Caloundra: The Southern Gateway to the Sunshine Coast

Caloundra, the headland town at the southern end of the Sunshine Coast where the Glass House Mountains provide the backdrop and the views north along the coast to the Noosa headland and south across Pumicestone Passage to Bribie Island and Moreton Bay create the panorama that no other Sunshine Coast town can match, provides the Sunshine Coast's most characterful and most scenically commanding residential and tourism location and the southern entry point to the region from Brisbane that the Bruce Highway and the Gateway Motorway deliver the visitor to. The town's combination of the surf beaches at Kings Beach and Dicky Beach, the calm water of the Pumicestone Passage for the family swimming and the kayaking, and the headland walks that connect the town's elevated points to the coastal views provide the complete beach resort experience that the Sunshine Coast's southern gateway sustains.

Kings Beach, Caloundra's main surf beach at the base of the headland, provides the swimming and the surf that the built-up residential foreshore frames in the urban beach character that distinguishes Caloundra's closest beach from the more natural beach settings of the headland-separated beaches further north. The Kings Beach waterpark, the free public water play facility on the beach foreshore, provides the family beach destination infrastructure that sustains the family market that Caloundra attracts as the more affordable alternative to Noosa for the Queensland family holiday.

The Pumicestone Passage, the protected waterway between the Sunshine Coast mainland and Bribie Island that the Caloundra waterway creates as the tidal exchange between Moreton Bay and the southern Sunshine Coast, provides the calm water environment for the kayaking, the paddle boarding, and the flatwater sailing that the passage's sheltered character allows year-round. The Pumicestone Passage's wetland ecology, supporting the dolphins that use the passage as the foraging ground and the diverse bird life that the seagrass meadows and the mangroves sustain, provides the wildlife encounter that the water-based recreational activities on the passage deliver alongside the paddling and sailing experience.

The Glass House Mountains, the volcanic plugs that rise dramatically from the coastal hinterland immediately west of Caloundra and provide the backdrop that the Sunshine Coast's southern section uses as the defining landscape feature of its inland horizon, offer the walking and the views that the national park trails up the accessible peaks provide. The Tibrogargan and Beerwah climbs, the two most popular Glass House peaks, provide the views across the coastal plain to the Sunshine Coast beaches and north to the Sunshine Coast hinterland that the elevated perspective creates.

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