Bonny Hills facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Bonny Hills Camden Haven, New South Wales
View of Rainbow Beach
Bonny Hills Location in New South Wales
Population	3,045 (2021 census)
Postcode(s)	2445
LGA(s)	Port Macquarie-Hastings Council
State electorate(s)	Port Macquarie
Federal Division(s)	Lyne

Bonny Hills is a lovely town in New South Wales, Australia. It's located right on the beautiful Tasman Sea coast. You can find it about 18 km south of the bigger town of Port Macquarie.

One of the oldest groups in Bonny Hills is the Wauchope–Bonny Hills Surf Life Saving Club. This club has been helping keep people safe at the beach since 1958! They even built a brand new clubhouse at Rainbow Beach in 2009. It replaced their first building, which was built by local volunteers way back in 1959.

Bonny Hills has handy places like a service station, a local tavern, and a post office. It's also home to a fire station and two holiday parks, perfect for visitors. Of course, it has its own amazing local beach too!

The Birpai (also known as Birrbay) people are the traditional owners of this land. They have lived in this area for more than 40,000 years, making it a place with a very long history.

Discovering Bonny Hills' Past

Early Explorers and First Peoples

Long ago, in 1818, an explorer named John Oxley traveled through this area. He camped on a "sandy beach" that we now know as Bartlett's Beach. But even before that, the Birpai people had been living here for thousands of years.

How Bonny Hills Grew

Bonny Hills wasn't always called Bonny Hills! It was first known as Green Hills, or sometimes "Creamy." A man named A. D. Suters owned a lot of the land and was the only person living there full-time. His brothers and a friend had holiday homes nearby.

In 1933, Thomas R. (Tom) Bartlett visited Green Hills from Wauchope. He liked it so much that he bought 20 acres of land. Later, he bought even more! The Bartlett family cleared the land and built a house, moving in around December 1933.

They tried growing passionfruit vines, but a big wind in 1938 ruined them. Later, they planted bananas and pineapples, which became popular. But by 1955, Arthur Bartlett decided to turn the land back into grass.

A New Name for a Growing Town

In 1944, a dam was built to bring water to Green Hills. A few years later, in 1946, a company wanted to build a post office and telephone exchange. But there was a problem: there were too many other places called "Green Hills" in Australia!

So, the postal department said the town needed a new name. The local community held a meeting to vote. At first, they thought about "Grants Head," which was on most maps. But then, a woman suggested "Bonny Hills," and everyone loved it! That's how the town got its beautiful name.

After the Bartlett family left in 1956, some of the beaches got new names. Little Beach became "Bartlett Beach" to remember the family. Big Beach was renamed "Rainbow Beach," which is a very fitting name for such a colorful place.

The Surf Club's Story

The Wauchope–Bonny Hills Surf Life Saving Club officially started on October 8, 1958. Before that, there was an older surf club that stopped operating before World War II. The new club first patrolled Little Beach.

Later, they decided to move to Big Beach (Rainbow Beach). They worked hard to build a clubhouse there between 1962 and 1964. In 2009, that old clubhouse was taken down. A fantastic new one was built in its place, opening in 2010.

Bonny Hills' Population Growth

The number of people living in Bonny Hills has grown a lot over the years! In the 2021 Census, there were 2,825 people living there. Most people (87.4%) were born in Australia. The next biggest group came from England (3.8%).

When it comes to languages, 94.4% of people in Bonny Hills spoke only English at home. For religion, the most common answers were No Religion (36.0%), Anglican (21.3%), and Catholic (20.9%).