Not all that glitters is Gold(en) Coast....a Surfer's Paradise lost
As the title suggests, not all trips are wholly successful or enjoyable. All are a mixture, with some a bit more balanced than others.
One of the things on Blake's "Absolutely MUST DO" list is Surfing. Having done it once or twice before several years ago, he has been anxious to get at it again. At some indeterminate point, I agreed to take one surfing lesson with him, despite my complete lack of interest in being in, near, or on the ocean due to a general distaste for sea water and sand getting all up in my business.
I digress, having done a bit of research, Blake settled on the Gold Coast, and a little nook called "Surfer's Paradise" seemed to be just the place. As we have done with all our other trips, we pulled up Airbnb, found an apartment with a little kitchen, a washer and dryer (laundry!!), a reasonable price, and all near the beach!
Our day started well packing up from our LOVELY Brisbane Airbnb in New Farm with the most wonderful host and amazing accommodations. Here I am fully loaded up with my pack and sunhat.
The good mood didn't last too much longer. Although we had a brief yet charming chat with a kind older fellow and his sweet little pup on the way to the bus, the bus ride itself proved to be immediately nausea-inducing. The hills, turns, and stops were taken with gusto by the driver, and dread by my stomach. A detour on the way to the train station from the bus stop again reminded us of our over-packing hubris (oh why did I bring so much stuff...) and lugging all of our lugg-age (huh, just noticed that) up and down flights of stairs barely navigable on foot alone.
Our hour-long train ride down the Gold Coast was filled with fascinating sights into the countryside and ways of the outer-outer suburbs of Brisbane. We were so enthralled that our phones stayed firmly tucked away in our bags while we watched. This enjoyable experience was, of course, cut short by a cut of the cheese if you will, as a nearby teenage boy let rip what can only be described as the smell of satan's rotting garbage heap set aflame by a burning tire. What a ghastly smell filled the entire train car sending us retching, noses into our collars trying in vain to filter out the foul odor. What felt like hours passed before it was safe to breathe again. It's funny in retrospect, but I assure you that I still harbor serious concerns for that boy's medical health.
Clear of the train, we made it to a "tram" much similar to the Light Rail in Minneapolis. We rode this for 30 minutes from the suburbs into the heart of Surfer's Paradise. Not to let their train fumigating compatriot be the only source of gross smells for the day, our ride on the tram was nasally assaulted by the sharp and pungent odor of teenage boy BO.
Let it be known, teenage boys the world over smell terrible in any fashion. I beg their mothers, fathers, caretakers, friends, and families to encourage them to bath at any regular interval and please abstain from eating McDonald's before entering an enclosed space with other human beings for any length of time.
It also turns out that Surfer's Paradise used to be a quaint little surfing hole, but is now some sort of surfer's Las Vegas. We were dropped right in the middle of commercialized, overbuilt, overdeveloped, humun-go high-rises with people EVERYWHERE.
Our Airbnb turned out to be less of a nice little apartment someone let us stay in, and more of a low-rent, gross-out tenement building with sprays and smears of all indeterminate origin all over walls, floors, and yes ceilings, complete with a crusty blanket, and a carpet that when I accidentally walked upon it barefoot, my feet were sticky afterwards.....
After a glass of wine and some hard looking, we made our way to a very high-end hotel where we secured a last minute booking for the evening so we could sleep on clean sheets, I know, we're princesses.
What started as a exercise in olfactory torture and hygienic depravity ended in a beautifully relaxed romantic evening complete with some vegging out on the tv, snacks in bed, and a beautiful ocean view. We slept like logs.
The next morning we made our way to as charming of a breakfast place as we could find in what amounted to a city-sized shopping mall, and Blake found us a Surfing school.
Have I mentioned I'm not a fan of the ocean? Saltwater makes me gag, the crashing waves make me want to run the other way, and I hate how sand gets everywhere. After the events of the previous day I was not a happy camper. Blake sat with me patiently while I shed a few tears over all the newness, unfamiliarity, lack of home-base, and other such things as one gets upset about when one is homesick.
Never-the-less, I summoned my courage, and changed into a stinky wet suit (there must be uncountable teenage boys its history) and we began our surf lesson.
I will say this, the instructor was very friendly, kind, and helpful, and I did find my way to catching a few waves on my belly. The second part of the lesson involved standing, but I had by then enjoyed quite enough salt water up my face holes and was feeling dizzy and queasy from being tossed about. I opted to sit the rest out, and assured the attentive and well-intentioned instructor that the progress I made was good enough for me.
Blake on the other hand was like a fish to water, or rather a surfer to a wave. In the hour of free practice time I watched him catch wave after wave, going out and riding back in, trying and trying and often falling (as most people do for most of the time in the beginning). The entire time a HUGE grin was plastered across his face. He'd miss the wave; Huge Grin. He'd fall face first into the water; Huge Grin. He'd catch a wave for about 5 feet before the swell topped him over; Huge Grin.
To say he absolutely loved it would be the understatement of the century. The surf school had safely stashed our valuables away, otherwise there would be photographic evidence of this guy's amazing positivity. I have included the following images for illustrative purposes only:
Sonja after surfing:
Blake after surfing:
We are back in Brisbane for another 6 days, having cut our Gold Coast trip short. We will continue to explore this city before heading up to Bundaberg for a Great Barrier Reef excursion, followed by our journey to SYDNEY!
