The Gold Coast beaches stretch for 30 Km, from Tweed Heads in New South Wales to Southport in Queensland. Only a few headlands and creeks break the strip. Surfers Paradise is the best known of the beaches, but in my opinion it is not actually the "best" as the surfing is better at others. I have been on most of the beaches, but Mum won't let me in the water so I have to be content with playing in the sand and terrorizing (small) crabs. Here are pictures of the beaches at the ends of the strip. The first one is at Coolangatta at the southern end of the Gold Coast. This is a good surf beach and if you look carefully you can see lots of surfers waiting for the best wave. The breakwaters protect the mouth of the Tweed River. Just south of the river you can see a jetty carrying a long pipe out beyond the breakers. This is a sand pumping station and it serves two purposes. One is to stop sand from clogging the river mouth, the other is to pump sand north onto the Gold Coast beaches. The natural drift of sand is northwards so this station makes sure that the beaches have new sand replacing the stuff that drifts away. The second picture is on the Spit at Southport, the northern end of the strip. You can see the high-rise buildings in the background and some of the hundreds of yachts that anchor here. I think it is great that right in the middle of one of the most "developed" areas of Queensland you can find a quiet area of beach like this for small bears to explore. There are proposals to turn the Spit into a cruise ship terminal, shopping malls and casino. Personally, much as I like cruising, I would be sorry to see this small patch of beach and native vegetation go under concrete and tar.
Labels: beach, Gold Coast, Queensland
# posted by Bart Bear @ 12:15 pm
