Surf
The beach as an institution. Surf lifesaving clubs and their reels, the flags, the boards, the carnivals, and the beaches themselves from Bondi and Manly outward. The largest photographic facet in the archive.
Part of Australia
126 moments in this segment.
- - Holidaymakers at Sandgate. A crowd fills the water and sand at Sandgate on Moreton Bay in the 1920s, the women in sunhats and carrying umbrellas, a motorcar parked on the beach itself. Daylight sea bathing had been illegal in New South Wales until 1903 and the beach holiday was still a recent freedom. The postcard was printed in Saxony for the White's Views of Queensland series.
- - Newcastle surf carnival, 1920. 1920. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, from footage of 1920 held by NFSA Film Australia.
- - Santa surfs the Queenslander cover. McBain's Christmas cover for The Queenslander of 20 December 1934 puts Santa Claus and a reindeer on the face of a wave. Summer Christmas had to be drawn from scratch, since none of the imported imagery fitted. The surf did a lot of that work.
- - March past at Burleigh Heads. Surf lifesavers parade in formation at Burleigh Heads, the front team in the striped costumes of the Burleigh Heads Mowbray Park club. The march past was a competitive event, judged on drill precision with the reel carried at the front. It made a volunteer rescue service into a spectator sport.
- - National titles come to Queensland. Club banners paraded at the Australian Surf Lifesaving Championships in 1947, the first year the titles were held in Queensland. The Palm Beach banner is among them. Carnivals moved between states and drew crowds in the tens of thousands.
- - The march past at Greenmount, 1947. A march past team on Greenmount beach during the 1947 championships. Teams marched in step behind their banner with the reel and line, in the drill that structured the whole competitive side of the movement. The photograph comes from the Palm Beach club's own collection.
- - Longboards at Currumbin Alley. Palm Beach club members riding the point at Currumbin Alley, then still called Shark Alley, in the mid 1950s. They had started surfing it in the 1940s on hollow plywood longboards whose dimensions followed a traditional Hawaiian design. Light and strong, the boards were built by hand.
- - The Queen in Australia: Surf Beach Carnival at Bondi Beach (1954). ), published by NFSA Film Australia and concerning New South Wales. The Bondi Surf Bathers Life Saving Club formed in 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. The footage depicts events of 1954. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, from footage of 1954 held by NFSA Film Australia.
- - What a Summer at Bondi Beach Was Like in 1960: Holidays, Customs and Everyday Life. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. The footage depicts events of 1960. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, from footage of 1960 held by Australian Archives Media.
- - Royal Visit Surf Carnival 1974. 1974. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, from footage of 1974 held by NFSA Film Australia.
- - Wave skis at the Alley. Wave skis lined up at Currumbin Alley during the peak of their popularity in the 1970s, when they suited point breaks particularly well. The club's own caption notes that they overcrowded the water and caused animosity with board riders. Line ups have been contested ground for as long as there have been enough people in them.
- - Kneeboards in the seventies. Kneeboards, called slabs, were a 1970s phenomenon and several Palm Beach members rode them well. The form did not last as a mainstream discipline. The club's caption calls it a passing fad in its own history.
- - Chips Greenwood on a paddle board. Gary Greenwood, known as Chips, paddling at Currumbin Alley in 1978. The paddle board was the racing and rescue version of the Malibu, fast and stable to ride and to paddle. Greenwood was a club stalwart across the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.
- - Paddling out at Currumbin. A paddle board at the Alley in 1978. The craft sat between the surfboard and the rescue equipment, used in competition and in the water for real. Surf lifesaving carnivals kept several board classes alive after the general surfing public had moved on from them.
- - The double ski race. Two paddlers driving a surf ski through broken water at the Australian championships in the early 1980s. Coordination between the pair matters most when the surf is large, which is when the event is worth watching. Surf boat and ski racing remain the core of the carnival programme.
- - Shorebreak at the clubhouse. The shore break directly in front of the Palm Beach clubhouse, which the club notes can produce quite passable waves. A club patrol works the same stretch of water its members surf. The two activities grew up together on the same beaches.
