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Talobilla Park Keeps Growing as a Peninsula Sports Hub in Kippa-Ring

Talobilla Park at Kippa-Ring. Photo Credit: City of Moreton Bay

Talobilla Park’s Next Chapter Takes Shape at Kippa-Ring

Talobilla Park is changing again.

A new softball clubhouse is under construction at Kippa-Ring, more work on the park’s softball facilities is planned, and next April international teams will arrive to train ahead of the 2027 WBSC Women’s Softball World Cup Finals.

It is the latest investment in a place that has gradually become one of the Redcliffe Peninsula’s biggest concentrations of community sport.

Across Talobilla today are baseball, rugby league, football and softball facilities. Council records four baseball fields, four rugby league fields, three soccer fields and up to eight softball diamonds, with nine sporting and community organisations holding leases or permits across the precinct.

Read: Talobilla Park to Become Home of $4.8M Clubhouse for Redcliffe Softball Community

The timetable has shifted

The new home of Redcliffe Leagues Softball Association is one project that has taken longer to get moving than first expected.

When news of the $4.8 million replacement clubhouse was reported in April 2025, construction was expected to start around the middle of that year and run for about 12 months.

Instead, temporary facilities began arriving in November, ahead of demolition of the old clubhouse. Council awarded Apollo Property Group the $4,809,106 construction contract on 10 November 2025.

The Australian Government is contributing $2,440,500 through the Thriving Suburbs Program, with City of Moreton Bay funding the balance. The replacement includes change rooms, a clubroom, kitchen and supporting facilities for an association with hundreds of members.

Council’s tender register now puts the expected completion date at 5 June 2027. That means the clubhouse will still be under construction when international softball arrives on the Peninsula two months earlier.

Talobilla’s World Cup role has changed

Eight international teams will be on the Redcliffe Peninsula from 5 to 11 April for the WBSC Women’s Softball World Cup Finals.

Talobilla was originally announced as the competition venue, but that changed in May when Softball Australia confirmed the tournament matches would instead be played at Kayo Stadium.

The Kippa-Ring fields remain part of the event as the official training and warm-up venue for the competing teams.

Talobilla Park field allocation map. Photo Credit: Moreton Bay Council

Council’s 2026–27 Budget also provides for further work on Talobilla’s softball facilities in preparation for the tournament. That investment is separate from the clubhouse, although the published budget material does not spell out the full scope or cost of those additional works.

Read: Dolphins Pitch Kippa-Ring Precinct Upgrade Ahead of Brisbane 2032

An idea that goes back to the 1990s

There is an older thread running through all this.

In the early 1990s, long before a softball World Cup was on the agenda, Redcliffe City Council had already decided what it wanted Talobilla to become. A parks strategy set an objective for 1992–93 to develop the park into a “focal formal sports area” serving sporting organisations across Redcliffe.

The transformation came gradually rather than through one big redevelopment. Softball established its current base at Talobilla in 1998, while the Peninsula Padres moved there in 2004–05. Rugby league and football also became part of a sporting precinct that continued to fill out as the Peninsula grew.

That process has never really stopped. In November 2025, Council granted the Padres a new 10-year lease as plans progressed for a replacement district-level baseball clubhouse. The club now has more than 400 players.

The construction happening around Talobilla today is another piece of a plan that has been taking shape for more than 30 years. There has been no single transformation and no grand unveiling — just successive generations of fields, clubs and facilities building on what was already there.

Next April will bring something new. While the World Cup matches will be down the road at Kayo Stadium, the eight international teams will prepare for them on the same Kippa-Ring fields used week after week by local players.

Published 6-September-2026

Two Wins From a Premiership: Redcliffe Dolphins Are Right in the Hunt

Redcliffe have spent much of 2026 looking like a team capable of going deep into September. After Sunday’s 20–16 escape against Central Queensland, the equation has become considerably simpler: two more wins and the Dolphins are Hostplus Cup premiers.

They have also earned themselves the best possible preparation for the first of them.

Sunday’s qualifying-final victory at Kayo Stadium sent the Redcliffe Dolphins directly into a home preliminary final, giving them a weekend off while Burleigh and Townsville fight for the right to meet them.

For a side that finished second and closed the regular season with four straight victories, that is a strong position. But the manner of Sunday’s win may tell us more about Redcliffe’s premiership prospects than some of the bigger scores that came before it.

The Run Into September

Redcliffe finished the regular season with a 14-5-1 record, three competition points behind minor premiers Sunshine Coast.

The ladder contained another number worth noticing. The Dolphins scored 577 points and conceded 344, leaving them with a +233 points differential — the best in the competition, ahead even of the Falcons’ +187.

Their final month showed where much of that difference came from.

