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Bus #314, #315, #372, #373. Coogee is a long-popular seaside resort, almost on a par with Manly and Bondi. Dominated by the extensive Coogee Bay Hotel on beachfront Arden Street, one of Sydney's best-known music venues, Coogee has had a reputation for entertaining Sydneysiders since Victorian times. At the northern end of the beach, the dome you can see over the Beach Palace Hotel is an 1980s restoration of the 1887 Coogee Palace Aquarium - in its heyday a gigantic dance floor that could accommodate three thousand pleasure-seekers. Today the hotel is a popular drinking spot for backpackers, who crowd out its oceanfront balcony. With its hilly streets of California-style apartment blocks looking onto a compact pretty beach enclosed by two cliffy green-covered headlands, Coogee has a snugness and a friendly local feel that its cousin Bondi just can't match, and since it's not so bristling with fashion plates, you can still happily wear your old shorts to the beach. Everything is close to hand: Arden Street has a down-to-earth strip of cafes that compete with each other to sell the cheapest cooked breakfast, while the main shopping street, Coogee Bay Road , running uphill from the beach, has a choice selection of coffee spots and eateries, plus a big supermarket. The imaginatively modernized promenade is a great place to stroll and hang out; between it and the beach a grassy park has free electric barbecues, picnic tables and shelters. One of Coogee's chief pleasures are its baths, beyond the southern end of the beach. The first, McIvers Baths, for women and children only, is known by locals as Coogee Women's Pool (noon-5pm; 50c); it's suitably secluded, with plenty of hidden rocks. Opposite the entrance, Grant Reserve has a full-on adventure playground. Just south of the women's pool at the end of Neptune Street, Wylie's Baths (7am-7pm; $2.40 ), a saltwater pool on the edge of the sea, has big decks to lie on and solar-heated showers and is open to all. Immediately south of Wylie's, Trenerry Reserve 's spread of big flat rocks offer tremendous views and make a great place to chill out.
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