south coast of Australia in 1802.

Towns of interest in the area include Victor Harbor, Willunga, Mount Compass, Goolwa, Yankalilla, Rapid Bay

Rapid Bay, South Australia

Rapid Bay is a small seaside town in the southwest of the Fleurieu Peninsula, South Australia. It is approximately 100 km south of the state capital, Adelaide...

 and the wine region of McLaren Vale

McLaren Vale

McLaren Vale is a wine region approximately 35 km south of Adelaide in South Australia. It has a population of about 2,000 and is internationally renowned for the wines it produces. The region was named after either David McLaren, the Colonial Manager of the South Australia Company or John...

. There is surfing on both the west and south facing coasts - known locally to Adelaide surfers as the Mid South Coast and the Far South Coast.