Alexandria Bay
According to TripAdvisor, Alexandria Bay is by far Queensland's most popular nudist beach and has been used as such for years. Some weekends, allegedly, hundreds of clothing-optional fans gather on the beach for sporting activities. I'm glad they didn't do that on Anzac Day, however. We went there for some soothe-our-souls-oh-sublime-Aussie-beach time. It was quite crowded by our exacting standards, and there were enough porky middle-aged men hanging out, so we didn't need an Adamandeve Club carnival, too.
Alexandria Bay is on the eastern edge of Noosa National Park between Hell's Gates and Sunshine Beach to the south. You can walk to the northern end from the Park headquarters car park (turn right at the Hastings Street roundabout in Noosa Heads) where you can pick up a map of trails in the National Park. Alternatively, you can walk to A-Bay from Parkedge Road in Sunshine Beach, which is what we did. The forest soon opens out into coastal heath with Serrated Banksias, tweeting darting birds and tea-tree-coloured creeks.
Despite a couple of calls, no one could tell me who Alexandria was?
How many more beaches can I rhapsodise about? I would understand if you said, 'Seen one, seen them all', but the thing is, they are so magnificent it's worth seeing them all. And they do have distinguishing features. A-Bay reminded me of Broken Head (NSW) in many respects, but it has a clearly defined stone zone that was rather attractive, if a little puzzling. Maybe I'd had too little sleep or too much sun.
There were patterns and other interesting things to be found, as always: swirly dark mineral deposits in the creek; and curious ridges in the sand that we concluded were subterranean sand snail trails. Although A-Bay doesn't have a regular surf life saver presence, this was a public holiday so there were frequent visits from a spotter chopper, beach buggy and rescue boat.
We walked to the northern end of the beach and back. The shadows were lengthening and the tide was coming in. Time to head back to Brisbane. Had this been the last beach day for a while?