Redcliffe shut out the PNG Hunters 32–0 in Port Moresby, then returned home and put 46 points on Brisbane Tigers. Tweed were beaten 30–12 a week later before the Dolphins finished the regular season with a 44–26 victory over Western Clydesdales.

Those were four very different afternoons, but together they took Redcliffe into September on a run no other finals opponent could ignore.

The Tigers match was perhaps the clearest display of their attacking ceiling. Redcliffe ran in eight tries, Jude Saldanha scored three, Trai Fuller crossed and Joshua James contributed a try and seven conversions.

Tweed made them work differently. Redcliffe led only 12–8 at halftime and the scores were level early in the second half before the Dolphins pulled away.

Then came September, and a much sterner examination.

The Capras Made Them Earn It

Central Queensland arrived at Kayo Stadium in serious form of their own, having won five straight matches and eight of their previous nine.

For 40 minutes, they looked every bit like it.

The Capras scored three first-half tries and took a 16–4 lead into the sheds. Redcliffe had been hurt by errors and poor decisions, and suddenly the comfortable victories of August did not count for much.

What followed was probably more instructive than another big winning margin would have been.

A penalty try to Saldanha brought Redcliffe back into the contest before Brent Woolf forced his way over in the 63rd minute to make it 16-all. With three minutes remaining, James found Jaron Purcell, who put Fuller through the gap for the try that settled it.

Redcliffe 20, Central Queensland 16.

It was not their cleanest performance of the past month. At this stage of the season, that hardly matters.

Finals football has a way of changing the questions. Opponents bring form of their own, mistakes become more expensive and one poor half can put an entire season in danger.

Redcliffe had one of those halves on Sunday. They found a way out of it.

Five Straight, With Something Bigger Ahead

Sunday extended the winning streak to five and continued a season in which Redcliffe have spent much of their time around the top of the competition.

There is plenty of experience behind the run.

Captain Sheldon Pitama played his 150th Cup match against the Capras, with every one of those appearances coming in Redcliffe colours. Fuller remains capable of producing the sort of moment that decided Sunday’s final, while James has been heavily involved in the Dolphins’ attack through the closing stages of the season.

Yet the stronger case for Redcliffe is not really about one or two names.

They have beaten minor premiers Sunshine Coast 28–14 this season. They finished with the competition’s best points differential. They closed the regular season with four wins of 18 points or more, then won a completely different sort of game when their finals campaign began badly.

That does not make Redcliffe inevitable premiers. Sunshine Coast finished three points clear at the top and also won its qualifying final, while every team still alive has already survived enough football to get this far.

What Redcliffe have done is put themselves in a position where much of that can unfold without them.

Next weekend, they can watch.

One Game From the Grand Final

Redcliffe’s next match will be a preliminary final at Kayo Stadium on the weekend of 19–20 September against the winner of Burleigh and Townsville.

Win it, and they are in the Hostplus Cup Grand Final.

There is an added local dimension to where this season could finish. The 2026 QRL Grand Final Day will also be played at Kayo Stadium on Saturday, 26 September.

So after a season spent chasing the top of the ladder, Redcliffe now have the possibility of playing the rest of their football without leaving home.

Sunday’s first half against the Capras was enough of a warning that nothing about the next two steps should be treated as straightforward. It was also a reminder of why September cannot be judged purely by margins and ladder positions.

Redcliffe were 12 points down at halftime and three minutes from the end they were still locked at 16-all.

They won anyway.

After 20 regular-season matches and one tense afternoon of finals football, the Dolphins are now one victory from a Grand Final and two from a premiership.

For a club making its 10th consecutive finals appearance, this is where another strong season has finally brought them: a week off, a home preliminary final, and the premiership very much within reach.

Published 6-September-2026

Woody Point Beach Project Moves Into the Next Stage

Several months after Woody Point’s new beach was announced, work along the Crockatt Park foreshore has moved further along the waterfront — but locals will have to wait a while yet before they can put down a towel on the new stretch of sand.

The approximately 60-metre beach near TS Moreton Cadets formed the first stage of the Crockatt Park Seawall Upgrade. City of Moreton Bay’s construction schedule had that work running from April to July, while two other stages are now within their scheduled construction periods.

The beach is not due to open separately. Council says public access will begin when the wider project is completed, currently targeted for mid-2027, weather permitting.

Work Moves Along the Waterfront

The project is much bigger than the new beach.

A 331-metre stepped concrete seawall is being built between Woody Point Jetty and Woody Point Boat Ramp, replacing coastal protection infrastructure and helping defend the foreshore against erosion, severe weather and sea-level rise.

Council has split construction into four stages.

Stage 2, covering the seawall near Woody Point Jetty, is scheduled from April to September. Stage 3 began in August and covers the section between Crockatt Park and Woody Point Jetty, with work programmed through December.

The final stage, directly in front of Crockatt Park, is scheduled from January to May 2027.

