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Published: December 26th 2010
We drove and drove winding up and down and in and out of the coast through these vistas marvelling at their diversity and looking for somewhere to settle for the night. We were going to stay and look for work in a place - which I think The Lonely Planet may have confused with somewhere else – called Wollongong. To our dismay, The ‘Gong’ resembled more Plymouth but with what beauty it possessed being shadowed in a looming PowerStation than the town described in our guide book. So we hit the road again, having already been on it for 9 hours and to our surprise, ended up in Sydney a few weeks earlier than planned. Being another wallet draining large city, we were lucky enough to find an amazing campsite fifteen minutes Metro ride out of town. We stayed in this bush camp (which happened to be a national park Jungle) for a week. It is most surreal to be hanging out next to the bbq on a hot summer evening, for company the local red backs, squawking parrots having frenzied parties in the palm trees and inquisitive possums with bright reflective eyes, whilst the sound of a full on choir
singing Christmas carols (with an operatic lead vocal) comes floating across the jungle canopy.
After leaving Sydney, again in search of somewhere to settle and look for work, we continued up the coast stopping in one or two potential seaside towns. Nowhere felt right, all very beautiful but a little bit dead to say the least, until along with every other backpacker on the east coast we arrived in Byron bay. And this is where we have decided to stay as it has everything we could want whilst we kick back waiting to do our safety course (for working on yachts) in February. We have become Gypsies here. The campsites are full; the ‘budget’ motels charge $1,600 per week and the park rangers vigilantly petrol the whole bay banging on the window of the van at quarter to six in the morning to move you on. Maybe we were pushing it a bit by parking up on the seafront with thirty other camper vans! So now our day goes like this. We wake up and drive to the beach and park up for the day, plunge in to the crystal clear water for a refreshing dip. Put the toast
on and the Mocha pot. Meander round Byron all day doing this and that, looking for a job, tucking in to exquisite sushi at very reasonable prices, walking along the stunning coastline before cooking dinner on the beachside free hotplate barby and drinking an ice cold stubby before looking again for somewhere sneaky to rest up for the night. It is a fun cheap way to live and we are looking forward to spending Christmas munching fresh meaty fish and bay bugs and messing around in the sea. I went for my first dive of this holiday and it was great. There were plenty of dolphins and manta rays to watch whilst zooming out on the rib across the sparkling blue ocean, myself and 12 chaps, to the dive site. Swam behind a massive Loggerhead turtle, the thing was about 2 meters in length. There are loads of strange coloured bottom dwelling sharks here (none dangerous) as well as abundant reef fish my favourite being porcupine which look like a massive puffer with little spikes and humungous bulbous bulging eyes on the side of their heads.
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dad
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Arachnophobia
I want to see a picture of red backs and tunnel webs ha ha!! dadXX