Vantastic NSW Blog 2
Free BBQ, Day Spa & a
Whale!
Nimbin
After leaving Tweed Heads, we set off on the road to Nimbin,
a small town in the mountains that is famous for its alternative
lifestyle. What we didn’t realise
was just how famous it is – backpackers from all over the world were stopping
their cars and campervans outside of town to get their photos taken with the
sign!
We wandered around the streets for a while, taking in all of
the colourful buildings, and checked out the Nimbin Museum, which is full of
old painted kombi vans, rusted metal sculptures and tributes to the town’s
cannabis culture. Although the
buying, selling and consumption of cannabis is illegal in NSW, they seem to
turn a blind eye in Nimbin, as well as openly rally against the laws.
We followed the sounds of music to the park and came across
a group of people from all over the world (Canada, USA, Peru, etc.) playing
drums and guitars, and giving away sausages in a free sausage sizzle. We stopped & listened for a while
and chatted to them about what they were all doing in Australia.
Day Spa
Next stop was Mullumbimby, another laid-back mountain town,
where we spent a couple of hours in the spas and sauna at Kiva Day Spa. The spa is set amongst gorgeous
rainforest trees and we had a seriously relaxing afternoon recovering from our
Mt. Warning climb a couple of days before. Fantastic!
Whales
We soon made it to Byron Bay, where we’ve been for the last
couple of days. It seems like
Byron Bay is the place to be if you’re a backpacker – whether you’re heading
north or south. We stayed at
Belongil Beachouse in great wooden cabin dorms with a shady rainforest
courtyard. Really lovely staff,
and the resident cats are great too!
As soon as we arrived, we heard that there were whales visible from the
beach, so we ran over and saw them surfacing with the sunset in the background.
Go Sea Kayak
The next day we had an even more amazing wildlife experience
with Go Sea Kayak in Byron, who taught us how to kayak, and took us out on the
bay to see dolphins and whales. If
you want to see wildlife, this is the way to do it! Within half an hour of paddling out onto the ocean, we saw
two whales – a mother and calf – swimming towards us in the distance. They kept surfacing every thirty
seconds or so, but then disappeared for a couple of minutes, so we weren’t sure
where they’d gone.
The next thing you know, the mother whale had surfaced right
in amongst our kayaks!!! It was an
absolutely amazing experience. All
of us were in complete awe that such an amazing creature would swim so close to
us. It’s definitely not something
that happens everyday, and will go down as one of the highlights of our trip.
While out on the water, we also had a school of dolphins
swim right by us (not as close as the whale, but still a lot closer than we’d
expected to get to any wildlife), and a sea turtle popped its head out of the
ocean. It was a very cool
trip! The other great thing about
Go Sea Kayak is that they’ll donate money from every kayaking experience to the
Sea Shepherd, to help protect ocean wildlife. We’d definitely recommend them if you’re in Byron Bay!
We’re here in town for a few more days, so stay tuned for
more NSW Adventures!
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