If Lonely Planet’s claim that Bondi Beach is the best beach in the world for people-watching triggered some less-than-ideal memories, this news will likely come as no surprise. A recent survey found that – according to residents – Bondi is the Aussie beach with the worst behaved beachgoers.
The beach etiquette survey, carried out by online language teaching marketplace Preply, surveyed more than 1,000 people from each of Australia’s 25 most populated coastal areas, asking residents to rate beachgoers on behaviours such as pet management, noise pollution and respecting personal space. The results are in, and it turns out that Bondi’s population of sand lizards are the country’s most poorly behaved – with Surfers Paradise Beach on the Gold Coast and St Kilda Beach in Melbourne coming in at second and third place.
According to Australia’s coastal residents, the most commonly-seen, socially-unacceptable beach blunders are bringing pets to the beach (55 per cent), not swimming in designated areas (48 per cent), and engaging in public displays of affection (PDA) (46 per cent). If you’re guilty of option A or option C, our list of the best dog beaches in Sydney and our round-up of romantic date spots should help you keep your fellow beach-goers on side. Other examples of unfavourable beach behaviour listed by beach goers include sitting too close, talking too loudly, playing excessively loud music or flicking sand by wearing thongs on the beach (39 per cent of respondents cited this as a beach etiquette violation).
When asked how to respond to beach etiquette violations, 55 per cent of respondents were in favour of “ignoring the behaviour”, a noble 24 per cent opted for “politely communicating the rules to abusers”, and eight per cent of us appear to be keyboard warriors, believing the best approach is to “record the behaviour and share it on social media”.
If you’re a stickler for good beach behaviour, it looks like you might want to head out of town – with Australia’s top five beaches for excellent etiquette all outside of the state. Not bothered by your fellow sun worshippers? Here’s our guide to Bondi.
You can read the full study and plan your next beach day over here.