Nielsen Park is a part of Sydney Harbour National Park

Sydney Harbour National Park

thumb|right|250px|[[Nielsen Park]]Sydney Harbour National Park is a national park comprising parts of Sydney Harbour, its foreshores and various islands. The park lies within the Sydney metropolitan area and was created in piecemeal fashion during the 20th century...

 at the suburb of Vaucluse

Vaucluse, New South Wales

Vaucluse is an eastern suburb of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Vaucluse is located north-east of the Sydney central business district, in the local government areas of Waverley Council and the Municipality of Woollahra....

 in the eastern suburbs of Sydney

Sydney

Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...

, Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

. It is a popular recreation area and beach on Port Jackson

Port Jackson

Port Jackson, containing Sydney Harbour, is the natural harbour of Sydney, Australia. It is known for its beauty, and in particular, as the location of the Sydney Opera House and Sydney Harbour Bridge...

. The kiosk is dated from 1914.

Previously part of the Wentworth Estate, the area which became Nielsen Park was once owned by William Wentworth

William Wentworth

William Charles Wentworth was an Australian poet, explorer, journalist and politician, and one of the leading figures of early colonial New South Wales...

. It was disused since 1898 after the death of Wentworth's last surviving unmarried daughter Eliza Sophia Wentworth, at a time when little of Sydney Harbour's foreshore was accessible to the public. From the 1890s, pressure built to buy back private land, and following agitation by the Harbor Foreshores Vigilance Committee (sic), the New South Wales state government took control of 22.9 acres (9.264 ha) of the Vaucluse estate on 6 July 1910. Known as Vaucluse Park,. It was soon renamed Nielsen Park after the Hon. N.R.W. Nielsen, the Secretary (Minister) for Lands, from 1910 to 1911, once an additional 51 acres (20.65 ha) were added in 1911.

The historic 1851 residence Greycliffe House

Greycliffe House

Greycliffe House is a historic, two-storey residential dwelling situated in the Sydney Suburb of Vaucluse. It is listed on the Australian Register of the National Estate.-History:...

 lies within its grounds, and after 1911 served as a neonatal hospital and mothercraft residence before its current function as an office for the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service

National Parks and Wildlife Service (New South Wales)

The National Parks and Wildlife Service is part of the Office of Environment and Heritage - the main government conservation agency in New South Wales, Australia....

. Nielsen Park is part of the traditional land of the Eora

Eora

The Eora are the Aboriginal people of the Sydney area, south to the Georges River, north to the Hawkesbury River, and west to Parramatta. The indigenous people used this word to describe where they came from to the British. "Eora" was then used by the British to refer to those Aboriginal people...

 or Birrabirragal people. Shell middens lie on the walk west of Nielsen Park towards Rose Bay

Rose Bay, New South Wales

Rose Bay is a harbourside, eastern suburb of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Rose Bay is located 7 kilometres east of the Sydney central business district, in the local government areas of Waverley Municipal Council and Woollahra Council .Rose Bay has views of both the Sydney...

. When storms and strong seas hit Sydney's coastline, Nielsen Park is suited to surfing

Surfing

Surfing' is a surface water sport in which the surfer rides a surfboard on the crest and face of a wave which is carrying the surfer towards the shore...

.

Rare flora and fauna

The last mainland Eastern Quoll

Eastern Quoll

The Eastern Quoll , also known as the Eastern Native Cat, is a medium-sized carnivorous dasyurid marsupial native to Australia. They are now considered extinct on the mainland, but remain widespread and even locally common in Tasmania...

 specimen was collected as roadkill

Roadkill

Roadkill is an animal or animals that have been struck and killed by motor vehicles. In the United States of America, removal and disposal of animals struck by motor vehicles is usually the responsibility of the state's state trooper association or department of transportation.-History:During the...

 at Nielsen Park on 31 January 1963.

The rare Nielsen Park She-Oak

Allocasuarina portuensis

Allocasuarina portuensis, commonly known as the Nielsen Park She-Oak, is an extremely rare plant growing in Sydney, Australia. Encountered as a shrub or small slender tree, up to 5 metres tall, it has green drooping branchlets up to 27 cm in length. It is dioecious, that is, male and female...

was originally identified here in 1986 from ten specimens. Those original plants have since died. However, efforts to propagate and reintroduce the species began from the time it was identified, and plants were planted at several locations around Nielsen Park and nearby Gap Bluff and Hermit Point. Fifty-four of these remained alive in 2000.