But now, MidCoast Council has warned tourists to avoid the sleepy town in a bid to ease concerns about traffic and emergency access.
“Please consider exploring other parts of our region over the coming days, as the amount of people in Seal Rocks is causing traffic and emergency access hazards,” MidCoast Council said in a social media post.
“Council staff are currently out and about in the area moving people on.”
MidCoast Council’s director of liveable communities, Paul De Szell, said traffic congestion from the influx of tourists was causing significant problems for the town.
“We had issues particularly last year where we were so congested we had a gridlock situation,” De Szell told the ABC.
“We couldn’t get emergency vehicles in there, we couldn’t get waste trucks in there, and we don’t want it to escalate to that point again.”
A lot of Sydneysiders have been holidaying in Seal Rocks. Photo / Destination NSW
Kimberley Hannaford is a worker at the town’s only store and has deep concerns about the condition of the settlement’s only accessible road.
“The road is the only road in and out of town,” she told the ABC.
“It is barely wide enough for two cars to pass at one time anyway, and now we’ve got people parking along the foreshore.
“My parents are 80 and they’re basically just hiding away in the house, they don’t go out because there’s just too many people around.”
The social media announcement by the MidCoast Council has split the internet.
Several were shocked at the local council’s decision to tell tourists to steer clear from a holiday destination, while others welcomed the announcement and critiqued the council’s recent tourism campaign promoting the region despite infrastructure issues.
One user commented: “A tourist region telling people not to go there?”
