BUSY BUSY: Bar Beach at Narooma always a popular safe spot with tourists.
BUSY BEACHES: Narooma district beaches were packed with the recent great weather, with locals commenting Dalmeny Beach was the busiest they had seen it in a while.
DUCK DROP: The Narooma surf life savers took time out from their New Year’s Day patrol to hold the annual surf club duck race. Rotary holds another duck race on Australia Day.
FIREWORKS: A large crowd gathered at the Narooma Golf Club for the New Year’s Eve fireworks show. See photos of the festivities at venues around the district inside. See a full gallery of photos on this website!
ACCOMMODATION providers around the Narooma district are reporting a bumper holiday season with the fine weather playing its part.
The consensus was that local towns from Tuross to Bermagui were packed with tourists, even more so than last year when bad weather and a forecast for rain keeping visitors away.
The camping grounds at Dalmeny and Mystery Bay, both managed by Annette Boulton, were amongst the most popular with all but one or two spaces at Mystery Bay taken between Christmas and New Year’s Day.
“It’s busy, busy and I have noticed that this year’s visitors are particularly relaxed and friendly,” Ms Boulton said.
“We’re having a very good year so far.”
Again, that perhaps proves that sunny weather makes for happy campers.
It was a similar story at the Island View Beach Resort south of Narooma where manager Jason Beard also said his park was full up and much busier than last year when the threat of weather kept people away.
The crowds have been causing a few issues in Central Tilba where business owner Phil Elton said cars were backed all the way up Corkhill Drive to the church.
The parking situation had been made worse by the narrowing of Punkalla Road on the other side of town that had restricted parking even further.
“The cars are parked out in the street meaning there is only one lane of traffic and it can be extremely dangerous with cars coming around the corner,” Mr Elton said.
Back in Narooma, the owner of the Holiday Lodge Motel Peter Wilkins said his observation was that it started a bit slow with more people arriving on January 27, but things really picked up over the weekend.
“I was also surprised that our pre-bookings were not more, especially with the LaSalle Motel now closed,” he said.
Eurobodalla Shire Council’s visitor information centres had also been swamped, according to the council’s manager for tourism and economic development Andrew Greenway, who was experiencing his first Christmas season in the district.
Mr Greenway said with a few exceptions all the accommodation providers under contract with Eurobodalla Tourism between Batemans Bay and Narooma had no vacancies.
“The weather has got a bit to do with it,” Mr Greenway.
“And even more so from now on because more people come down from Canberra and other areas if they know the weather is going to be good.”
He encouraged visitors to visit or call the visitor information centres on 1800 802 528 to find out what accommodation was available.
