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Wollongong, NSW



The Illawarra Coast from Sublime Point lookout


Wollongong Mall


Wollongong City rock pool


Wollongong Harbour


Port Kembla steelworks


Berry


Kiama Blowhole

Minnamurra rainforest, Jamberoo


The Illawarra coast from Bald Hill Lookout, Stanwell Tops

Known affectionately as "the Gong", Wollongong is a town with a long history of mining and industry, having coal mines, steelworks and an industrial port. The city is also a regional centre for the South Coast fishing industry. In spite of its industrial connections, Wollongong is increasingly becoming a tourist destination, as it is located close to the many scenic natural attractions of the surrounding Illawarra region.

Where is it?: New South Wales: Central & Far West. Wollongong is located on the eastern coast of Australia, 82 km south of Sydney. The city is connected to Sydney through both a rail and scenic coastal road route which take between 90 and 120 minutes, and via main roads, taking between 70 and 90 minutes. The main road connecting Wollongong is the Waterfall-Yallah Southern Freeway (formerly the F6). Passenger rail services on the South Coast railway line connect the centres of Nowra and Kiama to the south and Sydney to the north.

Lookouts: Sublime Point Lookout offers 180 degree views over the sea, the rainforest and the 17 beaches that span the coastline to Wollongong. This is one of the few places where the coastal foothills and the plateau are linked. The Sublime Point Track descends the escarpment via a series of steel ladders. Access is off Princes Highway at Bulli Tops. Further along the escarpment at Stanwell Tops is Bald Hill Lookout, a favourite hang gliding launching site. The views down the coast are equally spectacular.

Things to see and do:

The Illawarra coastline itself consists of many beaches characterised by fine pale gold-coloured sands. They are all popular swimming beaches and used by both locals and visitors from Sydney. Seventeen of the beaches are patrolled. Nine of the beaches have ocean rock pools attached - providing safe and relaxing swimming away from the surf breaks. The beaches are occasionally interrupted by prominent and picturesque rocky headlands jutting into the sea.

Surrounding area:

Minnamurra Rainforest, located in Budderoo National Park near the village of Jamberoo, is a rare remnant of subtropical and warm temperate rainforests that were once extensive in the Illawarra region. Visitors regularly see first hand the fauna of the area such as the normally allusive Lyrebird, the Eastern Water Dragons, Swamp Wallabies and a host of bird species which make Minnamurra their home.

Kiama is a seaside town set against green rolling hills and a scenic coastline of golden beaches and rocky headlands. Long treasured as a holiday destination, Kiama has managed to maintain its charm as a casual, relaxing resort without falling the way of the highrise compromise which has spoilt other areas. Kiama's most famous feature is its 'blowhole' situated on Blowhole Point behind the point's lighthouse. More >>

The town of Berry (63km south) is renown for its bucolic pastoral setting but now it is the boutiques, galleries, collectables, gourmet produce and the cafes which set it apart. Set amongst rolling green hills with the Cambewarra range providing a stunning backdrop, the landscape adds to the pleasant relaxed atmosphere of the place. More >>

Trivia: Wollongong was continually lampooned in the 1970's ABC series The Aunty Jack Show, including a parody of Lucky Starr's I've Been Everywhere where the verse consisted only of many Wollongongs and one Dapto. This series also launched the character of Wollongong media non-personality Norman Gunston.
In the Harry Potter book and movie series, there is an Australian Quidditch team from 'Wollongong' that is often considered to be the same as Wollongong (many names of Quidditch teams are similar, though not identical, to real towns).


About Wollongong

The regional centre of Australia's 9th most populated area - the Illawarra - Wollongong is the third largest city in the state of New South Wales, Australia, after Sydney and Newcastle. It is also a Local Government Area administered by the Wollongong City Council.
It has two Regional Cathedrals, and numerous churches of many denominations including the well-known land-mark, the Nan Tien Buddhist Temple, the largest in the Southern hemisphere.
The City of Wollongong has a distinct geography. It lies on a narrow coastal plain flanked by the Pacific Ocean to the east and a steep sandstone precipice known as the Illawarra escarpment to the west. The coastal plain is widest in the south and narrowest in the north.
To the north of Wollongong it becomes so narrow that the coastal road Lawrence Hargrave Drive once precariously hugged the cliffline until rock falls forced its closure. It was replaced in 2005 by the Sea Cliff Bridge. The bridge carries both vehicular and pedestrian traffic just off the coast, crossing the submerged rock shelf. The Illawarra Railway must go through several tunnels to reach the Sydney metropolitan area. The Southern Freeway and Old Princes Highway provide alternative inland routes, descending the escarpment further south at Bulli Pass or at Mount Ousley, entering the coastal plain at Gwynneville, just north of Wollongong's city centre.
The Escarpment ranges between 150 and 750 metres above sea level, with locally famous mountains such as Mount Keira, Mount Kembla, Broker's Nose and Mount Murray. The Escarpment contains strata of coal measures, and the entrances to many coal mines have been established along the slopes of the Escarpment right throughout Wollongong.

History: The area was originally inhabited by the Dharwal (or Turuwal) Indigenous Australians. The first Europeans to visit the area were the navigators George Bass and Matthew Flinders who landed in Lake Illawarra in 1796. The first settlers in the region were cedar cutters in the early nineteenth century, followed by graziers in 1812. Charles Throsby established a stockman's hut in the area in 1815. The first land grants were made in 1816. Further settlers arrived and in 1834 a town was planned. A road down the Escarpment through Bulli Pass was built by convict labour in 1835-6. By 1856 Wollongong had a population of 864. The Illawarra Railway to Wollongong was completed in 1887, and now continues as far south as the town of Bomaderry on the Shoalhaven River.
The navigator George Bass first documented the Illawarra coal deposits in 1797. There have been many coalmines in the district. Australia's worst coal mining disaster occurred in 1902, at the Mount Kembla mine when an explosion killed 94 men and boys, the youngest aged 14, the oldest 69. Two other men died attempting to rescue survivors.
Heavy industry was attracted to the region by the ready availability of coal. In 1928 Hoskins, later Australian Iron & Steel, started a steelworks at Port Kembla, a few kilometres south of Wollongong. The former Broken Hill Proprietary Company (now BHP Billiton after merging with Billiton) acquired AI&S in 1935, but has since spun-out their steel division as a separate company, now known as BlueScope Steel. The steelworks has grown to become a world-class flat rolled steel producer, operating as a fully integrated steel plant with a production of around 5 million tonnes per year. Other industries to have set up in the massive Port Kembla industrial complex - the largest single concentration of heavy industry in Australia - include a fertiliser plant, an electrolytic copper smelter (featuring the tallest chimney in Australia), a locomotive workshop, a coal export shipping terminal, a grain export shipping terminal and an industrial gases manufacturing plant.
Despite the decline of traditional manufacturing and blue-collar industries due to the abandonment of protectionist economic policies in the 1980s, many of these industrial installations still exist. This has not stopped Wollongong having the unenviable distinction of one of Australia's highest unemployment rates and rates of drug dependency. The city's economy is, however, on the rebound, thanks to diversification of economic activity including higher education, the fine arts, tourism, residential construction and eco-friendly electricity generation; however, the city's economy still relies primarily on heavy industry, and will continue to in the near future.


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