That means construction will remain part of the Woody Point waterfront for some time. Council says nearby parkland, parking and the boat ramp may be temporarily affected during the works, while pedestrians can expect diversions around active construction areas.

A Beach Built Into a Bigger Coastal Project

When Council announced the beach earlier this year, it said about 2,000 tonnes of sand would be used to create the new area.

*City of Moreton Bay Mayor Peter Flannery and Councillor Karl Winchester at the site* *where the beach is under construction. Photo Credit: City of Moreton Bay*

But the project was primarily designed as a long-term coastal protection upgrade.

The new seawall has a design life of 100 years. Before construction, engineers tested a scale model at the Queensland Government Hydraulics Laboratory at Deagon, using simulated extreme storm conditions to assess how waves and water would interact with the structure.

The finished foreshore will also include new staircase access with handrails for people with ambulant disabilities. Textured surfaces along the shoreline are designed to provide visual and tactile wayfinding for people who are blind or have low vision.

Some trees will be removed during construction, with Council planning replacement planting throughout Crockatt Park.

Still on Track for a 2027 Opening

The Crockatt Park seawall remains on City of Moreton Bay’s works program, with the project specifically included in Council’s 2026–27 Budget for Division 6.

It is jointly funded by City of Moreton Bay and the Australian Government’s Disaster Ready Fund, with $4.5 million in federal funding allocated to the project.

For anyone who saw the beach taking shape and wondered whether an opening was close, the important date remains mid-2027.

Council has not announced an earlier public opening for the beach. Its current project information says the overall Crockatt Park upgrade is aiming for completion by mid-2027, weather permitting.

Until then, Woody Point’s newest stretch of sand remains part of the construction site — and part of a much bigger overhaul of the foreshore.

Published 1-September-2026

Dolphins Fight Back From 14 Down to Beat Titans Before Finals

The Dolphins stared down a 14-point hole on the Gold Coast and came roaring back, beating the Titans 24–20 to carry winning momentum into the club’s first NRL finals campaign.

Gold Coast had them 14–0 down inside 16 minutes and threatening to turn the final night of the regular season into an uncomfortable one. By half-time, though, the Dolphins had dragged themselves back to 14–12 before two quick tries after the break completed the turnaround.

It wasn’t the performance of a top-four side cruising towards September. What mattered was how the Dolphins responded once the Titans had put them under genuine pressure.

Gold Coast Lands the First Punches

Playing his 100th NRL game, Jayden Campbell crossed after six minutes before AJ Brimson added another in the 10th. Campbell converted both and then kicked a penalty goal to give the Titans a 14–0 advantage.

The Dolphins, with Kodi Nikorima, Kulikefu Finefeuiaki and Selwyn Cobbo all given the night off as Woolf took a cautious approach ahead of the finals, had made a mess of the opening quarter and were suddenly chasing the game.

Their opportunity arrived when Keano Kini was sin-binned in the 23rd minute, and they didn’t waste it. Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow crossed less than two minutes later, Herbie Farnworth followed in the 28th and Jamayne Isaako converted both to cut the deficit to 14–12 at the break.

Twenty-Four Unanswered Points Change the Game

Rather than losing momentum at half-time, the Dolphins came out and finished the comeback almost immediately.

Ray Stone crossed in the 45th minute after Francis Molo broke the Gold Coast line, putting the visitors ahead for the first time. Two minutes later Tabuai-Fidow was through again and, with Isaako maintaining his perfect night from the tee, a 14-point deficit had become a 24–14 lead.

It was the Dolphins at their most dangerous. Once they found some rhythm, four tries arrived in a little over 20 minutes.

What followed was less convincing, with errors preventing them from putting Gold Coast away and giving the Titans enough possession to stay in the contest. Campbell eventually crossed for his second try in the 71st minute and converted to make it 24–20.

The final minutes became a scramble rather than a procession. Isaako was placed on report following a tripping penalty, while Titans prop Moeaki Fotuaika was sin-binned and placed on report late as Gold Coast searched for a way to steal the match.

They couldn’t find it.

A Win With a Warning Attached

There is plenty for Kristian Woolf to take from the comeback, but probably just as much from the way the Dolphins got themselves into trouble.

Giving a Titans side that entered the round in 16th a 14-point start was an obvious concern, while the errors that followed the second-half surge allowed a game the Dolphins appeared to have taken over to remain alive until the closing minutes. September is unlikely to offer the same margin for recovery.

Still, Tabuai-Fidow’s double again showed how quickly this attack can change a match. Farnworth continued his late-season scoring form, while Isaako’s four conversions ultimately made the difference in a four-point result.

There was a little history attached to the win as well. The Dolphins had won each of their previous three matches against the Titans at Cbus Super Stadium, so their perfect record there against Gold Coast now stands at four from four.

