A Trip to the Gold Coast in Australia
General Information
The Gold Coast, the Riviera of Queensland, is located a few dozen kilometers south of the city of Brisbane. This is the amusement and vacation area of Queensland in particular and Australia in general, where all the major theme parks and water parks of the state are located (5 large and diverse parks), as well as a large variety of entertainment and adventure options: high-speed boat trips, parasailing, fishing, whale and dolphin watching cruises, zorbing, and the favorite activity of the locals: surfing lessons. The Gold Coast has many beautiful places to travel and vacation in, and here is a description of some of them, accompanied by photos.
Recommended Hotels on the Gold Coast
5-Star Hotels:
A 5-star hotel in a central location near the beach. Outdoor pool, gym, spa, private parking. 3 restaurants.
♦ JW Marriott Gold Coast Resort & Spa
A 5-star hotel in a central location near the beach. 2 pools, one with saltwater and a sandy beach. Rooms for up to 4 guests. Free internet, private parking.
♦ InterContinental Sanctuary Cove Resort by IHG
A 5-star resort with rooms and suites. Saltwater lagoon with a sandy beach. 2 golf courses, access to a sports center with 5 tennis courts and a gym. 4 restaurants, free parking.
Apartment Hotels
A 4.5-star apartment hotel in a central location near the beach. 1-4 room apartments. A skyscraper 230 meters high with a 360-degree observation deck. All apartments have a fully equipped kitchen and washing machine/dryer. Free internet and parking. Heated pool, two lagoon pools, sauna, and gym. 4 restaurants.
♦ The Shores Surfers Paradise Apartments
A 4-star apartment hotel in a central location near the beach. 1-2 room apartments. The apartments have a partially or fully equipped kitchen. Private parking, free internet.
Weather
Queensland is known as the "Sunshine State," and indeed, the weather there is pleasant and sunny most of the year. Although tropical rain does fall there occasionally (especially in summer), it usually passes quickly, and in any case, the weather is warm and pleasant.
This is a successful and popular destination throughout all seasons.
Attractions and Activities
Booking water activities on the Gold Coast (from the Viator website):
Or a hot air ballooning experience and a ride in an amphibious vehicle:
Beaches
The Gold Coast is blessed with over thirty consecutive kilometers of excellent sandy beach with soft, golden sand and a sea particularly suitable for surfing and for lovers of waves and action, although you can find quiet beaches, mainly in the river estuary areas. The beaches are dotted with many hotels along their entire length.
The excellent beaches, combined with the wonderful weather almost all year round, the bays, rivers, and islands in the area have caused the place to develop as a highly attractive tourist site. Many hotels were built along the beaches, and many residential neighborhoods were and are still being built in the entire area.
Theme Parks on the Gold Coast
For travelers in the area who love theme parks, there is plenty to do here. On the Gold Coast, there are five large theme parks, including Sea World, Movie World, the Wet 'n' Wild water park, Dream World – which is a theme park full of rides and attractions, and right next to it is the modern water park, White Water World.
Book tickets through the Viator website:
Nature Parks
Those looking for nature parks as well will not be disappointed because in this area west of the beaches, not far inland, there are beautiful national parks of mountains with rainforests, waterfalls, birds, and interesting animals. These nature parks include the McPherson Range in the south, Mount Tamborine, which is a northern extension of the McPherson Range, located about 45 km from the Gold Coast beaches and features rainforests, waterfalls, creek channels, and spectacular viewpoints. Another nature park is the Springbrook National Park, which also has beautiful waterfalls, rainforests, and great viewpoints. West of this park is the Lamington National Park, which also has many walking trails within rainforests, beautiful scenery, waterfalls, pools, and interesting animals. In short, a celebration for nature lovers.
Residential Houses on the Gold Coast
On the Gold Coast, there is a large selection of residential houses both for rent and for sale. There are also many plots of land for sale for self-construction, at a variety of prices ranging from a quarter of a million to a million dollars and more per plot.
Basically, prices rise as you get closer to the center of the Gold Coast and to the sea. Houses with a waterfront are very expensive, and having a golf course frontage (there are many prestigious and well-maintained golf courses in the area) also increases the price.
Real estate developers have taken advantage of the many rivers and bays in the beach area to build entire neighborhoods of luxury villas, each having a waterfront with a private jetty for a yacht, and the wealthy of Australia pay 3-5 million dollars and even more for each such villa.
