Just like sands in an hourglass... so too, were our days on the Gold Coast. Not in a bad way... but they did tend to blur together a bit - sand, sea, salt, blue skies, sunshine. More sand. More sunshine. Can see why the rest of Australia is desperate to storm the barricades (state borders) and come here for holidays. Probably very enjoyable for a couple of weeks at a stretch... but fine weather and heat has a monotony all its own, particularly in winter.

We were playing the 'should we stay or should we go now' game for a month or so and when the tenant in our Sydney apartment decided she didn't want to sign on for another 12 months... well, the decision was made for us. Not to mention the owner of our holiday apartment in Broadbeach was rubbing his hands at the thought of being rid of us and our super cheap 6 month lease - desperate to be rid of us and start charging per night what we were paying per week.

Once the decision was made, the To Do list got very long, very fast. We had a mission - buy minimal furniture - that being a recliner sofa and a split king bed. We knew the chances of all the juggling balls staying aloft were slim to none. Initially we booked accommodation for a week (fully refundable of course). We would get a van, get things we needed from the storage pod and cart it back to the apartment, get the furniture delivered and get all set up in that first week - then actually move in. Crap idea. Too many $$$ outgoings for too little return. We then said let's just book one night of accommodation for when we arrive about 6.30 pm, have the furniture delivered earlier that day (sofa) and the following day (bed and storage pod). Worked well - the cost of the weeks accommodation came pretty close to paying for the sofa, the bed, the delivery fees and our hotel night.

We had bought some lovely blankets, a couple of great non-stick pans and many bits and pieces to make life more cosy in our Gold Coast rental. We'd also bought far too many clothes on our weekly thrift expeditions. We arrived in Australia with more than 23kg of checked luggage each - and then just added to it. First off we decided to book a Virgin flight from the Gold Coast to Sydney and utilise our small stash of Virgin miles in order to send the bags (and us) in business class. Well that worked for about 48 hours - before Virgin cancelled their Thursday flights. They said we could go on the Friday or the Wednesday... but one way or another we knew we'd be losing money - either a night already paid for at the Savannah or the night booked in Sydney. In the end we decided not to bother with Virgin for a while and booked a Qantas reward flight at 8 am from Brisbane - stupid o'clock given the 90 minute drive to the airport, check in etc. And within 48 hours we had an email from Qantas. Aaaargh! What?! What now?!!! For once it wasn't bad news and they'd changed our flight to one at 4 pm - which was much more civilised - and hadn't been available when we went to book the reward flight. All good. The plan was coming together. More shopping was in fact required.

With all our extra stuff we needed two more suitcases - $15 from the op shops. Having been bitten before by a second hand suitcase (literally), we bought a can of insect spray and drenched both of them inside and out before we brought them into the apartment. We were planning to get each bag as close to 32 kg as possible - so next purchase was luggage straps. Given the unknown condition of the contents of the storage pod, we figured a raid of a local thrift store in order - and we bought ex-hotel linen for a king bed for less than $10... washed and dried it and had it ready to go for our new bed.

The preparations required in the last month kept us well occupied but we still wanted to squeeze as much enjoyment as possible from the coast. We ventured to the beach every evening, close to sunset for a long walk. Even took our thermos down most nights or a drink and nibbles and enjoyed watching night fall. The day before we left we were treated to some distant whale watching - including venting and a couple of breaches - what an outstanding way to finish our Queensland stay. Sydney - here we come.