Burleigh Heads
A forested rocky point, with one of Australia's best right-handers below it.
Duration
1 hr 30 min – 3 hrs
Difficulty
●●○○○
Best time
Early morning
Open
Every day
Entry price
Free
Burleigh Heads is a basalt headland covered in forest, separating two beaches. The national park on it is tiny — twenty-seven hectares — but it protects one of the last fragments of coastal forest on the Gold Coast.
The right-hander that breaks along the point is one of the best in Australia: a long, fast wave that runs for hundreds of metres when the swell comes from the south-east. The headland path loops round in half an hour and looks down on the surfers — the best vantage point there is.
Getting there
Fifteen kilometres south of Surfers Paradise. G:link tram to Broadbeach South then bus 700, or twenty minutes by car.
What to bring
- Walking shoes
- Swimsuit
- Board
Rules on site
The point wave is for experienced surfers and the line-up is fiercely contested: swim between the flags, on the main beach. The rip currents along the headland are real.
