Crazy scenes at 4.30am on the Gold Coast as Australians queue for Christmas favourite

Thousands of people lined up before 5am to pick up a quintessential festive food.

Australians love their seafood and the festive season is no exception.

Footage uploaded by a tourist in Queensland showed a wild line forming on the Gold Coast at 4.30am in front of a local fish market.

Eager shoppers were seen queuing in the early hours on Christmas Eve to get into the Tasman Star Seafood Market, a family owned seafood shop that opened its doors to the public just 90 minutes earlier.

The caption noted that the line was at least a kilometre long and included “around 1000 people.”

People were lined up orderly, shopping bags in hand, in a queue that stretched as far as the eye could see.

Aussies’ love for seafood, particularly prawns, is well documented and its inclusion in Christmas menus is seen as a quintessential Christmas tradition.

890,000kg of prawns are expected to fly off Australian shelves during this year’s festive period, with 80 per cent of fresh prawn sales for 2024 expected to take place on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Shoppers lined up from 4.30am in front of a Gold Coast fish market on Christmas Eve. Picture: Instagram

Seafood is a popular Australian Christmas tradition. Picture: Instagram

Woolworths also predicted a bump in oyster and lobster sales in the week leading up to Christmas this year, saying it sells more than ten times the amount of the seafood this period as compared to a normal week.

In NSW, the Sydney Fish Market began a 36-hour “seafood marathon” on December 23 to cater for the huge demand for marine produce during the Christmas period.

Sydney Fish Market’s Gus Dannon claimed that he would be “surprised” if the market saw less than 100,000 people to pass through its doors.

Mr Dannon claimed that a “conservative” estimate would see 3500 tonnes of seafood sold by the end of the marathon on Tuesday.