I went to coffs harbour for schoolies back in 2007 , had a great time. Heaps of bonfires on the beach, impersonated security and police often on the streets with blue and red lights and generally just had a mad time with my mates.
We stayed at park beach holiday park and the rates where cheap and accomodation great. But if i could have my time again , id definetely say go a bit further and goto byron bay. while there is some schoolies at coffs , theres nowhere near the amount youd find at byron bay or anywhere else up north.
Byron bay has so much more pubs , clubs , restruants , and things to do. The nightlife is better and the people are better , the whole town becomes one massive hippy party and night and everyone has a great time. Id defs recommend driving a few more hours up north.
but a word of warning to anyone going to coffs. Im not a racist person by any means but the local aboriginal youth at coffs have some serious problems. We often ran into them and fights would ensure without provocation. One night in particular we ran into them walking home drunk as F**K from the jetty and they just wanted to fight and carry on. We had a few ladies with us too so it was pretty trumatic for them , fortunately one of us had a can of pepper spray and the situation was sorted out without much harm on our behalf.
Unfotunately they caught up with us again another night when we could barely walk and we werent so lucky. We spoke to the police on the same night who told us " The black fellas love this beach at night " he was referring to the beach around the hoey moey and park beach " He also said they hated the schoolies and whatnot and just generally caused trouble everywhere. And i'll believe it , many a night we were having some big bonfires with other schoolies and youd see them walk by maybe 4 - 5 of them but we were with to big of a group to try anything.
But keep this in mind if your there about at night which you obviously will be , look after your ladies and be prepared for the worst. but id recommend byron anyday.
Goodluck ! by the way , if anyones got a booking at park beach let me know ? they told us theyd never accept schoolies again after us because we made a fair mess of the cabin and sprayed a fire hose at passing cars . So id be interested to hear if theyd go back on that