Thursday 4th January – Day trip to the Gold Coast and bad news from the States

With a couple of hours’ journey to Surfers’ Paradise we thought we’d better get going in reasonable time, so we got a lift down to the South Bank and jumped on the 937am train.  That took an hour to get to Helensvale, where we transferred onto the light rail service to Surfers’.

Thanks to there being free Wi-Fi available on the train I was able to check my emails.  Sadly, what I read was not great news.  An email from Joe at Campers Inn in the States, with the update we had been dreading – it’s official, the sale of the RV has fallen through.  After all the messing around and delays caused by the buyer, apparently there was an electrical fault on the camper that broke the deal for him.  We’re gutted. And Joe was apologetic for the delays, but we are back to square one with no buyer or money in sight.  And I won’t go into detail but let’s just say we may have to reconsider our movements in a month or two as money is tight.  A cash injection from the States would have come in very handy round about now to keep our plans on track.

Pulling ourselves back together, there was no point on dwelling on the unwelcome news and letting it ruin the day. After all, we were off to the beach… in paradise! Getting off on a main street with plenty of shops and restaurants we made our way to the beach front.  It was very busy on the beach and in the City in general, being summer holidays. 

Where am I?!

It doesn't look windy but I can assure you it was..!

We found a small gap on the golden sands.  The sea was looking quite rough and the lifeguards clearly had their work cut out.  It was really gusty, which meant that as soon as we lay down we were getting sand-blasted continually from one direction.  We tried our best to relax, even though we were essentially being buried in sand the longer we lay there.  I spent time people-watching which consisted mostly of watching the lifeguards trying to keep everyone in between the red and yellow flags whilst in the water.  There was a very strong current that was moving all the swimmers along the beach and the lifeguards were understandably twitchy. So, I thought I’d better have a go!  The water wasn’t too cold, but the waves were definitely bracing. We took it in turns to have a dip and then stood on the beach drying off.  Neither of us wanted to sit back down on the beach and get covered in sand again and Simon was not feeling great after being wiped out by a violent wave and swallowing a load of sea water.  What a shame.  I love a beach, but sadly today was just too blustery, overcast and crowded for us to enjoy.  Having seen the lagoon at South Bank Brisbane yesterday, we agreed that looked far more inviting!

Well, we’d made it to Surfers and hardly spent a cent. But it was not our bag.  Far too commercial with chain fast food outlets and crowds everywhere.  It was time to start the two-hour return journey to good ol’ Brissie!

We were back by the lagoon by 330pm and had a lovely afternoon dip and sunbathe before grabbing a bite to eat at a Mexican restaurant on the Southbank nearby.