- - Freshwater club visits Palm Beach. A Freshwater march past team hosted as guests by the Palm Beach Queensland club in 1985. Freshwater on Sydney's northern beaches is where Duke Kahanamoku gave his surfboard demonstrations in the summer of 1914 and 1915. Visits between clubs across state lines were part of the movement's social structure.
- - Bondi at dusk in the eighties. A Kodachrome slide taken around 1985 and later scanned at high resolution, showing the beach emptying at the end of the day. The apartment blocks along Campbell Parade were already in place. The photograph predates the beach's later use as a global backdrop.
- - Manly beach from end to end. A nine frame panorama of the ocean beach at Manly, with Queenscliff and Curl Curl beyond. Manly was where William Gocher tested the daylight bathing ban in 1902 and 1903. The Norfolk pines along the front were planted to make the place look like a resort.
- - Newport Beach on the northern beaches. A panorama of the ocean beach at Newport, one of the string of surf beaches running north from Manly to Palm Beach. Each has its own club and its own patrolled area. The peninsula is effectively a chain of separate villages joined by one road.
- - Camp Cove in panorama. A stitched view of the harbour beach at Watsons Bay, shot on a 100mm macro lens. The beach faces back into the harbour towards the city. It is a swimming beach with no surf at all.
- - Sunbathing on a Sydney beach. Towels and bodies packed across the sand on a November day. Sun exposure of this kind produced the highest melanoma rates in the world by the late twentieth century, according to Australian cancer registries. The Slip Slop Slap campaign began in 1981.
- - Whatever it takes - Surf Life Saving. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Australia in 2011.
- - The Bondi Icebergs pool. The ocean pool at the southern end of Bondi, with the Icebergs clubhouse above it. The club was founded in 1929 by local lifesavers who wanted to keep swimming through winter, and membership required swimming through three winters in four. Waves break directly over the pool wall in a big swell.
- - The Noosa Festival of Surfing. First Point at Noosa during the 2011 festival, a longboard focused event held in the national park headland breaks. Noosa's points work only on a decent northeast swell and are otherwise flat. The festival is timed to the cyclone season for that reason.
- - Dawn on the Cronulla rock pools. First light over the pools cut into the rock platform at Cronulla. Cronulla is the only Sydney beach reachable by train, which shaped both its crowds and its politics. The 2005 riot there is part of the beach's recent history.
- - An early swimmer at Cronulla. One person in the outdoor pools before the beach fills. Ocean pool swimming is a daily habit for a substantial regular population on this coast. The pools are free and unstaffed.
- - Sunrise over Cronulla. A long exposure at dawn smoothing the water over the rock shelf. The Cronulla beaches run north from Bate Bay towards Kurnell. The photographer recorded an exposure of 0.8 seconds at f22.
- - Surf Patrol. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by NFSA Film Australia in 2011.
- - Between the Flags: 100 Years of Surf Life Saving in New Zealand. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving New Zealand in 2011.
- - Beach Flags and Signs - Surf Life Saving. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Australia in 2011.
- - Moon Bay near Bermagui. A small cove on the far south coast, stitched from nine frames. The photographer describes it as a tiny nudist beach. Informal clothing optional beaches exist along much of this coast without any legal status.
- - Boulders at the end of Garie Beach. A boulder strewn stretch at the southern end of Garie Beach. Garie has a surf club, reached by a road that drops steeply off the plateau. It is the only patrolled beach in the national park.
- - The last sunrise of 2012 at Stockton. Dawn over Stockton Beach, a 32 kilometre stretch of dune and sand north of Newcastle. Vehicles are permitted on it under permit. The dunes behind are among the largest moving sand masses in New South Wales.
- - Camp Cove inside South Head. A small sheltered beach a few hundred metres inside South Head. Arthur Phillip came ashore here on 21 January 1788 while looking for an alternative to Botany Bay, before settling on Port Jackson three kilometres west. The Australian relationship with the surf coast begins with a search for anchorage, not recreation.
- - The lifesaving club at Coogee. The clubhouse above the sand at Coogee in Sydney's east. Coogee has a shark net enclosure and two ocean pools alongside the open beach. The club buildings on Sydney beaches are typically interwar and heavily rebuilt.
