Australia Part XII – Brisbane, the Return Visit and Gold Coast

Back to my home away from home in Brisbane for a night before we take off to the Gold Coast.

We are on our way to Byron Bay which is south of Brisbane along the Gold Coast but it’s actually in New South Wales. You wouldn’t notice you’ve crossed the border other than a welcome sign and on the way back into Queensland the “no rabbits” sign!

We stop off at another famous pie shop called Yatala. This one is even signposted on the main traffic signs:

In an attempt to walk off the pie we check out Surfers Paradise. The beach is fabulous and goes on forever:

There’s been a recurring theme to our time hanging out and that’s food, so of course we start our Byron bay adventure with lunch and then we do a “short” hike to the lighthouse – Ian fooled us into thinking it was half the length it actually was. But we made it and honestly didn’t mind walking home in the dark – right Fiona?!!

On the way up we hit the most easterly part of Australia

After our hike we’re ready for a drink and we go into the main bar in town which used to be owned by Crocodile Dundee. We kept an eye out for him but apparently he doesn’t own it anymore. The pints were good though and we saw a live band who were, shall we say, interesting.

Next day we hit the beach at Byron after a big breakfast of course. Ian gets a board and tries a bit of surfing but Fiona and I are happy watching him from our sun beds with our kindles.

We head back toward Queensland and check out another beach called Coolangatta which looks back on Surfers Paradise. We had hoped to get into some calm water here but it’s actually a bit windy so instead we relax and take in the kite surfers and general loveliness of the beach.

The last of my parkruns is at South Bank Parklands and it’s a huge parkrun with nearly five hundred people. It goes along the river, over a bridge, through the botanical gardens, back over the bridge (not sure which one as there are so many bridges in Brisbane) and finishes by the river. It’s a gorgeous morning and we follow up the run with breakfast in one of the nearby restaurants.

For the rest of the day we lounge at the pool and when the sun is not so hot I finally get a game of tennis. The tennis court is really nice at the apartment complex so Ian and I play a couple of sets and I’m happy to report that the experience of the club player (i.e. me!) beats the strength of the newbie…. phew!!!

As it’s Cinco De Mayo today we decide to go out for Mexican food and some margaritas. There doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of Cinco De Mayo celebrations going on but there’s markets and it’s Buddhas birthday so we check that out… alas we’re a bit late to the party and everything is closing up so all we can do is go for another drink! We do manage to catch the churros stall before it closes:

Brisbane is a really colorful city at night

We check out the casino which is housed in a beautiful old building but don’t stay long as it’s quite a bizarre place to hang out for a drink. We do go to a nice bar called the Gresham and I’m fascinated by the system of checking your i.d. by a machine which apparently all the bars have and all the systems are connected. It captures a photo of you and matches it to your photo i.d. And you have to do that each time you enter or leave the bar… and the toilets are outside !!!

The manager wasn’t impressed with my paper drivers license from Ireland but he let me in! As we are enjoying our drink there’s two men outside (50ish) and as they are approaching the pub one of them starts to slip… he’s sliding for ages and managing to hold himself up but eventually goes down.. he’s very obviously twisted but they continue up to the door and try to get into the bar. It’s hilarious – they’ve no chance!

Well it’s been a busy few days back in Brisi and it’s time to head off again, one final short trip in this huge country. One more blog post to go!!