The Travelling McFrothys

Mooloolaba and Rainbow Beach

Next up we drove north from the Gold Coast, past Brisbane and to the Sunshine Coast area. First stay was in Mooloolaba, another beachside town with lots of waterfront homes & harbours, a popular holiday destination. Only had time for some walking around before heading off the next day - a nice enough little spot, but still a bit too "polished touristy" for us at this time.

Main beach as seen from the spit.

Looking back towards the spit.

We drove a lot further north to Rainbow Beach next. It's a very small town, with not much besides small holiday condos and hostels catering to visitors going to/returning from Fraser Island - the world's largest sand island - which is just to the north. The name comes from the multicoloured sand cliffs that surround the beach and bay.

First night at our hostel, just before sunset, we joined a group walk up to the Carlo Sandblow - a sand dune-like area that flows down to the beach below. I gave sand sliding/surfing a shot, though the sand was loose so you had to find a steep area in order to generate any respectable speed.

Sand's up!

Looking out to the bay and point where I would take a surf lesson in 2 days.

Sliding down the sand - fun, but only for about 7 seconds.

Finally looking a little wind-blown and sun-exposed. In my case, the overly-long hair helps.

There are, perhaps not surprisingly, many Subaru Outbacks in Australia. Even more common are SUVs fitted with elaborate bush bumpers and snorkels, such as the above. I would say no more than 5% of those SUVs have seen some outback and forded flooding streams - the rest are shiny and new and have probably never seen a serious dirt road. Still, a better fashion statement than a Hummer.

The rainbow cliffs as seen from the point break on the far side of the bay. (More on surfing later.)

Rainbow cliffs.

Our hostel - pretty good for a high-volume young backpacker place. 24-hour coffee always helps. :-)

We took a drive to the north of town, to the peninsula just below Franklin Island. Sarah drove for the first time, then handed the keys back to me when the drive was over...

A very rare cache of beer bottle litter near the tip of the point. Stubbies - how very early-1990s-Canada...

Looking out towards Franklin Island from the top of the peninsula. I wonder what that sign says?

Ah, probably a good policy.

We decided not to visit Franklin Island, though it's supposed to be really nice. It was quite expensive and time-consuming to get transport to the island and to stay overnight - even a day trip was about $150 each. So we decided to save our money for another surf lesson for me, and a short dive/snorkel trip to the Great Barrier Reef from Cairns, far to the north.

Rainbow beach was small, slow-paced and relaxed, and finally let us feel like we were on vacation as opposed to "travelling." Good stuff.

Murwillumbah

From the Gold Coast, we headed inland for a bit, staying in a small town called Murwillumbah (doesn't get much more Aussie-sounding than that). It's located in a massive caldera featuring a few national parks and nice rainforest-y mountains all around the edge of the crater. We drove up Mt. Warning - it was a bit late (and hot, and cloudy) for a hike to the top, so we took a brief walk through the rainforest instead.

Took a tourist drive through rural country and small towns, such as Uki (site of the Mt. Warning Hotel, above).

Drove up and over a pass to another small national park featuring a picturesque natural arch.

If you come at night, the cave is apparently full of lit-up glow worms. During the day, only bats.

Stayed at a very nice YHA hostel in Murwillumbah, right on the river. Experienced a multi-hour long lightning show that night that was amazing - almost no wind and very little rain, but incredible forked lightning all around and over us. A nice break from the busy coast.

A Visit to the Gold Coast

South of Brisbane is a long stretch of beach called the Gold Coast. [Chad: and north of Brisbane is a long stretch of beach called the Sunshine coast.] The Gold Coast is the home of the town Surfers Paradise (yes, for real), and the highly-recommended but lesser-known Coolangatta, among others. It was also our first destination leaving Brisbane in our super sporty rental car (okay, it's a Nissan Micra so it's neither super or sporty...) But it did mark our [Chad: ahem, my] first time driving on the left.

The Gold Coast is, in a word, developed!

Surfer's paradise has seen crazy development, and has a polished forest of high-rise condos and tourist attractions right up against the beach.

No shortage of lifeguards or surf condition warnings. You're supposed to swim between the red and yellow flags = safest for swimming.

If you like your own spot of beach, away from the busy urban core, Surfer's Paradise is not for you!

Surfer's paradise has a tradition of gold-lamay-bikini- and cowboy-hat-wearing greeters/parking attendants who patrol the esplanade, originally to help with parking but also as goodwill ambassadors you can have your photo taken with. [Chad: I figured I'd be called out as a lecherous old man - loudly, by Sarah - if I posed with the bikini ambassadors, so there is no photo.]

As much as we avoid fast food while travelling, a 30 cent cone in the heat is hard to argue with. I'll bet Rick wishes he was here...

We stayed at the southern tip of the Gold Coast (right by the border with New South Wales), in Coolangatta - a quieter stretch of beach with a more small-town feel. You can climb a small hill for a view of the area.

Like practically all other coastal areas in Australia, Coolangatta has a lovely public boardwalk, picnic areas and playgrounds fronting the beach. No European-style private beach control or ownership - it's all public all the time. Well done!

Looking north - Surfer's Paradise is just to the right of the photo, the towers poking through the haze.

[Chad: OK Australia, NOW I have deep respect for you. This is on top of the hill in Coolangatta - it's a FREE public BBQ/grill. This isn't unique to this area - most public picnic spaces have them, either gas or electric. Let me say that again - free public grills everywhere. So no need to bring your own messy grill and charcoal and/or propane. Just bring the shrimp and the skewers, brush off the grill, fire it up and cook away! Unbelievable. I can't help but thinking how in Canada public grills such as these would be vandalized beyond repair within days. But here, people actually use them and seem not to abuse them.]

More free public grills at Point Danger, just south of Coolangatta.

Now you see my sunglasses...

It was quite warm, so we took a dip in the ocean. The thing to do seemed to be to stand in the surf and let it break on you.

Here I am shortly before a wave punched me in the face, ripped off my bikini top, and stole my sunglasses.

Chad bracing himself for a wave while capturing the moment on our waterproof camera.

Now you don't see my sunglasses... Damn you, surf!

Good times at the beach.

Post being-smashed-by-the-surf beer - the only good thing about our hostel was 2 for 1 happy hour on Sunday nights!

Our hostel wasn't the best - prices are high and availability limited on the Gold Coast. The hostel was totally populated by barely post-high school aged surfer kids, probably on their first trip away from home. So it was pretty filthy, but such is the situation when travel budgets are tight. They did have a decent happy hour downstairs, full of older pre-Christmas-celebrating Aussies and a duo playing live music, which was a decent time.

We took a day trip south to famous Byron Bay, the surf hippie/counter culture location of reknown. It was okay, but really we weren't all that impressed. It has a lovely beach, but so does, well, everywhere in Australia. The rest of it was absolutely overrun by tourists and tourist-focused enterprise, and the beach was full of trendy too-cool-for-school types instead of hippies. So we just stayed long enough for a quick beach walk.

However, on the way out of town we saw signs for a brewery, so decided to drop in.

Brewery, cinema, day spa... together at last?

Byron Bay Brewing used to be a typical light-lager company that contracted out all their brewing. But several years ago it changed hands, and is now a proper craft brewery with a good selection of beer, all of it very tasty. If you visit Byron Bay, this is the only must-see in town.