Kate MacDonald, president of Palm Beach Surf Life Saving Club. Photo: James Brickwood

Surf lifesaving, rolling waves and white beaches, the Australian government tells backpackers and other tourists, are very much at the heart of how we see ourselves.

"Surfing and the beachdo not discriminate," the australia.gov.au website says.

This was Palm Beach as imagined by the rest of Sydney.

"They bring together a diverse range of people. Unlike other places around the world that have privately owned beaches, in Australia the beach is a public place. John Pilger, in his book A Secret Country , says, 'there are no proprietorial rights on an Australian beach' and there is 'a shared assumption of tolerance for each other'."

Prime site: Luckily for members of Palm Beach SLSC, volunteer clubs enjoy tax-free status. Photo: James Brickwood

And then there is Palm Beach.

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The curiously coarse red, gold sand lying between the rock pool to the south and the majesty of Barrenjoey to the north may be in public hands but a certain proprietorial right has existed since the first subdivisions attracted Sydney's most wealthy who had the time, money and cars to make the end of the northern beaches their own private paradise.

They established the Palm Beach Surf Life Saving Club in 1921 and it has bound their sense of privileged noblesse oblige ever since.

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Palm Beach - the richest surf club in Sydney?