More significantly, the regular-season climb that began with their NRL debut in 2023 is complete. Finishes of 13th, 10th and ninth have now given way to a top-four season and the club’s first appearance in September.

The Dolphins won’t want to take Friday night’s opening 20 minutes with them. The ability to recover from it, however, might be worth packing.

Titans 20
Tries: Jayden Campbell 2, AJ Brimson
Goals: Jayden Campbell 3 conversions, 1 penalty goal

Dolphins 24
Tries: Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow 2, Herbie Farnworth, Ray Stone
Goals: Jamayne Isaako 4 conversions

Half-time: Titans 14–12 Dolphins
Venue: Cbus Super Stadium, Gold Coast
Round: 27, 2026 NRL Telstra Premiership

Published 4-September-2026

Redcliffe Woman Wins $ 150,000 After Checking $10 Scratchie

A young Redcliffe woman planning to move out of home has received an unexpected $150,000 boost after buying a scratchie from a local Oxley Avenue newsagency.

The woman, who is in her early 20s and has not been publicly named, won the top prize on a $10 Bingo 10X Instant Scratch-Its ticket purchased from Midway News at 544 Oxley Avenue. She plans to save most of the money and put it towards moving out.

Routine purchase delivers six-figure surprise

The woman bought the ticket on a Monday but did not scratch it until the following day. After using a self-checker and learning the ticket had won a prize, she went back over it to confirm the result.

She initially believed she had won $75 before realising the prize was $150,000. The discovery prompted an emotional call to her mother, and she later told lottery officials the result was still difficult to comprehend.

Scratchies were not entirely unfamiliar to her, with family members having given them as birthday presents in the past. Buying one for herself was an occasional decision, however, and the winning ticket was a spontaneous purchase.

Moving plans move closer

The Redcliffe resident said she intended to put most of the winnings aside and use the money to help her move out. She has not disclosed where she plans to move or whether she intends to rent or buy.

No major spending plans have been announced. The $150,000 prize instead gives her a substantial financial buffer as she prepares for the costs of establishing a home of her own.

Midway News adds another major win

Midway News owner Deepak Rawat said staff were pleased to see another customer secure a significant prize from a ticket sold at the Redcliffe shop.

Rawat said the business had sold a division-one Lotto entry and two top-prize Instant Scratch-Its tickets in recent years, along with other smaller major wins. Staff plan to mark the latest result with posters in the store.

The Oxley Avenue outlet has previously sold other significant winning tickets, including a $1 million Gold Lotto entry claimed by a Redcliffe shopper in 2023 after going unchecked for several weeks.

A mother and daughter also won a $50,000 Instant Scratch-Its top prize from a ticket bought at the store in 2022. Another Redcliffe woman secured a $200,000 Lucky Lotteries first prize from an entry purchased there in 2019.

Published 3-Sept-2026

Can the Dolphins Actually Win the 2026 Premiership?

This wasn’t supposed to become a premiership conversation quite so quickly. Four seasons into their NRL life, the Dolphins have already secured a top-four finish and will play finals football for the first time.

Making September was the breakthrough, but the way this season has developed has pushed the conversation considerably further. Around Redcliffe, there is now a much more intriguing question to ask: can the Dolphins actually win the thing?

There is enough evidence to take the possibility seriously, without pretending there aren’t weaknesses that could bring the whole run undone.

An Attack Built to Hurt the Best

The Dolphins have attacking threats everywhere. Isaiya Katoa has 16 try assists from 19 appearances and increasingly controls the way this team plays, while Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow can open a game from almost anywhere and Herbie Farnworth has combined 12 tries with 143 tackle breaks this season.

Then there is Jamayne Isaako, Selwyn Cobbo and Kodi Nikorima, with a forward pack capable of creating the room for all of them. Give the Dolphins momentum and there aren’t many comfortable places for a defensive line to look.

But we knew they could score. The Dolphins led the NRL with 721 points last season and still finished ninth because too much of that attacking work was being given back at the other end.

That’s why some of the most encouraging signs in 2026 have come without the ball.

The Roosters Win Told Us Something Different

The 26–12 win at Allianz Stadium last weekend wasn’t another afternoon of the Dolphins simply running somebody off the park. Tom Flegler and Morgan Knowles were both sin-binned, briefly reducing them to 11 men, and suddenly the afternoon became as much about scrambling and surviving as scoring.

They handled it. Max Plath forcing Siua Wong into touch was one of several defensive moments that won’t dominate the season highlights, but collectively they said plenty about how this team has changed.

A year after defence helped keep the Dolphins out of September, they had just won a significant late-season game partly because of it. For their premiership prospects, that may tell us more than another six-try afternoon would have.

The Case Against Starts With 66–0

Any serious assessment also has to deal with what happened against Cronulla.