- - Big surf at Snapper Rocks. Heavy water at Snapper Rocks on the southern Gold Coast, with a single surfer weighing up the paddle out. Sand pumped from the Tweed River created the long right hand point known as the Superbank here from the late 1990s. It is one of the most crowded waves in the country.
- - South Solitary Island from Moonee Beach. The island low on the horizon, photographed from Moonee Beach on the mid north coast. The Solitary Islands sit in a marine park where tropical and temperate species overlap. The island carries a lighthouse built in 1880.
- - 2014 AUSSIES at Scarborough. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving WA in 2014.
- - Swanbourne Nedlands club sign. An interpretive sign recording that the club was established in 1932, starting during the Great Depression and patrolling a beach less popular than its neighbours to the south. It claims the state's most successful record among small clubs in both patrol efficiency and competition. Clubs of this kind were built by subscription and working bees.
- - SLSQ Nippers on Totally Wild. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Queensland in 2014.
- - 7 year old Nipper Zoe Jolley saves the life of a beachgoer. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Australia in 2014.
- - 100 years of The Aussies. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Australia in 2015.
- - Tracing the roots and evolution of surfing 100 years on. 2015.
- - Bate Bay towards Kurnell. The sweep of Bate Bay with Cronulla Point in the foreground and the Kurnell peninsula beyond. Kurnell is where the Endeavour anchored in 1770, on Gweagal Country. The industrial refinery on the peninsula sits within the same view as the surf.
- - Tathra Beach towards the surf club. The far south coast beach looking along the sand to the lifesaving club. Tathra also has a timber sea wharf, the last of its kind on this coast. The town burned in a bushfire in 2018.
- - Kiama Beach from Bombo station. The beach photographed from the railway platform at Bombo. The line runs along the coast here close enough to see the surf from the carriage. Bombo headland behind it is a quarried basalt formation.
- - Nelson Bay from Mount Tomaree. A panorama from the Tomaree lookout over Port Stephens. The headland was fortified during the Second World War and gun emplacements remain on the summit. The beaches below are sheltered inside the bay.
- - Surf Beach. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by NFSA Film Australia in 2015.
- - Call Of The Surf.. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by NFSA Film Australia in 2016.
- - 2016 Queensland Surf LIfe Saving Championships - March Past Final. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Queensland in 2016.
- - Surf Life Saving Club - Open Masters March Past - Collaroy Ladies SLSC. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Irene Isaacson Photography in 2016.
- - Looking down on the Bondi Baths. The pool cut into the rock platform below the club, filled and flushed by the sea. Ocean pools like this line the New South Wales coast and predate most chlorinated municipal pools. They were built partly as safe swimming alongside dangerous surf.
- - A storm front leaving Bondi. A squall line moving offshore over the water. East coast lows deliver both the best surf and the worst beach erosion on this coast. Sand is periodically stripped off Bondi and returns over months.
- - The beach at Byron Bay. Sand and water at Byron Bay on the far north coast of New South Wales. Byron was a whaling and meatworks town before it became a surf destination in the 1960s and 1970s. The transformation is one of the clearest cases of surfing rewriting a local economy.
- - Main Beach below Cape Byron. The central town beach with the headland behind it. Cape Byron is the easternmost point of the Australian mainland. The lighthouse on it dates from 1901.
- - The rock shelf at Kurnell. Weather worn rock lining the shore in Botany Bay National Park at Kurnell. This is the shoreline the Endeavour's party came ashore on in April 1770, land held by the Gweagal. The park now carries both accounts on its signage.
- - South from Garie Head. The coast running south from the headland, part of the 26 kilometre walk through the Royal National Park. Cliffs alternate with pocket beaches most of the way. Very little of it is built on.
- - Rocky Point Island at Balmoral. A small island just off Balmoral Beach in Sydney's north, joined to the shore by a footbridge. Balmoral is harbour water with a netted swimming enclosure. The bandstand and promenade date from the interwar municipal beach movement.
- - The Balmoral esplanade. The promenade running the length of the harbour beach. Sydney's harbour beaches and its ocean beaches produced different cultures, one genteel and one athletic. Both were shaped by the same nineteenth century bathing regulations.
- - The Wattamolla inlet. The sheltered water at Wattamolla in the Royal National Park. A waterfall drops into the lagoon at the back of the inlet. The place was a Dharawal camping ground long before it was a picnic area.
