Gold Coast.

The Gold Coast is the southern Queensland strip running north from the New South Wales border. The headline is the Superbank, a 2 km sand point from Snapper Rocks through Rainbow Bay, Greenmount, Coolangatta, and Kirra. The Tweed River sand bypass has pumped north since 1995 and built the bank. Burleigh Heads is the second right-hand point fifteen kilometres up, D-Bah the open beach break just south of the border. The Quiksilver Pro at Snapper ran on the WSL Championship Tour for decades. Kelly Slater won it six times.

February and March are peak, when tropical cyclones to the north send long-period east to south-east swell that wraps the points. Through autumn and winter, mid-period south-east swells off the Tasman Sea keep it consistent. Dominant wind is the south-east trade; west through northwest is offshore on the points. Dawn is the play. The trades fill in by mid-morning and turn the points sideshore. September through December is the lull, with onshore north-easterlies and weak swell.

Water sits at 20 to 22 °C in August, 26 to 28 °C in February. Boardies and a rashie cover most of the year; a springsuit when a cold southerly is up. The Superbank gets 500+ surfers on a good day, and drop-ins are the rule, not the exception. Locals run the take-off rock at Snapper. Sit wide if you’re new, take scraps. Kirra has degraded since the sand piled in but still fires when the bank lines up. On a soft or onshore day, run Burleigh or the open beachies between Currumbin and Mermaid.