The Sharks beat the Dolphins 66–0 at Kayo Stadium in July, the heaviest loss in the club’s NRL history. Katoa was injured, while Tabuai-Fidow and Cobbo were rested after Origin, leaving the Dolphins without several important attacking players.

Sixty-six points is still 66 points.

There have been less dramatic warning signs as well. Brisbane led 24–0 in the Battle of Brisbane before the Dolphins produced that extraordinary 40–32 comeback, a result that showed enormous resilience while also exposing how quickly a game can get away from them.

Against the Broncos, there was enough time and attacking quality to repair the damage. A September opponent may not offer the same opportunity.

They Know They Can Trouble the Heavyweights

This isn’t a premiership case built entirely on potential.

The Dolphins beat the Warriors 26–24 in June and have beaten the Roosters twice, first 48–10 and then 26–12. Penrith needed Nathan Cleary in golden point to get past them 23–22 in Darwin.

Regular-season results won’t buy them anything once the finals begin, but they do remove some of the mystery. The Dolphins already know their football can trouble the sides expected to be around deep into September.

Even the nature of those performances is encouraging. They have blown a contender away, survived a tight finish, fought back from 24 points down and, against the Roosters last weekend, defended their way through periods of serious disadvantage.

That’s a useful collection of experiences for a team about to enter unfamiliar territory.

Plenty Have Been Here Before — Katoa Hasn’t

The Dolphins may be finals newcomers, but the dressing room isn’t devoid of September experience. Felise Kaufusi won two premierships with Melbourne, Morgan Knowles won four Super League titles at St Helens — three under Kristian Woolf — while Flegler and Farnworth were part of Brisbane’s run to the 2023 NRL Grand Final.

The more fascinating unknown sits at halfback.

Katoa will enter his first NRL finals series at 22, carrying considerably more responsibility than simply creating tries. Finals football will inevitably produce stretches when the Dolphins aren’t rolling forward and the space around their dangerous outside backs disappears.

Those are the moments when his kicking, patience and game management become every bit as important as his attacking instincts. We have watched Katoa develop into one of the central figures in this Dolphins side; what we haven’t seen is how he controls a match when an entire season is sitting on the next few sets.

Good Enough? Yes. Proven? Not Yet.

Sixteen wins, a +152 points differential and a guaranteed top-four finish make the strongest argument. The Dolphins don’t need to be talked into the premiership conversation on sentiment anymore; their season has put them there.

The reasons for caution haven’t vanished. Cronulla demonstrated their floor can still be alarmingly low, the defence has had damaging stretches and some of the players carrying the greatest responsibility are heading into their first NRL finals campaign.

But this no longer looks like a team simply delighted to have made September. The attack has always been dangerous; the difference in 2026 is that the Dolphins have shown more ways to stay alive when their preferred game isn’t available.

That doesn’t make them favourites. It makes them legitimate.

For four seasons, Redcliffe has watched this club build towards September. What happens once they get there is still unknown, and that’s precisely what makes the next few weeks so compelling.

The Dolphins have built their first finals team. September will tell us whether, almost without anyone noticing, they built a premiership team too.

Published 3-September-2026

Eight Years Without Stable Housing Shapes Kippa-Ring Case

Photo Credit: QPS/Facebook

A man convicted over a Kippa-Ring bottle-shop theft said he was not planning to seek parole because release would leave him without a stable place to live after about eight years of homelessness.

Jonathen Joinbee, 31, pleaded guilty in Cleveland Magistrates Court to four counts of stealing after previous conviction.

One of those offences occurred at BWS Peninsula Fair in Kippa-Ring, while others involved shops at Cleveland and Raby Bay.

Peninsula Fair Theft Brings Kippa-Ring Link

The Peninsula Fair offence happened about 9:40am on 1 May.

CCTV showed Joinbee taking a bottle of Jack Daniel’s valued at about $50 before telling staff what he was doing and indicating security could be called.

The police prosecutor said Joinbee had displayed similar behaviour during other bottle-shop thefts, calmly telling workers he was taking alcohol before leaving.

Moreton Bay community — *Photo Credit: Pexels*

Eight Years Of Homelessness Raised

The sentencing hearing also dealt with Joinbee’s circumstances outside custody.

His lawyer said Joinbee had been homeless for about eight years before his May arrest and had nowhere to live if released.

The absence of accommodation contributed to his stated decision not to apply for parole.

His parole had been suspended since 6 May, while his existing District Court sentence had a full-time expiry date of 26 May 2027.

The police prosecutor nevertheless argued parole should remain available, allowing Joinbee the opportunity to live in the community under supervision and address his alcohol problem.

Kippa-Ring homelessness and parole — *Photo Credit: Pexels*

Leaving Custody Without Housing

Housing difficulties among people leaving custody extend beyond Joinbee’s individual case.

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare figures show specialist homelessness services assisted about 8,800 people exiting custodial arrangements nationally during 2024–25. About 5,800, or 66 per cent, needed accommodation assistance, while approximately 2,500 received that form of support.

