McAleers On Tour!: Byron Bay

We arrived in Brisbane to meet up with a few friends from home - Natalie Kenny (friend and neighbour from Dubai) and Dangerous Dave Dean (aka Dave Crab thanks to autocorrect...). We battled horrendous thunderstorms that evening in order to have a whistle stop tour of Brisbane and dinner with a group of Nat's friends.

The next morning, after a hearty breakfast, we set off for Byron Bay, 2 hours south of Brisbane. As Byron is known for its hippy lifestyle and surfing we were sincerely hoping the forecasted thunderstorms would hold off! We checked into our lovely holiday home and then decided to check out what Byron had to offer in terms of nightlife. The recommended bar in town 'Cheeky Monkeys' turned out to be full of school leavers - not quite our scene! However we did learn about some of Australia's drinking rules eg no drinking on the roads, no shots in bars in Byron and the bat closed at 1am - this led to Andy's quote of the trip 'Australia is a no fun zone!'

The next day we nursed our hangovers by heading to the beach, and what a gorgeous beach it was! Soft white sand, clear blue waters and once the clouds shifted a beautiful sunny sky! However that sun turned out to be our downfall as we hadn't realised just how strong the Australian sun was, and we both got horrendously burnt! I didn't even know I could get burnt! We definitely learned our lesson and have been applying sunscreen ever since!

We also visited a lighthouse in Cape Byron that evening and got there just in time for sunset. The views were absolutely incredible.

For our final day in Byron Bay we tried our hands at surfing! It was so much fun! Andy actually became pretty good at it and could surf into shore pretty well on his own. I made it to my feet once (and stood for long enough to shout for Andy to witness it!) and didn't drown so I considered it a successful day! After a couple of hours, we were all exhausted and aching, so went for a refreshing swim in a lake full of tea tree oil before heading back.

The next day we headed back to Brisbane after a slight detour to Australia Zoo, a zoo founded and run by Steve Irwin (the crocodile hunter) and his family. We had an amazing time there! Highlights included feeding kangaroos, petting koalas and watching the crocodiles being fed!