Byron Bay

I have been meaning to post about our long weekend in Byron Bay, but for whatever reason I have done everything but write about our weekend so here goes...

We headed south to Byron Bay (located in New South Wales and not Queensland - my first out of state adventure!) on Good Friday. Pretty much everything was closed for the holiday, but luckily a good coffee shop in our neighborhood was open. Yes, this is the same one I bitterly complained about in an earlier post. I am getting over the whole different customer service approach and trying to roll with things as best I can. While on the beach in Byron Bay I did hear an Aussie woman complaining about a restaurant and poor customer service and was relieved that it is not just my American sensibilities that can get irked here. Hot cross buns are also huge here for the Easter holidays. Every commercial break since I got here has had at least one commercial about hot cross buns. In one of them a group of guys (construction workers, mason workers?) sit outside the supermarket waiting for it to open and get their hot cross buns and butter. Once they get said buns they use a trowel to spread the butter on. Does this remind you of any family members...Kranes, Furderers? You know who you are.

I digress, the drive down to Byron Bay was nice. All in all with traffic it took us a little over 2 hours. We stayed in a motel with Tamas, Kate and Tamas in a small town south of Byron called Ballina. The Tamas' are Sean's coworkers and Kate is Tamas's wife. All of them are from Hungary and working for one of the two large engineering firms overseeing the tunnel project.

We spent Friday afternoon on a beach near the Ballina lighthouse and swam and did a little surfing. The next day we all drove to Nimbin, a small hippie town about 45 minutes west from the coast. The town was adorable and the countryside was beautiful. That afternoon Sean and I headed to the Byron Bay Bluesfest and saw Old Crow Medicine Show and Bela Fleck perform with a group of Malian musicians. There were tons of bands at the festival but those two were the highlights.

We spent the rest of the weekend hanging out on the beach at Byron Bay, which was glorious - white sand, turquoise water and lovely green hillside. On Sunday I rented a stand-up paddle board while the boys rented surf boards. I thought it would be fun to paddle a bit in the waves. The board as it turned out was exceptionally heavy, not very stable (which is key to the standing up bit), and conditions were rather windy. I spent most of my time in the water fighting to stay up on my knees and got worked by several large waves. When I got tossed off the board and it hit me in the head, chipping my front tooth (I discovered that later) I decided I was done for the day. My legs are now covered with bruises from the board hitting me, but at least I don't make a whistling sound when I talk because of the chip (really, it's a very small chip and I've been watching a lot of Arrested Development).

The other excitement that occurred on the trip other than the loveliness of Byron, was that on Saturday night we and our rental car were victims of a smash and grab. Someone broke the passenger window on the car and stole Sean's iPod. The Ballina police were very nice, though they seemed a little disappointed that they weren't going to be able to use the fingerprint kit and also didn't really know what an iPod was. The last bit was little surprising to me especially since lots of people here have iPhones. In the end we were out the cost of replacing the window and I will have to turn over my iTouch to Sean. I wonder what I will do with all my music though....? :)

This weekend we are flying down to Sydney to check out the big city. I am really excited and plan to try some fun restaurants that I've read about. Any good food tips from folks that have been? We are staying at the Lord Nelson Brewery Hotel in The Rocks near Circular Quay. Brewery+Hotel=Brilliant (sleeping and drinking needs met in one building).

On the exercise front, I am still hitting the gym everyday and slowing working some running back into my routine. Today was especially hot, so I swam instead, which was really enjoyable except I managed to tear a chunk out of my foot on the bottom of the pool somehow. It didn't hurt at the time, but now it's pretty painful. Hopefully I can sort it all out with some bandaids.