Byron Bay

new day new 🐧

I am currently back in Scotland but doing these retroactively.

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After my very very long journey from Thailand to Brisbane, I finally headed to meet up with Jodie using the a quick train from Brisbane to Gold Coast. Great transport links in Aus, the trains and busses are all only 50 cent (25p). Didnt see much of brisbane before i left for gold coast, we decided not to stay there as it isnt on the coast.

Once I arrived in Gold Coast, I had to walk a bit to get to our car hire pickup spot. We decided to hire a car for a week as we had heard it can be tricky to get around without one.

All the cars here are automatic and the roads are all so wide, so quite easy to drive luckily.

Once I had the car, I went to pick up Jodie. She was staying in a place called 'Surfers Paradise' in gold coast which is renowned for being quite tacky. Jodie only stayed there for one night but she didnt like it at all! I picked her up aand then we picked up one of Jodie's closest friends from Glasgow that lives in Aus. Since I handt properly slept in a few days at this point, I let jodie take over the driving and we all headed down to Byron Bay.

Byron Bay is south of gold coast, we both loved it there, amazing beaches great food spots and cafes and a very laid back surfer vibe. Its become a bit of a celeb hot spot (Chris Hemsworth, Margot Robbie etc. have houses there) and thwere are some huge houses there which have amazing views. They are all worth several million!

The coffee in Aus has been amazing so far, some of the best I have had. A lot of the cafes even ask for your bean preferences. My go to orders have been flat white and capcuccino.

We stayed in Byron for 6 days, the first 4 days we were in a hostel right on the beach front. You could borrow surf boards for free as part of the hostel so we had a go at surfing a couple of times. The hostel also had a cold plunge and sauna which was nice!! Altho it was a bit too big of a hostel for my preference. During the first 4 days we also took some day trips to nearby wateralls and really nice hiking spots. We got really lucky with the weather so every day we have been here so far has been sunny and clear and around 25-30 degrees with a breeze.

We also went to a few bars in Byron, one of which had two face to face massive grand pianos in the middle with two guys who took song requests all night. It was super busy in there and lots of people singing along to different genres of songs (lot of taylor swift, chapelle roan etc. + some older stuff). Was like a massive communal karaoke bar.

I also booked a last minute skydive on day 5 as I had heard Aus was a good place to do it! Skydive itself was amazing, never felt anything like the feeling of jumping out a plane, the scariest part was the build up of watching other people jump out and knowing you were next! The plane journey was also really nice, and got some great coastal views of Byron and north east australia. Weather was perfect. Freefall was 60 seconds and then i had a few minutes of gliding with the parachute. When I landed, I was ready to jump again!

Some people in my group didnt like the experience as much. One guy had lots of ear pain on the way down due to pressure and some others felt very naseuous.

Definitley something I'd recommend though!

Our last 2 days in Byron we stayed in an airbnb and Jodies friend had to go back to Brisbane for work. Our airbnb was rly nice! in a quiet area but everything is super accessible im Byron with the car. We went to some more rly nice beaches and watched the surfers. The beaches are all huge and not very crowded which is ideal. Also managed to see a Koala up in the trees!

We rented surf boards for the penultimate day in Byron which was fun, went to some beginner friendly surf spots to try and keep learning. Did mean we had to drive around with 2 surf boards in the car which was tricky to say the least!

Our last day in Byron we took a day trip to Springbrook national park which is where they film "I'm a Celeb!". Its actually only an hour away from Byron and not as remote as I thought! We drove to a view point using some very steep and very bendy roads which were really fun to drive. Sadly Jodie was feeli g quitr sick because of all the twists and turns. Seems to be a popular motorbiking spot! The view from the top was amazing and we learned how the valley was formed from an active volcano as Australia was drifting millions of years ago.

After Byron we went back to Gold Coast to see some friends for the weeeknd but I will save that for the next penguin as this one is alrrady way too long!

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