Shopping, Djembe &
Snorkelling!
Shopping
We stayed in Byron Bay for 5 nights overall, and found it to
be a great little town. We spent
the afternoon after our kayaking adventures wandering around town. There are lots of cool surf stores, art
galleries and restaurants, and we both made a couple of purchases. We also recommend Cardamom Pod for a
feed – they do great vegetarian food!
Byron is also great just for walking around the area. The beaches are gorgeous, and the views
from the top of the headland at sunset are amazing, so make sure you head up
there!
Drumming
After listening to the djembe drummers in Nimbin, as well as
another group we came across playing on the beach at sunset in Byron Bay, we
decided that it was something we needed to learn for ourselves, so we booked a
lesson with Gareth, who does drumming tours from Byron.
He picked us up from the centre of town and took us out to
his secret drumming spot – an amazing area in the middle of a rainforest,
overlooking the ocean. It’s the
perfect place to drum, but you’ll have to give him a call (0449 923 114) if you want to know
where it is! Gareth lived in
Africa for years and learnt to play djembe there, so he’s the perfect teacher. We learnt about 4 different rhythms,
and then had a jam session overlooking the ocean. Right in the middle of it all, we had whales arrive, and
they took about 25 minutes to swim by, so it was great to watch them while we
were playing!
Snorkelling
On our last morning in Byron, we went snorkelling with the
Byron Bay Dive Centre. They took us out to Julian Rocks, a marine park visible from the main beach at Byron. It’s a beautiful place to snorkel –
there are all sorts of fish out there, and one girl we were with even saw a
turtle! My favourite fish was
probably the “blue groper” – a huge fish that is a gorgeous blue colour. There were also some scuba divers that
went out with the dive centre on the same boat as us, and apparently the marine
life down the bottom of the ocean is pretty spectacular too – one guy saw a
grey nurse shark.
After Byron Bay we headed to Yamba, so stay tuned for blog
#4 to hear all about this amazing little town!
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