Beaches in New South Wales

A thousand kilometres of Australian east coast running from subtropical Byron Bay to the cool southern beaches below Sydney, with the Tasman swell arriving along all of it. This is where organised surf lifesaving began, at Bondi in 1907, and the flag system developed here is now used worldwide. The coast holds both the country's most-used city beaches and, in Jervis Bay and the south coast national parks, some of its emptiest. Whales pass northbound in winter and southbound in spring, close enough to see from most headlands. Practically: patrolled beaches carry red and yellow flags between October and Easter and the water between them is the only place to swim, because rip currents cause the great majority of drownings here. Water runs from about twenty-three degrees in February to seventeen in August. Access is public throughout, and the coastal walks — Bondi to Coogee, the Cape Byron track, the Jervis Bay White Sands Walk — are frequently the better way to see this coast than the beaches individually.

Each is a different kind: three shores across three beach worlds. Together they account for 3 km of shore. · computed from the 3 records below