Goolwa and the Goolwa pipi

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Goolwa in South Australia is an historic river port on the Murray River. The name means ‘elbow’ in the local aboriginal dialect. We stayed with friends in nearby Adelaide and they took us to visit the town. It is a popular holiday resort and home to the PS (paddle steamer) Oscar W. On odd-numbered years the town hosts the South Australian Wooden Boat Festival. Goolwa is also a Cittaslow town and the first non-European town to gain Cittaslow status. I’ll do another post about that. The left-hand sign is hardly conducive to having a pleasant day on the beach but maybe the locals are tough. The right-hand sign gives information about the harvesting of the Goolwa pipi or cockle. These were once collected purely as bait but are now considered a delicacy. There are strict limits regarding their harvest and, as you can see, big penalties for those who err. Only certain sizes can be taken in certain areas and numbers are limited. The molluscs are enticed to the surface by gatherers doing the ‘cockle shuffle’. However there have been times when cockle-collecting had been banned due to the level of E. coli found in the cockles.