Two new places like this, for example, which are still under construction, are Sovereign Island near Surfers Paradise, and a neighborhood that is just in the beginning of construction in Jacobs Well called Calypso Bay, where prices are half of those in Sovereign Island, about 750 thousand dollars per plot. Photos from a visit to these places will appear later in the article.
For those looking for houses for rent or sale at more reasonable prices and cheaper than in the nearby city of Brisbane, there is a large selection in neighborhoods that are slightly further from the beach and scattered along the M1 motorway.
For example, villa prices in the north of the Gold Coast in Ormeau, Coomera, and Pimpama are around half a million dollars for the purchase of a five-bedroom house, and for renting such houses, one pays between 1500 and 1800 dollars per month. Living here is an excellent alternative to the expensive housing in the city of Brisbane, where for such a price you get an apartment half the size of these apartments. For those who need to get to Brisbane, there is also a train about every half hour from the Gold Coast and a good motorway, although there are traffic jams during rush hours in the morning and at the end of the workday.
The population in these neighborhoods, from Ormeau southwards (Ormeau, Pimpama, Coomera, Oxenford), is usually made up of established Australians. Further north, from Beenleigh and beyond (Beenleigh, Yatala, Logan), there are many residents of Asian descent – Chinese, Indians, Pakistanis, Arabs, etc., and prices there are cheaper.
On the Gold Coast, they don't stop building, and this is a sign that there is high demand. We lived here for a year and really enjoyed being here thanks to everything this area has to offer.
Surfers Paradise: This city is located in the heart of the Gold Coast, and many high-rise hotels tower over its beaches. This is the place for those looking for the liveliest area on the Gold Coast. Of course, hotel prices here are the most expensive.
The following photo illustrates both the beautiful beach that is here and the appearance of the hotels along it. This view, as well as the view in all directions of the Gold Coast, can be seen from the tallest building in Queensland, called Q1, which is located in the heart of Surfers Paradise. A shot of it appears later.
The tallest building in Queensland, Q1, located in Surfers Paradise in the heart of the Gold Coast.
Surfers Paradise has shopping centers, a lively promenade along the beach, restaurants, pubs, cafes, souvenir shops, and lots of small entertainment and tourist attractions: mini-golf, an adrenaline park with bungee jumping and other jumping and swinging rides, a unique maze called Infinity, a Ripley's museum (believe it or not), an area of shooting and entertainment facilities called: Time Zone, which also includes bowling and laser tag, a bar made entirely of ice, including ice cups you drink from and ice sculptures, called: "Minus 5", a haunted house, a wax museum of scary figures, and more.
This is also the place for those who like to see and be seen.
Beaches of Burleigh Heads
Burleigh Heads is located in the southern part of the Gold Coast, and it is just one more example of a tourist beach city along the Gold Coast, which is dotted with quite a few such cities along its length.
From the M1 motorway, you exit to Burleigh Heads at exit 85. Like the entire Gold Coast, this beach also excels with a pleasant and wide sandy beach. What sets this place apart is a high and wooded hill that is adjacent to the beach. This hill is a national park with organized walking trails inside it up to the summit and along the beach, so you can reach beautiful viewpoints over the sea and the beach and see the skyscrapers of Surfers Paradise.
Along the beach are restaurants, benches, grass, electric grills, public restrooms – everything is arranged as the Australians know how. There was also a painter in the place who painted the beautiful sea; here is the picture and here is a shot of the sea.
Even though it was a weekday, there was no shortage of people on the beach; Australians love to chill.
All the benches along the promenades in the Gold Coast area are built in the shape of a surfboard, so you won't forget for a moment the activity that is the favorite of the Australians in every month of the year.
Along the beach are also scattered various restaurants where you can sit and enjoy a good meal and a pleasant atmosphere.
Villa neighborhood on Sovereign Island on the Gold Coast
Along the Gold Coast, there are many villa neighborhoods. As you head south and get closer to Surfers Paradise, villa prices rise. Closer to the sea, there are many bays and rivers, and the prices of villas adjacent to the water with a private jetty for a boat soar to several millions for each villa.
A neighborhood of luxury villas, for example, is located near Paradise Point on an island called Sovereign Island. The island is connected to the mainland with a bridge. On this island, about twenty years ago, they decided to turn it into a villa neighborhood where every villa would be adjacent to the water with a private jetty. For this purpose, they dug many canals within the island with concrete jetties along their entire length and an infrastructure of roads and electricity. Today, most of the land on the island has been sold, and luxury and expensive villas have been built on it. But anyone who hurries can still buy one of the last plots (it only takes 4-5 million dollars...).
