Day 90 (Sunday 14th January 2007)

We left for Byron about 10:00. It had stopped raining but the roads were still very wet. It was then that we had our near death experience!

Sarah lost control around an innocuous bend at 60kmph and as we spun into oncoming traffic, a landrover just did enough to swirve out of our way and the petrol station to its left. Sarah was a little shaken up, as can be expected, but everyone was ok!

We arrived in Byron Bay without anymore panic about 13:00. The whole place swarmed with surfer dudes who all thought they were 'too cool for school', but just all look the same and hippies who never really grew up and left.

We popped into the visitor centre and the muppet behind the desk was the most unhelpful person on the planet. Byron wasn't making much of an impression upon Marc and when we went to sit and eat our sambos down by the beach, not only was there nowhere to park, but the pay and display machines were charging a bomb, as well as restricting the amount of time you could actually park anywhere.

After getting told off for illegally parking in a 'no parking' zone, we quickly nabbed a space as someone was leaving. Walking down to the Main Beach we found a load more 'too cool for school' types and instead of a pumping surf, all we could see were a few feeble, pathetic ripples hitting the beach. This was it, the surfing capital of the east coast...we weren't too impressed!

We found a cheap place to hitch our tent for the night at the Byron Bay Tourist Park and in reception, we had our first encounter with the sour old b**** who ran it. At this point Marc couldn't wait to get out, but as soon as old 'Bellamy' found a large colourful spider, wierd colourful caterpillar, some kookaburras and parrots to keep him amused, he was quite content for the rest of the night.

Day 91 (Monday 15th January 2007)

We went back down to the Main Beach in the morning (having to park 10-minutes away in the Wollies carpark). There was still little or no surf and after a few cries of boredom from Marc, we took a spin up to the cape to view the lighthouse and Little Watego's Beach.

That evening we met Essex boy Paul and Welsh boy Dan "Wardy" Ward on their way back from Tallow Beach, which was a 5-minute walk from our campsite. We had planned to hit the flicks in Ballina that evening, but Paul talked us into hitting the town for the night with him, his girlfriend Helena and Welsh boys "Wardy" and Jay Tucker.

Paul and Helena were doing a similar trip to us, buying their car in Adelaide and working their way up. They met the Welsh boys when they stuck their tent up next door. Based at Jay's dad's place in Brisbane, the Welsh lads also bought a car to get around in, but after the piece of junk broke down shortly after, Jay's old man gave them the ute. For them this was a few days trip before heading back to 'Brizzie'.

We had a few drinks, hit a few bars and ended up having a real good laugh. Paul and Helena left earlier than us which was astonishing and we ended up staying up until 03:00 with the Welsh boys, sitting and talking crap at the campsite.