Beneath Wollongong's Flagstaff Hill Lighthouse, tucked against the base of the cliff, sits a rough-edged pool most locals have only ever heard about in rumours. The Chains Bath, built by convict labour in 1839 and named for the iron chains swimmers gripped in rough seas, is believed to be the second-oldest rock pool in NSW, possibly in Australia. It was made specifically for women, part of a colonial push to attract women to a male-dominated settlement. There's no sign, no plaque, nothing marking it, which is precisely the point of the tour that stops here.
She Shapes History, founded in 2021 by Sita Sargeant, runs walking tours that dig up the overlooked stories of women who shaped Australian cities. Its newest offering, the Wicked Women of Wollongong, is a two-hour stroll through the city's past, running Saturday and Sunday mornings for $60 a person. Existing tours cover Canberra, Melbourne and Sydney, and Sargeant plans to expand to other Australian and international cities.
The Wollongong route packs in some heavyweight stories. From a lookout south towards the Port Kembla Steelworks, guide Lindsay Burlton recounts how a group of women took BHP to the Equal Opportunity Tribunal in the 1980s and won, in what became the biggest sex discrimination case in Australia. Just off Crown Street, the Ethel Hayton Walk, a laneway of rotating public art, honours the journalist who pushed Wollongong from coal town towards a cultural centre, helping found the Conservatorium of Music and the Art Gallery.
Other stops cover hotelier Hilda Condon, whose resourcefulness helped inventor Evelyn Owen get the Owen Gun, Australia's most successful wartime weapon, into production, and Aboriginal rights campaigner Pearl Gibbs, a key figure behind the 1967 referendum. The tour ends at Crown Street Mall, where activist Sally Bowen united eight diverse groups for Wollongong's first International Women's Day march in 1979, which secured funding for the city's Women's Centre.
For travellers, this is a different way into a city most people only know as a stop on the Grand Pacific Drive or a beach day trip from Sydney. Wollongong has the surf beaches, the sea cliff bridge and the lighthouse crowd, but this tour layers on a social history you won't get from any signposted lookout. It suits anyone who likes their city walking with a bit of edge, and it's a strong pick for a weekend visit from Sydney, roughly an hour and a half south by train or car.
