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We decided to leave Noosa and completely bypass Surfers paradise as this week it is Schoolies week in Oz. Its when all the school leavers go on a complete bender after finishing school and they basically take over most beach resorts in Australia and apparentlt Surfers Paradise is one of the worst so we decided to leave it out. We did drive through it on the bus on the way to Byron Bay however and it really wasn't what either of us expected. In my mind Surfers paradise would have been quite small but in fact its quite a big city with lots of high rise flats. Sure enough it looked packed full with teenagers!
Byron Bay is known as the hippie town of New South Wales and its such a nice place to be. there is a really nice beach and the town centre is really quaint and there are lots of little hippy shops and stuff. We stayed in a place called the Arts factory which is a huge hostel that has acres of land. There are teepees and wigwams that you can stay in aswell as dorms. It was recomended to us by Gareth and Daniella who we did our Fraser Island tour with and it was such fun. the only thing that wasn't fun was the coackroaches that were in our room! Eurghhh!
On our first night we got chatting to a couple of Irish lads, Tommy and Shaun, who we ended up seeing most nights that we went out in Byron. They were so much fun! They had been kicked out of their flat in Brisbane for partying too much so they decided to buy a claped out banger and drive to byron bay for a bit. They didnt have much money so they ended up sleeping in the car most nights but they were always pissed when we met up with them! We also met a few Canadians and a pretty wierd Italian guy that Tom wasn't that keen on!!
The arts factory was a great place to stay as it had its own bar which had different nights on each night so there was always something to do.
While in Byron we decided to do a surf lesson. Now i thought this would be fun as i really enjoyed body boarding. How wrong was I! We went with a surf school called KoolKats and the guy that ran it was so hilarious! he was a little bit mental like he had been hit in the head with his srf board too many times! The theory he taught us on the beach was easy enough but he took us to beach where the surf was really rough...ideal for surfing really...just not ideal for me who is crap at surfing and who spent most of her time trying to drag her surf board out to sea! Tom got the hang of it pretty well and managed to actually surf, I however didnt even mange to stand on the board for longer than 10 secs. the teacher was getting so annoyed with me! At one pont he was like 'Im not being rude mate, but ive never seen anyone with as bad balance as you!'.. i could have told him that before I started! i fell off so many times and ended up bruising my bum badly and twisting my ankle to the point where it was swollen for a few days. Tom managed to pull a muscle in his shoulder too. SURFING IS DANGEROUS! DO NOT DO IT! Tom really enjoyed it but i have to say i really didnt. No more surfing for me!
While in Byron we also took a day trip to a hippy town called Nimbin on a really wierd hippy tour bus witha guy called Jim. He basically spent the whole day telling us how he was a die hard hippy and how he spent most of his life organising demonstrations to legalise cannabis! Our first stop was the town of nimbin, a wierd place that housed too far gone hippies that walked around barefoot and mumbling to themselves! He then took us to an American guys house, yet another hippy! his house was in the middle of nowhere and he claimed to have created a forest around him, and had planted all these trees about 30 yaers ago to save wildlife...but the trees looked over 100 years old and as if they had been there way before this wierdo was born. Hippies eh!
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