Surf Camp, Barrington Tops and Taree

29th August - 3rd September

The rain continued for our next few days on the Oz Experience for some wet and wild adventure! We were lucky again (as we were in Kroombit) to get a good bus driver called Gollum due to his uncanny impression of the Lord of the Rings creature. We were also with a nice small group of people. We didn't make many stops on the way to surf camp in Crescent Head, apart from to gaze in awe at the big banana 'monument' in Coffs Habour and to pick up Phil's banana fridge magnet prize for winning an Aussie trivia quiz!

At our secluded surf camp there were already two other groups including a northbound bus and we met our typical surfer dude instructors who gave us a briefing including the first rule of surf camp - 'have fun and look cool'! It was very difficult in practice, even just wading out to sea trying to carry our 8ft long boards in the wind and rain. We tried and failed to stand up for more than 1 second during our first lesson. There was little recuperation for the next day's lesson as there was no water for a shower!

After some success during the second lesson, as Phil managed to stand up for a few seconds, a smelly bus made its way to Barrington Tops national park. Due to the rain, the scheduled night kayaking was too dangerous, so it was strangely substituted for a night of wood-fired pizzas, salsa and drinking upside down! After a late night we kayaked down the grade 3 (aka 'chance of death'!) rapids in daylight. It was actually good fun and we even got to surf some standing waves - way more successful than on our surfboards!

After those exhausting few days we met up and stayed with Pete and Di, some of Phil's family friends, who live in a town called Taree. We had a great few days with them, relaxing, eating, seeing some local sights and a little bit of drinking.