After an ordeal of aborted flights and days of airplane changes, I boarded the evening flight from San Francisco to Melbourne, via Sydney. September 26th 2006.
I was greeted by Pat, assistant owner (now owner) of the Lords' Lodge hostel right there on Punt rd. and he was seriously helpful and cool. The hostel is small and cozy, and close to St. Kilda, Prahran, the F1 race course, an outdoor beer garden, the botanical gardens and a bunch of really awesome, free, outdoor skate parks. . The building is the former home of an old headmaster of the college across the street. This hostel became my home base for what turned into a 9 month stay in Australia. Melbourne is a hot spot for late night, all night adventures. So I'll start there. From Chapel st. in Prahran, south of the CBD, east to St. Kilda rd in St. Kilda and north of the city on Fitzroy st. the weekends in Melbourne last from Thursday afternoon to Sunday night. The bars don't stop, the shows don't stop, the people definitely don't stop and if you decide you can't keep up you can stop in at the liquor store at sunrise, grab a six pack and head on home to recover. The skate parks were all over too. In the day the parks were perfect, in the shade on the grass we could chill and smoke, drink a beer and skate. The summertime city goes off. Every other weekend is some holiday or special event. Taking the 9 minute tram ride up St Kilda rd, across the bridge into the city, there would be fireworks and blocked roads for huge street parties. The train station is visible from the tram on the way into downtown; a beautiful sight. Federation Square appears on the right, lighted up and crowded. The streets are relatively safe, though some minor violence occurred during my tenure in the country, most was not meditated but drunken foolishness. The Victoria gallery is right there on St. Kilda rd, south of the CBD. Downtown the river is alive during the day with rowers and dinner boats. Red helicopters circle the city, offering tourists willing to pay, a view from above the skyscrapers.
Favourite spots:
I took a trip up the west coast to see the beaches, and do some surfing in Byron Bay. I flew out on December 31st, arranging myself a nice 14 hour layover in Sydney along the way, so I could spend New Years moment in this famous harbor. The city was f*ing packed. The subways were only running certain stops, and the streets were mayhem. I spent the night cruising the endless street party. Towards the end of the morning, with travel pack on my back (having left my main pack at the hostel in Melbourne), I skated through the city. The subways were so insanely packed with people that I skated all the way to the airport, cruising right down the center of empty streets at 5:30 in the morning new years day and into an empty airport on-ramp. I wasn't the only one sleeping outside the closed airport that night, in my mind it was a perfect new years eve, the next morning I would fly into Ballina. From there it was off to Byron Bay for a few weeks on the beach, surfing day and night.
What's really great:
Up in Byron the water was warm and the the land was lush and green. In contrast to Melbourne, where there is currently a huge water drought, Byron bay and the surrounding 20 Kilometers is essentially a tropical rain forest. The land is lush and green, there are lots of huge snakes and frogs. Luckily at this time there were not too many blue bottle jellyfish in the water, and we did a lot of surfing. The first few days were rainy in the mornings, with mountainous thunderclap clouds looming in the afternoons. But rain or shine the water was great, the town is amazing. Byron Bay has a quality all of its own and alone is worth the trip across the Pacific. An hour drive inland from Byron is the town of Nimbin. If you are in Byron Bay visit Nimbin, a quaint hippy town with a history of pro-marijuana activities.
Accommodations:
After a few weeks stay we traveled the Gold Coast and up through Tweed Heads to Surfers Paradise. In Tweed Heads we took a few different hikes in the rain forests of the nearby inland national parks. The Coolangatta trails go for days, and there are heaps of waterfalls and forest beauty in those parks. The rain comes and goes keeping the land lush and green, and then the clouds break and the sky is enormous and surreal.
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