It's everything that people overseas imagine an Australian summer to be. Bright sunshine, waves splashing toward the coast and family groups taking advantage of them on their new year break.

Of course the flies, sunburn, oppressive heat and humidity and sharks rarely rate a mention.

But, I grant you, today was pretty close to idyllic here on the coast south of Sydney. It probably would have been less so on the city beaches, which were more likely to be packed. But on this particular beach there was plenty of space, plenty of sunshine and waves which weren't really too threatening but this guy can still have diving into them all to himself for mine. And to top it off there was a cool breeze from the south, keeping temperatures down to the low to mid 20's. (Though that has its disadvantages as well; chances are that a number of people stayed out longer than they intended to and will be quite burnt tomorrow as a result of underestimating the intensity of the unforgiving solar radiation.)

There's no denying, though, that this was a pretty good day to be alive. Indeed overall mine was probably better than most, though it had little to do with sunshine and beaches as such.

Less so for our southerly cousins in Melbourne and Adelaide, both experiencing heatwave conditions of around 40. I'm sure it'll make its way up to us in due course, but for the moment it's time to enjoy the temperate weather.

Last Year