Main Attraction

As the sand moved northward and people started to develop a taste for swimming in the rolling surf, interest in sea bathing moved from Southport, across the mouth of the Nerang River to Main Beach.

Still a popular bathing and surfing spot today, this area became home to the Gold Coast's first surf life saving club, Southport, established in 1924.

The original surf club building was lost of a cyclone and in 1936 a new club house was built to compliment the style of 'Spanish Mission' bathing pavilions built two years earlier. The first, at the western foreshore of the Broadwater.

And the second just opposite where the clubhouse stands today at Main Beach Boulevard. While the first building remains as the architects envisioned, the Main Beach pavilion's original style has been lost to bright garish colours, no doubt to compete with the relentless glare of pristine white sand under the hot Gold Coast sun.

The Main Beach pavilion is much larger than the one at the Broadwater. In addition to toilet and change facilities, it also houses a takeaway shop. It was also used as an outdoor location for the early 1990s teen soap Paradise Beach.

Unfortunately this souvenir, a Royal Stafford pin dish, doesn't really do justice to the location, rather disappointingly the image on its face could really be of anywhere.