Gold Coast secrets that most visitors don’t know about

The Gold Coast used to be about theme parks and endless beaches. But while they’re still here (it’s one of the best places in the country for beaches), there’s a lot more up here than most know about: from easy-to-access championship golf courses, to calm waterways for boating, and to a restaurant scene that’s not just about being by the beach.

It has the highest concentration of golf courses in Australia

The Gold Coast is a golfing mecca.Credit: Destination Gold Coast

Not just that, there’s more golf courses per capita on the Gold Coast than anywhere else on Earth – little wonder it’s dubbed the Golf Coast by those in the know. There are 35 championship courses built along the region – and most of these are all within a 30-minute drive of each other. Unlike many courses in Melbourne and Sydney, all but three of the courses are open to the public, and some – like RACV Royal Pines Resort – have held major golf tournaments (it was home to the Australian PGA for seven years running to 2019). These courses include Jack Nicklaus’s first Australian signature course (Lakelands Golf Course), the only Arnold Palmer designed course in Australia (the Pines at Sanctuary Cove) and one of Greg Norman’s best Australian courses, The Glades.

They don’t drink XXXX up here

The Gold Coast is the place for craft beer, like here at Balter Brewery.

Certainly not, the Gold Coast has actually become one of the country’s top craft beer brewery scenes. Starting with pioneers Burleigh Brewing who revolutionised the local craft beer scene 15 years ago – and won 28 brewing gold medals along the way – you can now find an award-winning brewery in most of the best suburbs. These include one of Australia’s best-rated breweries, Balter Brewing (whose XPA is a two-time winner of the prestigious GABS Hottest 100 Aussie Craft Beers competition), once owned by local world surf champions like Mick Fanning and Joel Parkinson. Sunday sessions at craft breweries are a way of life on the Gold Coast.

There’s calm water to play on too

The Gold Coast Waterway is a calmer way to swim in the region.Credit: Tourism and Events Queensland

While its 57-kilometre stretch of surf beaches attract the plaudits, the Gold Coast also has a calm stretch of water ideal for sailing, boating, jet-skiing, house-boating and more. The Gold Coast Broadwater goes unnoticed by most travellers – and yet, it’s home to a huge calm-water estuary offering a vast range of water-based experiences. You can take a ferry (Hopo) between destinations on the water, including entertainment and dining hubs and Sea World. You can hire your own boat (or houseboat to sleep out on the water), go whale-watching (through the Seaway) between June and October, or try unique attractions like hydro foiling – riding an aquatic hoverboard. The biodiversity value of the waterway also make it an international Ramsar site – and the Broadwater also feeds 90 per cent of Australia’s canal estates.

The Gold Coast has an art scene

HOTA has made the Gold Coast a genuine cultural destination.Credit: Tourism and Events Queensland

The Gold Coast didn’t use to have culture, at all. Now it’s become an art lover’s hotspot. Home to the largest public art gallery outside a capital city – part of HOTA (Home of the Arts), a cultural precinct just behind Surfers Paradise – the gallery has over 2000 square metres of exhibition space over six floors and was the world premiere destination for the Masters of Pop Art exhibition in February, featuring Andy Warhol. Though there’s more to the arts here than HOTA, there are exhibitions and galleries all over the Gold Coast, especially in industrial precincts like Currumbin Waters, or Miami. It also hosts one of Australia’s leading contemporary arts festivals, Bleach, an 11-day festival held across the Coast featuring over 300 artists and 200 performances in the areas of dance, theatre, music and more.

The best restaurants aren’t on the beach

Restaurant Labart, helmed by local culinary star Alex Munoz.

You’re going to have look hard because the new brand of Gold Coast restaurateur is letting their food have top billing. Two of the region’s best eateries – North Room and Etsu – have nondescript shopfronts and are located right on the Gold Coast Highway, while the region’s most celebrated chef, Alex Munoz, serves his fare in a small Parisian-style bistro off Burleigh Head’s main street (Restaurant Labart) around the corner from the best Japanese, accessed via a secret back door entrance (Oi Izakaya). Other favourites, like Eddy and Wolff and Social Eating House and Bar, are located in the middle of shopping areas (Robina and Broadbeach respectively).