- - The coast south of Marley. Cliffs and headlands running south from one of the park's walk in beaches. The Royal National Park protects about 15,000 hectares immediately south of Sydney. Its coastline has almost no development on it.
- - Surf Life Saving SA. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving SA in 2016.
- - Surf safety tips: swim between the flags. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving New Zealand in 2016.
- - The crescent at Bondi. The white sand arc between the two headlands, seen end to end. Bondi is a kilometre long and is patrolled by both a volunteer club and council lifeguards. Its reputation abroad is out of proportion to its size.
- - Waves breaking at Bondi. Whitewater rolling across the sandbank in the middle of the beach. Bondi's rips are well known and the flagged area moves daily according to where they run. Most rescues on Australian beaches are people caught in a rip.
- - Sculpture by the Sea at Bondi. Works installed along the coastal walk between Bondi and Tamarama for the annual outdoor exhibition. The event began in 1997 and runs for about three weeks each spring. It puts several hundred thousand people onto a clifftop path built for far fewer.
- - Jervis Bay from Callala. Looking across the marine park, which covers about 215 square kilometres of water on the south coast. Jervis Bay's beaches are known for unusually white sand. The bay is shallow and sheltered, which makes it a different animal from the open surf coast.
- - Trees behind Big Marley Beach. Coastal scrub and trees behind the sand in the Royal National Park south of Sydney. The park was declared in 1879 and is among the oldest in the world according to New South Wales parks. Its beaches are reachable only on foot.
- - An unpatrolled beach at Bawley Point. A south coast beach with clear water and no flags, which the photographer notes makes it unsuitable for inexperienced swimmers. Most Australian beaches are unpatrolled most of the time. The flags mark the exception rather than the rule.
- - The Bogey Hole at Newcastle. A pool cut out of the solid rock shelf by convict labour in 1820 for the commandant of the Newcastle penal settlement. It is still open to swimmers and still fills with each swell. Ocean bathing in Australia started as a private privilege carved by forced labour.
- - The Marine Parade walk. The path from Manly Beach past Fairy Bower ends at Shelly Beach. The walk is cut into the rock along the water and is among the busiest coastal paths in Sydney. Fairy Bower has an ocean pool set into the rock platform.
- - Cabbage Tree Bay from the headland. The view from the Shelly Beach walking track over the bay to Manly beyond. The reserve here protects a full rocky reef system inside a city of five million. Divers and swimmers share it with the surf zone a few hundred metres north.
- - The Lifesaver helicopter over Coogee. A Westpac Lifesaver Rescue Helicopter working the coast above Coogee Beach. The service began in 1973 and is claimed as the first dedicated helicopter rescue service of its kind. It patrols for both swimmers in trouble and sharks.
- - A surf boat at Albany. A surf boat drawn up at the Albany club on Middleton Beach. The boats are rowed by a crew of four with a sweep standing at the stern oar. They were rescue craft first and racing craft second.
- - Looking out from the Caloundra club. A wide view from the clubhouse across Kings Beach. Club buildings are usually sited for sightlines over the patrolled water as much as for the members' comfort. The bar and function room subsidise the patrols.
- - Down the length of One Mile Beach. Looking south from the northern end of the beach. Long straight beaches like this generate persistent rip currents at regular intervals. Reading them is the first thing a patrol does on arrival.
- - It All Starts Here - Nippers Sign On 2018. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Queensland in 2018.
- - North Bondi Surf Life Saving Club. The clubhouse at the northern end of the beach. Surf lifesaving clubs are volunteer organisations that own their buildings and patrol under their own rosters. The first Australian clubs formed in Sydney in the years just after the daylight bathing ban ended.
- - A new picnic shelter at Bondi. A recent shelter on the park behind the sand. Bondi's public infrastructure has been rebuilt repeatedly since the pavilion of 1928. The beach is council land and the arguments about what may be built on it are permanent.
- - Coogee club in Western Australia. The surf club at the Western Australian Coogee, not the Sydney one. Colonial naming duplicated place names across the continent, which regularly confuses the record. This beach sits south of Fremantle on Cockburn Sound.
