Second Beach Track
Dunedin · Otago
This walk was suggested by the community and checked against the authority quoted above before it was published. The route line comes from official track data. Dunedin City Council’s own wording: “Dunedin City Council Dog Control Policy 2024 (approved 26 November 2024, date of effect 5 May 2025), section 6: “If a public place is not listed in this policy, then dogs are allowed there on leash. Dogs on leash and under control is the default classification in Dunedin.” Section 6.2 adds that unless specified elsewhere dogs must be on a leash “on all beaches unless otherwise specified”, “on all coastal dune areas including access pathways” and “at all public places not listed elsewhere in this policy or schedules to the policy”. Neither Second Beach nor Second Beach Road is named anywhere in the policy or its schedules, so the on leash default applies to the track and to the beach it reaches. Worth knowing before you set out: the sand next door IS listed, as a prohibited area, but the Esplanade itself is not. Schedule A prohibits dogs from “the beach from the Salt Water Pool to the northern end of the sea wall (except dogs on a leash may have access to the beach between 8.00pm and 8.00am the following day)”. Schedule B repeats it under the locality heading “St Clair Beach and Esplanade from the Salt Water Pool to the northern end of the sea wall - ONLY between 8.00pm and 8.00am (otherwise prohibited)”, which reads as though the promenade is shut too. It is not. The council’s own “Where you can walk your dog” page scopes the same entry, headed “St Clair Beach and Esplanade”, to “All of the beach from the St Clair Salt Water Pool to the northern end of the sea wall, except, dogs on a leash may have access to the beach between 8pm and 8am the following day. The park on Victoria Road adjoining the playground area and the playground area itself.” The prohibition is the sand and the Victoria Road playground park, not the paved walkway above them, and the same page lists “St Clair Esplanade Track to the Scout Den on Kettle Park” among the places where “dogs are allowed … as long as they are securely controlled on a leash”. Shona and Missy flagged that we had read the heading as the rule. We also checked the ground rather than only the page: DOC's Public Conservation Land layer returns no feature at the trailhead, the midpoint or the beach end, so this is council land under the council bylaw and no reserve rule sits on top of it”. Evidence: the rule-setter’s own published wording. How we check dog rules.
Good to know
Dogs are allowed here. Keep them on the lead, watch for ground-nesting birds and stock, and read the signs at the gate.
Herenga a Nuku records this walk as suitable for a wheelchair, mobility scooter or pushchair. National Tracks Dataset, acquired 2026-08-29. It describes the built track, not today’s conditions, so the signs on the ground still win.
About Second Beach Track
Second Beach Track is a short walk of 0.5 km, near Dunedin in Otago.
A five minute walk from the western end of Second Beach Road in St Clair, around the point and down to a boulder beach that a good part of Dunedin drives past without ever knowing it is there. The council measures the track at 504 m, so it is a shade over a kilometre if you walk out and back, which is about the twenty minutes Shona quoted when she sent it in with Missy. Grade 1, gravel, and graded a Short Walk. The council's own description is the clearest account of it: “Second Beach Track starts at the western end of Second Beach Road in St Clair. The gravel track leads around the point to reach the bouldery Second Beach. Accessible to buggies and people in wheelchairs. Beware of some steep drops above the rocky beach.” Take that last line seriously. The track runs along the top of the cliffs for most of its length, the drop is on your seaward side, and Second Beach itself is boulders rather than sand, facing straight into the open Pacific swell. It is a place to look at the sea, not to swim in it. Dogs are welcome on the lead. That is the Dunedin default rather than a rule written for this track: the council's Dog Control Policy says that any public place it has not listed is an on leash place, and Second Beach is not listed. On a clifftop gravel path a hand's width from a long drop, the lead is the right call anyway. The thing worth knowing before you go is the sand, because the neighbouring beach is not on leash, it is prohibited. St Clair Beach, from the Salt Water Pool to the northern end of the sea wall, is closed to dogs between 8.00am and 8.00pm, and open to dogs on a lead only in the twelve hours the other way around. The Esplanade above it is a different matter: the walkway is on leash at all hours, and the council lists the St Clair Esplanade Track to the Scout Den as a track dogs are allowed on. So you can walk the promenade at midday, you just cannot drop down onto the beach, and the park on Victoria Road by the playground is out as well. The Second Beach trailhead sits right beside the Salt Water Pool, so the track itself is clear of all of it. The Long Dog Café is about 40 m from the start of the track and takes dogs at its outdoor tables, which makes this an easy one to bolt onto a coffee.
Expect easy going, with around 14 m of climb, and takes about 7 min to walk.
Dogs are allowed here, on the lead. This walk is on the map because Shona & Missy suggested it, and we checked it against the source above.