Miami isn’t the only hip industrial area

Australia’s (official) best beer can be found at Balter Brewing Co.

Miami may get all the attention for the make-over of its industrial area (former mechanic workshops and panel beaters are now some of the region’s hippest cafes, craft breweries as well as live music arena/ designer hub, Miami Marketta) but look a further south and you’ll find the same thing happening in Currumbin Waters. Surfboard factories and auto-electrician workshops are now home to the Gold Coast’s most innovative cafes, like Dust Temple, a café/ art gallery and live music venue, or Balter Brewery, who make Australia’s number-one rated beer. There’s wine bars, vegan restaurants and cafes/ restaurants like Stone’s Throw where the Gold Coast’s most renowned professional surfers eat.

The hinterland is right there

The hinterland is just 20 minutes away from the coast.Credit: Tourism and Events Queensland

The Gold Coast Hinterland is home to some of the oldest remaining tracts of sub-tropical rainforest on Earth. But you don’t have to even drive that far to escape into wilderness. Drive on the most stunning scenic road in south-east Queensland for less than 20 kilometres inland from Currumbin and you’ll find Currumbin Valley, home to rock pools you can swim in, organic farm stores and cafes set deep in the bush. Cougal Cascades is located at the end of the valley, 20 minutes drive from the beach. It’s part of World Heritage-listed Springbrook National Park, with a 1.6 kilometre paved trail through rainforest, beside cascades. Only a few kilometres north, there’s another scenic drive to the end of Tallebudgera Valley, where mountains loom above and there are waterholes to swim at, and hiking trails through rainforest.

It’s actually a hub for retro motels

God retro at the stylishly revamped The Cheshire Cat Motel.

When you think of the Gold Coast, you’re probably picturing modern high-rises beside the beach, right? But the southern Gold Coast has become a hub for some of Australia’s best retro-style motels. It started in 2018 with The Pink Hotel, in Coolangatta, a remodelled 1950s motel painted in garish cotton-candy pink, with a beachfront rooftop, individually styled rooms and a secret piano bar disguised as a janitor’s closet. Just around the corner in Bilinga, Tessa’s on the Beach was a 1960s motel that got an overhaul. Occupying prime beachfront position, it has a magnesium pool and faux lawn where musicians play facing the waves. Two streets over, La Costa Motel recreates the 1960s beach shack while two suburbs north, the Mysa Motel with its Palm Springs-style styling and kidney-shaped pool was fashioned from a 1960s motel. Goldie fixture The Cheshire Cat Motel has also been restored to its former glory, with a retro-luxe upgrade completed in early 2024.

It has the best positioned surf clubs in Australia

Want a cheap beer, with a decent-priced meal, with a multi-million-dollar view? There is a surf club built right on the beach in almost every beach-side suburb on the Gold Coast, occupying the most exclusive real estate on the coast. Starting south at Coolangatta the trend continues for over 50 kilometres to Southport Surf Club. Some like Currumbin are built so close that at high tide on a big sea, the carpark isn’t safe for parking. Other surf clubs, like Nobby Beach Surf Club, are the only beachfront restaurant in one of the Gold Coast’s most desirable beachside suburbs. Proceeds go towards to volunteer lifeguards who patrol the beaches.

Its best bars are hidden

The Scottish Price.

The Gold Coast used to be full of big sports bars selling XXXX beer with plenty of TVs for the footie, and the horse races. No more, now its best bars are hard to find. Taking the cue from Melbourne’s secret laneway bars, you’ll have to know where to go to truly embrace the Gold Coast nightlife. Bars like Lockwood, hidden behind a big red door in Burleigh Heads, require you text to enter. Palm Beach’s Suga has no sign, but serves over 60 varieties of rum. Veladora in Broadbeach requires you solve a riddle to get there, while many others like Scottish Prince, The Cambus Wallace and Naami are tucked away with no signage, beside takeaway joints.