84 SUNKLANDS OF PORT PHILLIP BAY AND BASS STRAIT 
waters. Another factor of some consequence is the powerful 
wave action associated with the prevailing winds, which materially 
assists in redistributing deposits. 
Prom its present and former subaerial aspects, the Nepean Bay 
Bar may be considered from the standpoints of : 
(I) Its geomorphology, 
(II) its submerged land surfaces — the shoal of Port Phillip, 
(III) the King Bay profile. 
(I) The Qeomorphology of the Nepean Bay Bar. 
The Nepean Peninsula (Pig. 5) is a sickle-shaped land surface 
with its southern or King Bay shore slightly concave from the 
S.W. and its northern or Port Phillip shore concave from the 
N.N.E. ; Point Nepean, the end of the sickle, points N.W.b.W. 
Its E.b.S. boundary is Selwyn’s Pault which cuts across it from 
Dromana to Cape Schanck. It formerly extended to beyond 
Barwon Heads, but is now interrupted by the fairway through 
The Heads, which has been cut in dune limestone. 
Por some miles east of Point Nepean, the King Bay shore is a 
young coast ; it is cliffy, with a steep inshore prolfie, and indented 
by small bays with pocket beaches, while along and near the shore 
are reefs, arches, caves, and blow holes. Nearer Cape Schanck, 
however, the coast becomes sub-mature, consisting of long beaches 
with a shelving profile, broken here and there by low headlands 
of dune-rock. The shore line from Point Lonsdale to Barwon 
Heads is a similar, submature coastline. 
The Port Phillip shore of the Nepean Bay Bar consists, for the 
most part, of beaches, broken occasionally by cliffs of dune-rock ; 
this contrasts with the shore of the Bellarine Peninsula which, at 
Point Lonsdale and Shortland Bluff, is cliffy, but further north 
is low lying, and composed largely of siliceous sand. At St. 
Leonards, further north, the low cliffs are composed of Pliocene 
( ? Werrikooian) sandstones. 
The area of the Nepean Peninsula is about 45 square miles. 
Locally, it is known as The Cups, an appropriate name, as most 
of it is a succession of calcareous dunes and dune ridges, separated 
by hollows with closed contours ; the dune material has been con- 
solidated into dune-rock by the solution and redeposition of the 
calcareous material. Pew of the consolidated dunes east of Rye 
rise above 100 feet but near Sorrento, St. Pauls, a consolidated 
dune is 176 feet above L.W.M., and there is a record by Gregory 
(1901) of a dune nearer Point Nepean being 225 feet above 
L.W.M. 
