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The Sunshine Coast, Queensland
The Sunshine Coast
(population 290,645 with up to an additional 50,000 in visitors and
seasonal workers) is a coastal region located in South East
Queensland, north of the
Queensland capital of
Brisbane.
The Sunshine Coast has recently been united into a single Local
Government Area, the Sunshine Coast Regional Council.
The Sunshine Coast is bordered by the Pacific
Ocean in the east, and extends to the local government boundaries
beyond the Blackall Range to the west. Occasionally, the towns of
Gympie, which is 30 minutes' drive north of Noosa Heads, and
Caboolture, 30 mins drive south of
Caloundra, have been included in a
broader definition of the Sunshine Coast region.
Since the Glass House Mountains were first
sighted by James Cook from the deck of HM Bark Endeavour in 1770,
the Sunshine Coast's history has been as diverse and colourful as
its scenery.
The Sunshine Coast's first white inhabitants were
three castaways who shared the life of the Aborigines for 8 months;
it became the home of numerous runaway convicts who preferred life
among the Aborigines to the living hell of the Moreton Bay Convict
Establishment; it was the scene of some of the most bitter
skirmishes of Australia's 'Black War'.
Timber getters used its rivers and lakes as
seaways to float out their great logs of cedar, gold diggers scaled
its mountains to reach the Gympie gold. With the coming of the
railway line to Gympie, the coastal towns, founded as ports for its
early river trade, were bypassed, and grew slowly into quiet holiday
resorts whose peace remained undisturbed until the development boom
of the 1960s and 1970s - just 200 years after Cook had passed that
way.
Tourism
The Sunshine Coast is a
centre for tourism, containing attractions such as Steve Irwin's
Australia Zoo, UnderWater World marine park, Aussie World with the
Ettamogah Pub, The Buderim Ginger Factory, Big Pineapple and the
Majestic Theatre.
National Parks
The Sunshine Coast region is home to more
individual national parks than any other region in Queensland. The
natural biodiversity of the area has been protected by five separate
parks in both coastal and inland regions, including Mapleton Falls
National Park, Kondalilla National Park, The Glasshouse Mountains
National Park, Noosa National Park, and the Great Sandy National
Park, which includes sections on Fraser Island and in Cooloola near
Rainbow Beach.
Education
The Sunshine Coast's
infrastructure includes, but is not limited to:
- Universities - The major university campus
being the University of the Sunshine Coast, with Central
Queensland University having a small campus based in
Noosa.
- TAFE - five campuses at
Caloundra,
Mooloolaba, Maroochydore, Nambour &
Noosa.
- Schools - Many varied denomination, private
and public primary and secondary schools.
Annual Events
- Schoolies Week
(November)
- Noosa Triathlon (October)
- Mooloolaba Triathlon
Content via
Wikipedia
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Sunshine
Coast Regional .com 