Travels without a Plan #15

New Year’s Eve, Surfers Paradise and Brisbane
If I had thought Christmas was rather surreal in Byron Bay, there is only one word that can describe New Year’s Eve, and that is awesome. The streets around Byron are all closed off to traffic, all residents at hostels are issued with wrist bands to show that they have somewhere to stay (although the level of security at our hostel would indicate that those supposedly checking, were having as good a time as everyone else), and the streets are prepared for a massive influx of party hungry people.

The main street and those parallel to the beach are all geared towards revellers with a live music stage and a dance arena with a great line-up of DJ’s, bongo players, fire weavers, fireworks, fun fairs and food stalls. There really was something for everyone. It’s an amazing sight seeing a whole town full of people dancing till the early hours of the morning and realizing, that you have in fact just spent the last two hours dancing in the car-park of the local supermarket!!

As with all New Year’s Eves, my night seemed to envolve a lot of drinking, a lot of losing people and then finding them again, tonnes of dancing and a lot of wandering around chatting to random people. But in the whole scheme of things, everyone agreed that it had been their best New Year’s ever.

It was also a great sight, everyone sitting on the beach waiting for the sun to come up (despite the slightly overcast conditions), knowing that we were one of the first countries in the world to welcome in the new year. All in all a memorable night (although some of it is still rather hazy….)

Despite the amazing times in Byron and the offer of a spot in a shared house with the “Swedish Contingent” (the Swedes have the best drinking games ever. Funnily enough no matter what card anyone picks, everyone has to drink, a brilliant bit of Scandanavian logic I feel), I thought it was time to move on, and Surfers Paradise seemed the logical next place.

Surfers Paradise can be described as the Costa Del Sol of Australia; lots of high rise hotels and malls all catering for rich Americans and Japanese. This has to be my least favourite place of my trip so far, it really is a place without a soul. In many ways it reminded me of Las Vegas, but without the Elvis’s or the cheap and tacky wedding chapels (perhaps if it did it would appeal to me more). So, a couple of days were spent on the beaches improving the tan, then time to move on.

Brisbane has to be the suprise of the trip so far. I had heard so many bad stories: muggings, drug addicts wandering the streets, a place with nothing to do. All in all I have seen nothing of the sort, it’s a clean attractive city with lots to see and do, with the Glasshouse Mountains and the “Crocodile Hunter”’s zoo all within striking distance of the town. An ideal place to spend my last week or so in Australia.

It also just so happens that Chris, one of the founders of BootsnAll, is visiting home in Brisbane for his sister’s wedding. Knowing that we both enjoy a beer or three, it was decided that we should meet up. All in all a pretty amusing evening was had, with a good selection of nationalities, Aussie, Brits, American, and Korean (with much amusement to the Koreans as they had never met an American, “wow, you really are from America, that’s amazing”, hope you weren’t too embarrassed, Jen). Hopefully we will be meeting up again soon, to repeat the evening, before I head off to Asia in eight days time.

This will probably be my last group posting before I head off to Asia. It’s been a fantastic trip so far, Australia is a great place to visit. To all those who I have met on the way, thanks for making it so special. Hopefully I will catch up again with you all soon.

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