At the entrance to the island, there is, of course, a gate and a guard, and a vehicle from a security company patrols the island constantly to guard the expensive houses that surely also contain valuable property. Almost every villa also has a luxury yacht attached, the value of which is also between half a million and several millions (there are several yachts for sale in the marina at the entrance to the island at similar prices).
Wandering the streets of the island is truly an experience of touring a museum of charming houses, each one more beautiful than the last. There are houses in the White House style, and there are Mediterranean style, and there are Adobe style like in Santa Fe in New Mexico, and more. The houses are also decorated with beautiful statues and designed gates.
You can rent a boat in the area and travel with it in the bays and between the beautiful residential neighborhoods on the island, or join a cruise on a tour boat like the following ship that sailed between the neighborhood's canals.
Leaving this island, you can notice that there is a nearby island that is also connected to the mainland with a bridge and is also in a construction boom. This island is called "Ephraim Island".
The construction on Ephraim Island is based mainly on luxury multi-story buildings that are mostly still unoccupied, but there are also expensive townhouses with a waterfront and a limited number of large villas with two or three floors with a built-up area of 500-600 meters on a plot of a similar size. There is a small shared pool, and the area between the buildings is well-maintained, with ornamental ponds and small waterfalls, and every building has a large, decorated, and designed sign. A long bridge connects Ephraim Island to the mainland.
No doubt, the Gold Coast is in a construction boom, and beautiful villa neighborhoods are popping up all along its length, and real estate businesses are flourishing.
Calypso Bay and Jacobs Well
Another example of a new luxury residential neighborhood near the sea can be found near an old town called Jacobs Well, which borders the southern part of North Stradbroke Island.
Near the town is the mouth of the Pimpama River. The place is located at an excellent departure point to the quiet and excellent nearby bay with all its water activities, and it is also halfway between Brisbane and the Gold Coast. Developers with ability saw the potential of the place and decided to build a huge luxury villa neighborhood in the place with a waterfront for every villa, including a jetty for a private boat. The prices here are half of what they are in the villa neighborhood on Sovereign Island near Surfers Paradise, mentioned earlier. They are selling plots of land for construction with a size of 700 square meters for about 750 thousand dollars, and the buyer is required to build a house within two years with a size of at least 300 square meters. Just the committee fees for the neighborhood cost 400 dollars a month here. At the current stage, only a few plots have been sold, but the infrastructure of the entire neighborhood is already ready, including the commercial center (still mostly unoccupied) and a large and beautiful restaurant that is already active, and part of the golf course is also open. The promotional slogan of the place is interesting:
Calipso Bay – Every Day's a Holiday!, suits me...
Of course, only for those who can afford to buy a house here!
In the following picture, you can see inside the sales office an aerial shot of the neighborhood, the rivers around it, and the nearby islands, and on the left is the town of Jacobs Well.
On a short walking tour of the place, you see the beautiful marina that is already ready with many yachts, the large restaurant, and the nearby river and bay.
A two-minute drive from there is the town of Jacobs Well. On the water's edge of the town is a pier that is usually busy with fishermen and next to it a small swimming beach and nearby a free electric barbecue as the Australians love. You can rent a small motorboat in the place for fishing or just for a trip to the nearby bays and islands.
The houses in the town are mostly old and without direct access to the water like in the luxury neighborhood being built next to them.
It is recommended to rent a boat for a full day (6-7 hours) and go for a cruise in the quiet canals of the Gold Coast, between the villa neighborhoods, and especially to the nearby islands. A cruise of about an hour in quiet waters will bring you to South Stradbroke Island.
(From Brisbane, you can go on guided tours or sail on a ferry with a car to North Stradbroke Island, which is larger and more developed).
On South Stradbroke Island, there is a nice resort with restaurants with pleasant music, a pool, wallabies that you can feed from the hand, rainforests leading to a stormy beach facing the open ocean, mangrove trees, a quiet swimming beach on the side facing the mainland where you can rent kayaks or swim in peace. In addition, there are several more camping sites, and beyond that, it is all huge sand dunes. It is great fun to hike among these dunes, roll on them, slide on them, and be impressed by the huge amounts of pure and soft sand.
Along the beaches are countless beautiful shells in various shapes and colors and pristine landscapes of a stormy sea, mangroves, and huge sands. It is hard to believe that you are such a short distance from the hustle and activity of Surfers Paradise.
Fishing enthusiasts are invited to bring their rod and fish in the water near the island.