Among approximately 2,000 clients who were homeless when they began receiving support after leaving custody, about 1,300 were still experiencing homelessness when their support ended. Around 330 were recorded as sleeping rough.

The figures provide national context rather than information about Joinbee personally, but show that securing stable accommodation can remain an issue for some people moving from custody back into the community.

Closer to Kippa-Ring, Queensland recorded 19,623 people using funded specialist homelessness services during May 2026, covering people experiencing homelessness as well as those at risk of losing housing.

Parole Option Remains Open

Acting Magistrate Rebecca Bellamy considered Joinbee’s previous probation, intensive correction orders, parole and imprisonment before imposing a nine-month jail sentence.

The period he had already spent in custody was taken into account and he was made immediately eligible to apply for parole.

The decision left Joinbee with the option of release under supervision, while the lack of stable accommodation remained one of the practical issues raised during sentencing.

Published 2-September-2026

All Eyes on the Sky as KiteFest Returns to Clontarf

Photo Credit: Sheba_Also / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0

The skies above Clontarf will fill with colour again this September when Redcliffe KiteFest returns to Pelican Park, this time with a renewed focus on the thing that started it all: kites.

VietJet Redcliffe KiteFest will take over the foreshore on Saturday 19 and Sunday 20 September, bringing experienced kite flyers from Australia and overseas to the Peninsula. General admission will be free in 2026, with organisers reshaping the festival to put kite flying firmly back at the heart of the weekend.

For anyone who remembers KiteFest before it grew into one of the Peninsula’s best-known annual events, there should be something familiar about that approach. Pelican Park’s wide-open space beside the bay has long provided the setting for the festival, and this year visitors will again be encouraged to join in rather than spend the whole day watching from the sidelines.

More Kites in the Clontarf Sky

Giant inflatables and artistic kites will be among the displays overhead, with international and Australian flyers taking to the main arena throughout the weekend. As always with kite flying, exactly what happens in the sky will depend on the wind and conditions on the day.

There will also be plenty of room for amateurs to have a go.

Public flying zones will give visitors somewhere to launch their own kites, while children can make one at a kite-making workshop before heading outside to test their handiwork.

That hands-on element fits neatly with the direction organisers are taking this year. The 2026 festival has been pitched as a return to what made KiteFest popular in the first place — a weekend built around kites, the foreshore and people getting involved.

VietJet returns as naming-rights sponsor, with the festival also recognising Vietnam’s kite-flying culture.

Plenty Happening Back on the Ground

Kites may have reclaimed top billing, but Pelican Park will still be busy at ground level.

The program includes rides, pony rides, a dedicated kids’ zone, kite-making and food trucks, with plenty of open space for families to spread out for the day. Visitors can also bring their own food and drinks, although alcohol and glass are not permitted within the festival.

Entry is free and no ticket is required, but some activities and rides will carry a charge.

The timing also gives local families an easy option for the first weekend of the spring break. Queensland state schools finish Term 3 on Friday 18 September, with KiteFest opening the following morning.

The festival runs from 10am until 4pm on both days.

A Busy Weekend Around Pelican Park

For Clontarf residents, KiteFest will bring some temporary changes to the streets around Pelican Park.

The speed limit along Hornibrook Esplanade will drop from 60km/h to 40km/h from 7am on Saturday until 4.30pm on Sunday, with additional parking and stopping restrictions applying around nearby streets during the weekend.

Parking at Pelican Park will be reserved for vehicles displaying valid accessible parking permits, and an accessible drop-off area will operate at the main entrance.

A free shuttle bus service is also planned, with buses able to accommodate wheelchairs and prams. The Pelican Park boat ramp will remain open for people using the ramp, although access to its car park will be managed by traffic marshals.

For everyone else, the attraction is considerably simpler. Find a spot on the grass, look towards the bay and, if the wind plays its part, watch Pelican Park’s usually open sky become crowded with kites.

After years of the festival growing around that idea, KiteFest is putting it firmly back at the centre of the weekend.

VietJet Redcliffe KiteFest
Saturday 19 and Sunday 20 September 2026
10am–4pm
Pelican Park, 101 Hornibrook Esplanade, Clontarf
Free general admission

Published 31-August-2026

Four Years to September: How the Dolphins Built Their First Finals Team

It took the Dolphins just four seasons to go from a blank NRL team sheet to September. What began with Wayne Bennett, a collection of hardened veterans and a handful of calculated gambles has evolved into the club’s first finals team — and one that looks very different from the side that started it all.

When the Dolphins were awarded the NRL’s 17th licence in October 2021, the new franchise carried the history of a Redcliffe club founded in 1947 but deliberately entered the competition without the suburb in its name.