- - Marcoola club on the Sunshine Coast. The club at Marcoola, north of Maroochydore. Beaches here are long and open with few headlands to break the swell. Patrol areas on beaches like this are a short marked section of many kilometres of sand.
- - Glenrock coastal reserve. A coastal reserve near Newcastle with cliffs, rainforest gullies and Aboriginal heritage sites within it. Awabakal Country covers this coast. Coal was mined here in the nineteenth century and the reserve now sits over the old workings.
- - Tennis Wharf beach, Scotland Island. A small beach at Tennis Wharf on Scotland Island in Pittwater, reached only by boat. The island community has no bridge and no road access. Pittwater is estuary water rather than surf coast.
- - A rock pool near the cliff edge. Sky reflected in a shallow pool on the low cliff shelf near the beach. Rock platforms like this hold their own ecosystems between tides. The park's coast walk crosses several of them.
- - Surf Life Saving NSW Inspiration Reel. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving NSW in 2019.
- - 50 Years of IRBs in Australian Surf Life Saving. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving NSW in 2019.
- - 2019 Aussies - Open Mens Surf Boat Final. 2020.
- - Nippers: BLACKROLL Activation & Recovery Series. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving NSW in 2020.
- - Our Club is Your Club. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Australia in 2020.
- - Aussies 2021 | March Past. Aussies 2021, published by Surf Life Saving Australia. The Bondi Surf Bathers Life Saving Club formed in 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Australia in 2021.
- - Delwood Beach on the harbour side. A small harbour beach on the walk from Manly wharf towards Fairlight, looking back into Sydney Harbour. Manly has ocean surf on one side and flat harbour water on the other, a few hundred metres apart. The contrast shaped how the suburb was sold from the 1850s.
- - Point Lookout on Minjerribah. The club seen from the gorge walk on the eastern headland at Point Lookout, North Stradbroke Island. The island is Minjerribah in Quandamooka language. The headland gives a view straight down onto the surf breaks below.
- - What is a surf lifesaver?. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving NSW in 2021.
- - Aussies 2022 | Open Male Surf Boat Final. Aussies 2022, published by Surf Life Saving Australia. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Australia in 2022.
- - How important is surf lifesaving to the community?. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Australia in 2022.
- - Shelly Beach from Manly. The sheltered cove at the southern end of the Manly stretch, seen along the shoreline. Shelly Beach sits inside Cabbage Tree Bay, which is now an aquatic reserve. It is one of the few Sydney ocean beaches that faces west.
- - Surfing Is Sydney's Favourite Summer Pastime. Australian Diary 55.. 2023.
- - What is like to be a nipper. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Cronulla Surf Life Saving Club in 2023.
- - Aussies 2023 | Open Male Surf Boat Final. Aussies 2023, published by Surf Life Saving Australia and concerning Western Australia. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Australia in 2023 (VMJ7PQY85RQ).
- - Aussies 2023 | U23 Male Surf Boat Final. Aussies 2023, published by Surf Life Saving Australia and concerning Western Australia. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Australia in 2023.
- - Back when bikinis and budgie smugglers were banned | Great Australian Stuff | ABC TV + iview. Back when bikinis and budgie smugglers were banned, published by ABC Entertainment. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by ABC Entertainment in 2023.
- - Surf Life Saving Western Australia in the air. The Surf Life Saving Western Australia helicopter over Cockburn Sound, photographed from the sea wall at Jervoise Bay. Aerial patrol covers stretches of coast too long for beach patrols to see. Western Australia's beaches run for thousands of kilometres with very few people on most of them.
- - Observation tower at City Beach. A patrol tower on the sand at City Beach in Perth. The tower gives the height needed to read rips and spot swimmers past the break. Perth's beaches face the Indian Ocean and get a consistent afternoon sea breeze the locals call the Fremantle Doctor.
- - One Mile Beach at Forster. A wide panorama of the beach at Forster on the mid north coast. Beaches of this length with a single small town behind them are the norm rather than the exception on this coast. The patrolled section is a few hundred metres of it.
- - Nine Mile Beach, Tuncurry. Sand running north from Tuncurry, across the entrance from Forster. Four wheel driving is permitted on parts of beaches like this, which is contested with swimmers and with shorebird conservation. The names on this coast are mostly measurements.