One of the things on Blake's "Absolutely MUST DO" list is Surfing. Having done it once or twice before several years ago, he has been anxious to get at it again. At some indeterminate point, I agreed to take one surfing lesson with him, despite my complete lack of interest in being in, near, or on the ocean due to a general distaste for sea water and sand getting all up in my business.
I digress, having done a bit of research, Blake settled on the Gold Coast, and a little nook called "Surfer's Paradise" seemed to be just the place. As we have done with all our other trips, we pulled up Airbnb, found an apartment with a little kitchen, a washer and dryer (laundry!!), a reasonable price, and all near the beach!
Our day started well packing up from our LOVELY Brisbane Airbnb in New Farm with the most wonderful host and amazing accommodations. Here I am fully loaded up with my pack and sunhat.
The good mood didn't last too much longer. Although we had a brief yet charming chat with a kind older fellow and his sweet little pup on the way to the bus, the bus ride itself proved to be immediately nausea-inducing. The hills, turns, and stops were taken with gusto by the driver, and dread by my stomach. A detour on the way to the train station from the bus stop again reminded us of our over-packing hubris (oh why did I bring so much stuff...) and lugging all of our lugg-age (huh, just noticed that) up and down flights of stairs barely navigable on foot alone.
Our hour-long train ride down the Gold Coast was filled with fascinating sights into the countryside and ways of the outer-outer suburbs of Brisbane. We were so enthralled that our phones stayed firmly tucked away in our bags while we watched. This enjoyable experience was, of course, cut short by a cut of the cheese if you will, as a nearby teenage boy let rip what can only be described as the smell of satan's rotting garbage heap set aflame by a burning tire. What a ghastly smell filled the entire train car sending us retching, noses into our collars trying in vain to filter out the foul odor. What felt like hours passed before it was safe to breathe again. It's funny in retrospect, but I assure you that I still harbor serious concerns for that boy's medical health.
Clear of the train, we made it to a "tram" much similar to the Light Rail in Minneapolis. We rode this for 30 minutes from the suburbs into the heart of Surfer's Paradise. Not to let their train fumigating compatriot be the only source of gross smells for the day, our ride on the tram was nasally assaulted by the sharp and pungent odor of teenage boy BO.
Let it be known, teenage boys the world over smell terrible in any fashion. I beg their mothers, fathers, caretakers, friends, and families to encourage them to bath at any regular interval and please abstain from eating McDonald's before entering an enclosed space with other human beings for any length of time.
It also turns out that Surfer's Paradise used to be a quaint little surfing hole, but is now some sort of surfer's Las Vegas. We were dropped right in the middle of commercialized, overbuilt, overdeveloped, humun-go high-rises with people EVERYWHERE.
Our Airbnb turned out to be less of a nice little apartment someone let us stay in, and more of a low-rent, gross-out tenement building with sprays and smears of all indeterminate origin all over walls, floors, and yes ceilings, complete with a crusty blanket, and a carpet that when I accidentally walked upon it barefoot, my feet were sticky afterwards.....
After a glass of wine and some hard looking, we made our way to a very high-end hotel where we secured a last minute booking for the evening so we could sleep on clean sheets, I know, we're princesses.
What started as a exercise in olfactory torture and hygienic depravity ended in a beautifully relaxed romantic evening complete with some vegging out on the tv, snacks in bed, and a beautiful ocean view. We slept like logs.
The next morning we made our way to as charming of a breakfast place as we could find in what amounted to a city-sized shopping mall, and Blake found us a Surfing school.
Have I mentioned I'm not a fan of the ocean? Saltwater makes me gag, the crashing waves make me want to run the other way, and I hate how sand gets everywhere. After the events of the previous day I was not a happy camper. Blake sat with me patiently while I shed a few tears over all the newness, unfamiliarity, lack of home-base, and other such things as one gets upset about when one is homesick.
Never-the-less, I summoned my courage, and changed into a stinky wet suit (there must be uncountable teenage boys its history) and we began our surf lesson.
I will say this, the instructor was very friendly, kind, and helpful, and I did find my way to catching a few waves on my belly. The second part of the lesson involved standing, but I had by then enjoyed quite enough salt water up my face holes and was feeling dizzy and queasy from being tossed about. I opted to sit the rest out, and assured the attentive and well-intentioned instructor that the progress I made was good enough for me.
Blake on the other hand was like a fish to water, or rather a surfer to a wave. In the hour of free practice time I watched him catch wave after wave, going out and riding back in, trying and trying and often falling (as most people do for most of the time in the beginning). The entire time a HUGE grin was plastered across his face. He'd miss the wave; Huge Grin. He'd fall face first into the water; Huge Grin. He'd catch a wave for about 5 feet before the swell topped him over; Huge Grin.
To say he absolutely loved it would be the understatement of the century. The surf school had safely stashed our valuables away, otherwise there would be photographic evidence of this guy's amazing positivity. I have included the following images for illustrative purposes only:
Sonja after surfing:
Blake after surfing:
We are back in Brisbane for another 6 days, having cut our Gold Coast trip short. We will continue to explore this city before heading up to Bundaberg for a Great Barrier Reef excursion, followed by our journey to SYDNEY!
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