The ambition extended well beyond the peninsula. NRL chief executive Andrew Abdo said the Dolphins could reach from Brisbane’s northern corridor through Moreton Bay and towards the Sunshine Coast, giving the club a much broader footprint from which to build its support.

Wayne Bennett was appointed foundation coach eight days later and faced the considerable task of assembling an NRL roster from scratch. The recruitment strategy that followed leaned heavily on experience: Felise Kaufusi became the inaugural signing before Jesse and Kenny Bromwich and Mark Nicholls joined a forward pack carrying premiership success, representative experience and hundreds of first-grade games.

Alongside them were two younger recruits whose importance would become clearer with time. Isaiya Katoa was only 18 when the Dolphins signed him from Penrith, while Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow arrived from North Queensland with an opportunity to establish himself at fullback. Four seasons later, both are central figures in the first Dolphins side bound for September.

An Opening That Changed Expectations

Few expansion teams get an introduction quite like the Dolphins did.

More than 32,000 people were at Suncorp Stadium on 5 March 2023 when they faced the Sydney Roosters, with the occasion carrying an added connection through Arthur Beetson, the rugby league Immortal who had represented both Redcliffe and the Roosters.

The Dolphins won 28–18 and quickly showed it was more than an opening-day flourish, winning seven of their first 12 matches and sitting sixth after Round 13. The demands of a full NRL season eventually exposed the limitations of a new roster, however, and they finished 13th with nine wins and 15 losses, scoring 520 points while conceding 631.

Thirteenth place hardly suggested an immediate finals contender, but the first season had answered the more fundamental question confronting any expansion club. The Dolphins had demonstrated quickly that they could compete at NRL level, and expectations began moving accordingly.

One Game Short — and the End of the Foundation Era

By the end of 2024, credibility was no longer the benchmark.

The Dolphins entered Round 27 knowing victory over Newcastle would put them into the finals in only their second season. Instead, the Knights won 14–6 and claimed eighth place, leaving the Dolphins 10th with an 11–13 record.

The defeat also drew a line under the club’s foundation era. Bennett departed after two seasons, Kristian Woolf moved from assistant to head coach and inaugural captain Jesse Bromwich retired.

Bennett later credited Bromwich, his brother Kenny, Kaufusi and Nicholls with helping establish the standards required inside a new NRL club. Their recruitment had given the Dolphins something an expansion side could not develop overnight: players who already knew what successful NRL environments looked like.

Woolf inherited those foundations, but the next stage required the Dolphins to become less dependent on the generation recruited to establish them.

The 721-Point Season That Still Wasn’t Enough

The answer in 2025 was spectacular in attack and costly at the other end of the field.

In Woolf’s first season as head coach, the Dolphins scored 721 points, the best attacking return in the NRL, while Jamayne Isaako led the competition with 278 points. For all that attacking production, they conceded 596 and finished ninth with a 12–12 record.

According to rugby league historian David Middleton, they became the first team since Western Suburbs in 1924 to lead the competition in points scored and still miss the post-season.

The problem became particularly stark late in the season. Across successive matches against the Roosters, Broncos and Sea Eagles, the Dolphins conceded 36, 38 and 58 points. A side capable of scoring at a premiership-threatening rate had been left outside the eight because it could not consistently contain opponents.

That contradiction became one of the defining lessons carried into 2026. The Dolphins did not need to reinvent an attack that had already led the competition; they needed to become considerably harder to beat.

Woolf Builds a More Complete Dolphins Side

Defence, fitness and physical resilience were consequently prominent themes heading into Woolf’s second season, but the change since 2023 has involved considerably more than tightening the numbers without the ball.

Katoa has developed from an 18-year-old investment into the halfback entrusted with directing the team. Tabuai-Fidow has become one of the club’s defining players, while Max Plath went from joining the Dolphins in 2023 and making his NRL debut that season to winning the 2024 Arthur Beetson Medal and making his Queensland debut in 2026.

Isaako’s career revival has added another strand to that development, while the roster has been strengthened progressively rather than rebuilt in one hit. Daniel Saifiti and Kulikefu Finefeuiaki arrived for 2025, with Morgan Knowles, Selwyn Cobbo and Brad Schneider among the additions for 2026.

It is a significantly different model from the one Bennett needed in 2023. The inaugural Dolphins relied on established players to import experience and standards; the current side increasingly combines that foundation with players whose best football has been developed or produced during the club’s own short NRL life.

The Comeback That Finally Took Them to September

The breakthrough arrived in a Battle of Brisbane that initially looked like becoming one of the Dolphins’ worst nights of the season.

Brisbane raced to a 24–0 lead at Suncorp Stadium on 8 August before the Dolphins overturned the deficit to win 40–32, securing the first finals appearance in the club’s NRL history.

