Our first day in Byron bay was A LOT of fun!! We spent the afternoon on the beach, playing in the surf and admiring the sights that byron had to offer! On our way back we decided to treat ourselves to a happy hour drink which turned out to be very beneficial because whilst we were having a drink we got chatting to the reps from the travel agent across the street who ended up giving us a very good deal for our buses and trips! However they took their sweet time in processing everything so we started drinking our 'goon' in the shop (they didn't seem to mind and actually went and bought some beers for themselves whilst they were working!)
We ended up going back to their shop to have a few more drinks with them and the rest of the backpackers that they had invited. I stupidly forgot my id so we had to go back to the hostel. When we finally made it out with id in our bags and saw the bar we thought we were home, safe and dry.....nope as we approached the bar, Chelsey had a drink in her hand, so we got turned away from the bar! Luckily we found another bar, tried sheisha (don't worry mum, it's legal), finally got back into the bar! So later that evening we both decided that we needed some dinner, clearly we did not want the same thing because we ended up sitting at a spot at opposite sides of the town together, but we made it home together and made a friend along the way to walk home with! You would think the sensible option would be to go home and go to bed! But no, I clearly didn't think I had had enough excitement for one night so suggested to Chelsey that we might like to jump in the pool, before she had a chance to respond I pushed her in and jumped in myself! Finally it was bed time!
As you can imagine we were feeling a little worse for wear in the morning so we thought that we would go and have our breakfast in the sun. Well this was making us feel better until a large lizard leapt onto our table and proceeded to take Chelseys toast off of her plate! We jumped up in horror, turned around to find that we had been cornered by about 4 of these ruddy animals!! One ran at my legs, another jumped on the table! Needless to say, we took our breakfast and moved to a safer spot!
Unfortunately the previous night repeated itself and once again we were turned away from the bar, initially just for 30 minutes until I went to the back of the queue and queued up again straight away, clearly I was pushing my luck so I received a firm 'no'. So I wandered back to the hostel, and jumped in the pool again! This time I wasn't so lucky and got thrown out of the pool too! Wasn't my luckiest night, but was certainly fun!
18.01.14 Today I left for Brisbane and have since spent the week with the Crofts! I have loved seeing them again! They arranged a Aussie BBQ which was a lot of fun! Sandra and I took the ferry up the Brisbane river, we visited a local golf course to see the kangaroos (they were much bigger than the wallabys on the farm, and there was a grandad kangaroo who didn't exactly hop, he preferred the feet to hand movement, he looked so stiff that I expected to hear 'eeeee' when he moved!). Sandra showed me all the areas that had been flooded! It was hard to imagine just how bad the floods were and how much it would have rained to create the water levels that they experienced! We also went up mount cut-tha day and night, which overlooks Brisbane (beautiful spot!). One evening we went for a walk along the water at 'sandgate' and got to watch lots of kite boarders riding in the water (I definitely would like to learn to do this!) and we had fish and chips, it felt like I was back at home although the fish and chips were much nicer than what you get in England! We spent one day on Mooloolaba beach which was great fun, we spent the majority of the day in the water (I am beginning to get braver in the water!)
Yesterday Sandra and Allan took us to a big dam, Allan had shown us some photos of what the dam looked like during the floods so it was great to see the contrast! Then that afternoon whilst Chelsey and I were in the city the heavens opened and the rain came thrashing down! It rained more in one afternoon than it had in 3 months! We had a lovely meal last night with Sandra, Allan and Sam! All in all we has a lovely time in Brissie!
We are now on our way to Dalby to go and work on a polo crosse farm!!