IT’S a rite of passage for many older teenagers to go out on a pub crawl through Gawler once you reach the legal drinking age.

But for two days last week, Member for Light Tony Piccolo flipped that on its head with a crawl of a different kind.

Mr Piccolo embarked on a two-day “Cafe Crawl” throughout his electorate in a bid to boost foot traffic and provided an extra shot to an industry hit hard by Covid-related restrictions.

Launching the venture at the Kingfisher Inclusive Cafe at the Hewett Centre last Wednesday, Mr Piccolo said it aimed to highlight just how tough hospitality were doing it in Gawler.

“I visit the cafes when I walk around and a lot of them have empty chairs and tables,” he said.

“Some are doing OK, but OK means they are covering costs and they are surviving.

“Some aren’t, some clearly aren’t doing OK.

“We thought the least we could do is promote (the crawl) and I want to go around say it’s OK to do this.

“Wear you mask, do the right things and play it safe, you can still go out and do things and support our local businesses.”

Hewett Centre manager Amy Paul said the centre had been affected by continuing density restrictions.

She estimated that about 80 per cent of the centre’s events were forced to be canned in 2021.

“Events are coming back but it is a struggle; restrictions are constantly changing so we can’t take anything in advance,” she said.

Kicking off on Friday morning at the Gawler Heritage Cafe, Mr Piccolo worked his way down to Munno Para West’s Enchanted Cafe on the electoral border before heading his way back up through Evanston to Café Sia and out to Bohemian Beans at Willaston.

He also visited Gawler South Bakery, Michels at Gawler Central and Bizzie Bean Cafe in Gawler Arcade.

Up again to do it all over on Saturday, Mr Piccolo made his way down Gawler’s business strip with refuelling stops at Delicia, Coffee on Jacob, Cibo Espresso, Poetic Justice, Java Hut and Cafe Nova.