Tidal River Campground

Tidal River Campground is the park's main camping and visitor hub: 484 camping and caravan sites set among tea trees between Norman Beach and Tidal River. It's a practical base if you want beach time, river swims and nearby walks without driving back toward the park entrance after each outing. The tradeoff is scale. This is a busy holiday settlement in peak periods, not a remote bush camp, and people share the internal roads with cars.

The campground isn't one uniform field. Some sites sit in tea trees a short walk from sandy Norman Beach; others are closer to the calmer water of Tidal River. A beach-side area sits behind low scrub and dunes, while another cluster spreads around a large field near the visitor centre and General Store. That gives you a real choice between the open coast and a calmer river edge, with the shared hub close by.

Norman Beach runs between Pillar Point and Norman Point, with Mount Oberon behind the bay. A walk along the Fifth Ramp passes a wooden lookout over Norman Bay. From camp, Loo-Errn Track and the Tidal River footbridge link into riverside walks, so a stay can be as easy as a swim and a wander or the start of a longer day out.

Tidal River served as an army commando training base from 1940 to 1942. After the war, some remaining army buildings were adapted for park staff and visitors, and the campground grew into the Prom's main visitor base. That history gives the hub a different story from the beach-holiday feel most people come for.

The visitor centre is also useful for mobility access: free beach wheelchairs and a motorised TrailRider are available to hire for sandy and semi-rough tracks. Ask there which route suits the equipment and conditions. The campground's setting makes swimming and walking easy to combine, but not every stretch of sand or track is the same underfoot.