Animal Exercise Beach

Close to my house, most owners clean up after their pets and good parking.
This is my go-​to dog beach.
Make sure you do lock up your car and hide valuables though since one of my friends did have her car broken into at this car park which is unfortunate.

The Animal Exercise Beach at Hillarys is one of the few spots where dog owners can take their best friend for a dip. The beach tends to be busy most times, especially on the weekends. It is not uncommon to see the carpark filled at 8am on a Saturday or Sunday.
There is a good stretch of beach for dogs. The limits of the beach are marked clearly, and there are doggie waste bags available for when Fido heeds the call of nature [please use them; the worst thing is to walk into a pile that had been hidden by sand]. The ocean is generally calm and is good for dogs to have a swim.
On the other side of the beach is a stretch for horses. It is less used that the dog beach, but there is usually a few floats in the carpark in the morning.
At around 9am on the weekends, there is a mobile coffee kiosk set up in the carpark, so after taking Fido for a dip, you can warm up and relax with a coffee.

Hillarys’ animal exercise beach is quiet when I visit to photograph it, but that’s because it’s a little later in the afternoon. You should see it in the morning. It’s mental. One can’t move for the Irish setters and labradors, the beagles and golden retrievers. Or at least those are the breeds that one can’t move for if one turns left at the first T-​junction off the main road. If one turns right, one is liable to run into all these and more, as well as into thoroughbreds and show ponies, the lot of them gallivanting in the surf. And then there are all these animals’ owners. Dog people, horse people, and you. You’d better hope you’re an animal lover.
I haven’t been swimming down at the beach this summer, but the morning when I begin to do so again is just around the corner. It’s a weird beach to swim at for exercise, perhaps, given that one is always a stroke or two away from running into a doberman pinscher, but my girlfriend owns a good-​natured mongrel who also likes to swim for exercise and so that’s our swimming beach of choice. (Two good-​natured mongrels, really.) It’s slightly choppier than some of the other beaches along the coast, but that’s just fine by me, and there are the requisite showers and changing rooms on site. Get there early to get a park. A surprising number of people own dogs.