There was another indication of their progress three weeks later at Allianz Stadium. Forced to defend periods with 12 men and then 11 against the Roosters, the Dolphins conceded only 12 points and won 26–12. It was their 16th victory of the season and moved them to third on the ladder with one regular-season match remaining.

Through Round 26, the Dolphins have scored 612 points and conceded 474. The attack remains among the club’s great strengths, but the broader change is reflected in the outcome: 16 wins already, compared with 12 across the entire 2025 regular season.

Four Seasons, a Different Measure of Success

Four years ago, the Dolphins were an expansion gamble — a new NRL side built around hardened veterans and young talent that might or might not deliver.

Now the gamble is paying off.

The Dolphins are heading to September for the first time, and the players once recruited on potential are increasingly the ones driving them there. Katoa, Tabuai-Fidow and Plath are no longer prospects around an experienced foundation; they are part of the core of a finals team.

That is how far this club has moved in four seasons. The question is no longer whether the Dolphins belong in the NRL. It is how far they can go.

Published 30-August-2026

When Dolly Came to Brisbane: A Local Farewell to a Country Music Legend

Dolly Parton’s death at the age of 80 will be felt a long way from the Tennessee mountains where her remarkable story began. In Brisbane, there are thousands of people who can remember seeing that story play out in person.

Parton performed at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre 10 times across three visits spanning 27 years, beginning with four shows alongside Kenny Rogers in 1987 and ending with three concerts on her Blue Smoke World Tour in 2014.

The country music legend died on Tuesday, 25 August, leaving behind a career that stretched almost seven decades and produced some of the most recognisable songs in popular music.

Brisbane was fortunate enough to welcome her at three very different points along the way.

Kenny and Dolly Arrive in Boondall

Parton’s first documented Brisbane concerts came in February 1987, when the Brisbane Entertainment Centre itself was barely a year old.

Then came Kenny and Dolly.

Parton and Kenny Rogers were already firmly associated in the public imagination through Islands in the Stream, their huge 1983 duet, and Real Love, released two years later. Their Australian tour reached Boondall for an extraordinary four concerts in five nights, on 23, 24, 25 and 27 February.

For Brisbane audiences, this was Dolly at the height of her crossover fame. She had already made 9 to 5, established herself on the big screen and taken songs such as Jolene and I Will Always Love You well beyond their country music beginnings.

Those four nights also began a long association between Parton and the Entertainment Centre, the venue she would return to on both of her later Brisbane visits.

A 24-Year Wait for Her Return

Brisbane then waited a very long time for another Dolly Parton concert. She finally returned in November 2011 on the Better Day World Tour, playing three consecutive nights at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre on 25, 26 and 27 November. The middle show was sold out before the tour arrived.

A generation had passed since the Kenny Rogers concerts, but Parton’s audience had become broader rather than smaller. Whitney Houston’s version of I Will Always Love You had introduced her songwriting to millions more listeners, while 9 to 5, Jolene and Coat of Many Colors had become songs parents could share with children who weren’t even born when Dolly first played Boondall.

The 2011 tour marked her return to Australia after a lengthy absence, and Brisbane’s three-night run showed there was still considerable appetite to see her. At 65, she wasn’t simply revisiting an old catalogue either: Better Day, her 41st studio album, had been released only months earlier.

Brisbane’s Last Chance to See Dolly

The wait for the next visit was much shorter. Parton returned to Boondall in February 2014 on her Blue Smoke World Tour, performing on 21, 22 and 25 February.

Australia had a prominent place in that chapter of her career. The Blue Smoke album was released first in Australia and New Zealand to coincide with the tour and went to No. 1 in both countries.

A review of her Brisbane show that month found a 68-year-old Parton still moving comfortably between the old and the new. Jolene appeared early, Coat of Many Colors drew on the Tennessee childhood that shaped so much of her songwriting, and Islands in the Stream and 9 to 5 helped bring the show towards its close before I Will Always Love You finished the night.

There was new material as well, along with the humour and storytelling that had become as much a part of a Dolly Parton concert as the rhinestones.

Few in those audiences could have known that these would be her final Brisbane appearances.

Parton eventually announced in 2022 that she was finished with large-scale touring, although she continued recording and making occasional appearances. She released the rock album Rockstar the following year and remained musically active into her late 70s. In January this year, she marked her 80th birthday with a new recording of Light of a Clear Blue Morning.

For Brisbane, though, the memories lead back to Boondall. Between February 1987 and February 2014, Dolly Parton walked onto the Brisbane Entertainment Centre stage 10 times. Some fans saw her beside Kenny Rogers, others waited 24 years for her return, while a younger generation caught her during those final Australian shows.

She never made it back to a Brisbane stage after 2014, but for the people who filled the Entertainment Centre on those 10 nights, Dolly Parton wasn’t always a legend somewhere far away in Tennessee.

Every now and then, Dolly came to Brisbane.

Published 25-August-2026