The Gold Coast is Australias equivalent of Orlando, Miami, Panama City, and Daytona Beach . It's the vacation destination for not only foreign tourists, but also Australians. EVERYONE here is a tourist! It really is a beautiful part of the country though. Golden sandy beaches with great surf waves and towering behind was heaps of high rise condo's and hotels as far as the eye can see. We decided that we had been in a campervan for tooooo many long nights and it was time to take a vacation from our vacation and set up post in the biggest of all the gold coast cities “Surfers Paradise.” How could a town called Surfers Paradise possibly disappoint! So after 50 phone calls we finally found a hotel that could squeeze us in (no air conditioning though...ugh). We spent the next few days tearing up the beach and reaffirming that we (me and gina that is) in fact cannot surf! Joe called it quits back in New Zealand. All well, I guess I wasn’t destined to have long flowing blonde hair and live in a tent by the beach...maybe in another life ;).
We also decided to spend New Year's here too. A street vendor convinced us to go on a “party boat” that was supposed to have a spectacular view of the fireworks and be an awesome party. It tuned out much as we expected however, a boat filled with drunks that was 2 miles away from the fireworks. It was fun though, albeit crowded, and the fireworks were crap anyway so not much was lost. After the boat we went to a bar that they let us into for free (and line jump) which actually worked out really well as town was CRAAAZZYYY busy! Joe and Gina went home after awhile, and I decided to go watch the sunrise on the beach with some friends we made on the boat from none other than New Zealand (half of which were maori)! Whew.... long night! But it’s not every day you can see the first sunrise of the year in a country halfway around the world 15 hours before your friends and family ;).
I should also mention that all of these places had a dress code so we had to leave behind our synthetic shirts, zip-off hiking pants, and boots and go shopping for a “normal” outfit. I forgot what normal clothes feel like!!! and now I want my comfortable and oh-so-cool hiking stuff back!
And for those of you who this will make sense too. Doover was in full action and I think a new “Doover-usalem” has now risen. The “man-drought” has no effect on me....damn.
