Pearl Beach is the kind of place people came to as children and bring their own children back to, and the reasons have not changed: a calm beach, a rock pool, a village with almost no traffic, and bush behind every fence. Here is how it works with a family, and the few things worth knowing before you come.
The 250 metres
The single most useful fact about the house with small children is that the beach is 250 metres away on the flat, and the house sits at the quieter end of Diamond Road where the only traffic is bikes. No hill, no car, no packing the boot. It means the beach happens twice a day instead of once, and that the person who wants to go back for the hat, the bucket or a nap can do it in three minutes.
Where to swim
The southern end of the beach, near the rock pool, is the calm end and where local families sit. The northern end towards Mount Ettalong has more swell and rips; give it a miss with children. Pearl Beach is not patrolled, so this is a beach for swimming with your kids rather than watching them from a towel. When you want flags, Umina Beach is ten minutes away and patrolled on weekends and public holidays through the season.
The rock pool
The 30-metre ocean pool at the southern end is the children’s part of Pearl Beach. Shallow at the near end, sheltered from the chop, with a rock platform around it full of crabs and anemones at low tide. At high tide the waves come over the wall and the pool fills with squealing. Go early on hot days. Reef shoes are worth packing for the platform.
Green Point and the rocks
Past the pool, the rock ledge at Green Point is for older kids: rock pools, fishing off the point with a parent, and whales in winter. The reserve at the end of Green Point Road has room for a picnic.
The Arboretum
Five minutes’ walk from the beach, the Crommelin Native Arboretum is flat, shaded, free and full of things to find: boardwalks over the wetland, a creek, labelled trees, and lyrebirds, wallabies and echidnas for the patient. It is where you go when everyone has had enough sun and nobody has had enough running about. No dogs and no ball games, so it is a wander, not a kickabout.
Umina: the playground and the flags
Ten minutes by car, Umina Beach has the Central Coast’s biggest playground on the foreshore, a patrolled beach with calm shallow water, a kiosk, barbecues and a dog-friendly stretch of sand. It is the day out when the rock pool has been done three times.
The ferry
Children rate the ferry to Palm Beach above almost everything else. The Fantasea ferry from Ettalong takes half an hour past Lion Island; the little timber Merinda II from Patonga is the one to choose if the timetable lines up. Walk to the lighthouse on the other side if legs allow, or just ride over and back with an ice cream.
Patonga
The headland walk from Pearl Beach to Patonga is for confident walkers of about eight and up: three kilometres each way with steep steps at the Patonga end. For everyone else, drive the five minutes: fish and chips from the Boathouse kiosk on the beach, a paddle in the calm water by the wharf, and back before anyone melts down.
When it rains
The house has a wall of glass onto the bush, which is oddly good entertainment in the rain, and a long table for board games. The Arboretum is fine in light rain. For a proper wet day, the Ettalong Markets are entirely undercover and the cinema is in the same building.
What to pack, because there is no shop
Pearl Beach has no supermarket, general store or café at the moment, and the nearest shops are ten minutes away in Umina. The kitchen has a dishwasher, a food processor and a capsule coffee machine, and the deck has a barbecue and a pizza box, so cooking for a family is easy once the fridge is full. With children that changes how you pack:
- Do the full food shop in Umina or Woy Woy on the way in, including the things you always forget: sunscreen, nappies, the cereal they will actually eat.
- Bring buckets, spades, reef shoes and the beach shade; there is nowhere in the village to buy them.
- Bring the bikes. Diamond Road is flat, sealed and quiet at this end, and the ride to the beach is the highlight of the day for a certain age. Two cars fit off-street.
- Linen and towels are included; bring beach towels. Ask HolidayCo about a portacot and high chair before you arrive so you know whether to bring your own.
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