- - Sunrise at Mollymook. Dawn light on the south coast beach at Mollymook. The whole east coast faces the sunrise, which is why so much Australian beach photography is made before seven in the morning. Mollymook has a patrolled beach and a golf course on the headland.
- - SYDNEY BONDI BEACH AUSTRALIA WALKING TOUR 4K Sightseeing Exploring the famous iconic Bondi Beach NSW. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Walking and Sightseeing Travel Channel in 2023.
- - Sufing's First World Championship Manly 64. 2024.
- - I love the beach. 🏖️ The surfing culture is in my blood. 🏄❤️ | Heywire | ABC Australia. I love the beach, 🏖️ The surfing culture is in my blood, 🏄❤️, published by ABC Australia. The people named here are Wiradjuri. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by ABC Australia in 2024.
- - 1 Hour of Beach Chaos - Bondi Rescue Full Episode Marathon. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by BondiRescue in 2025.
- - Albatross Nippers Overview. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Queensland in 2025.
- - The Bondi lifeguard tower. The council lifeguard tower above the sand. Paid council lifeguards work alongside the volunteer club patrols, a division that is unusual internationally. The tower is also the base for the television series filmed on this beach.
- - Broome Surf Life Saving Club. The club at Cable Beach in the far north west. Patrol conditions here include stingers and crocodiles as well as surf. The lifesaving movement spread from the southeastern cities to coastlines with entirely different hazards.
- - Kings Beach club at Caloundra. The clubhouse at Kings Beach on the southern end of the Sunshine Coast. Caloundra sits where Moreton Bay opens to the ocean. Queensland's club network runs almost continuously from the New South Wales border to the far north.
- - Mission Beach club in the tropics. The club at South Mission Beach in far north Queensland. Patrols here run stinger nets through the summer months against box jellyfish and Irukandji. The tropical season inverts the southern pattern, with the dangerous months being the hot ones.
- - Caves Beach and its sea caves. The beach south of Newcastle with its caves visible at right and the lifeguard stand at left. The caves are accessible at low tide and cut off at high. The combination makes it one of the more heavily signposted beaches on the coast.
- - Merewether from the ocean baths. The view northeast from Merewether Ocean Baths with Bar Beach behind. Merewether has produced a disproportionate number of Australian competitive surfers, including Mark Richards. The baths beside it are among the largest ocean pools in the southern hemisphere according to Newcastle council.
- - Newcastle Ocean Baths from Fort Scratchley. Looking down Shortland Esplanade over the Cowrie Hole and the ocean baths from the fort above. The baths opened in 1922 with an art deco pavilion added later. Newcastle built its beachfront while it was still a working coal port.
- - The Nobbys Beach surf pavilion. The pavilion at Nobbys, at the mouth of the Hunter River. Beach pavilions were built between the wars as changing sheds and refreshment rooms, and most that survive are heritage listed. Ships still pass a few hundred metres off this beach.
- - The Memorial Walk above Bar Beach. A steel walkway along the cliff above Bar Beach, built for the centenary of the Anzac landing and of the local steel industry. It carries silhouettes of soldiers cut from steel. The walk links Bar Beach to Strzelecki Lookout along the ridge.
- - Marley and Little Marley from the air. The two beaches seen from above in the Royal National Park. Neither is patrolled and both have drowned swimmers. Access is by the coast track, which runs 26 kilometres through the park.
- - Wattamolla lagoon and beach. The sheltered inlet at Wattamolla, where a freshwater lagoon meets the sea behind a sand bar. It is the most accessible beach in the Royal National Park and gets correspondingly busy. Cliff jumping there has caused repeated serious injury.
- - Junior Activities (Nippers) in Surf Life Saving. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Queensland in 2025.
- - Bondi Beach in the Roaring 1920s | Rare Silent Film of Sydney's Iconic Beaches. Bondi Beach in the Roaring 1920s, published by NFSA Online and concerning New South Wales. Bondi in Sydney is where the first surf lifesaving club formed in 1907. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by NFSA Online in 2025.
- - What To Expect When My Child is Starting Nippers - Introduction video. 1907, five years after daylight bathing ceased to be prohibited. Filed as a surf lifesaving record, posted by Surf Life Saving Queensland in 2026.