Beautiful Byron Bay

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  Byron Bay, New South Wales, Australia
Wednesday, July 16, 2008

It is one of the great ironies of our relationship that, while Paul and I are well-suited to paddle the metaphorical boat through the proverbial ocean of life together, we are not at all well-suited to actually and physically paddle any kind of boat together in real life.  While we both love kayaking, we long ago learned on an ill-fated paddling trip in a double kayak in Seattle that we need to be in our own kayaks.  By the end of that trip, we were both very irritated by one another and did not enjoy ourselves, despite the beautiful scenery.  I am sure there are many reasons for our inability to paddle together.  I always blame Paul.  In any event, our inability to paddle together was re-inforced in Byron Bay.

Byron Bay is a beautiful, somewhat beatnik town located on the coast (an area of Australia known as the Gold Coast).  We arrived late on Sunday night, but woke up to a beautiful day, albeit a little overcast.  However, it was the first day we could wear shorts while in Australia, so we were ecstatic.  We got up early to go on a sea kayaking tour that advertised a view of dolphins and whales.  It was with a bit of dread that we discovered that we would be in double kayaks when we arrived.  But, we figured that years had passed and thought we would be better.  Turns out, not so much. 

Unfortunately for both of us, the water was rather choppy and we were barely in the ocean when our kayak flipped over, dunking both of us in the freezing water.  We continued to have problems coordinating our paddling throughout the rest of the trip, and Paul almost flipped us over while we were well into the ocean which almost caused me to have a heart attack (as much as I love to be on the water, I mean that literally--I like to be "on" and not "in" the water--I am not a particularly great swimmer and am petrified of deep water).  After all of that, we didn't see a single dolphin or whale.  And, while I wanted to beat a hasty retreat to the shore, I kept turning around and catching Paul sitting and chatting with some of our fellow kayakers instead of paddling.   All in all, it turned out to be a pretty disappointing trip and left me in an irritable mood.  Wisely, we decided to spend some time apart for the rest of the afternoon (or "relationship renewal," as my friend John calls it), and I spent the afternoon getting pampered with a massage and other luxuries while he read on the beach.  But we had a very pleasant dinner and strolled contentedly back to the cute Bamboo Cottage bed and breakfast where we were staying.

The next day was beautiful, sunny and warm--not a cloud in the sky--so we decided to take a walk along the beach to the Byron Bay lighthouse (apparently the most powerful lighthouse in the world).  To our great annoyance, from the shore we could see dolphins and whales happily frolicking in the water while presumably ecstatic kayakers watched from a few meters away.  C'est la vie, as they say.

Our camera is on the fritz and we don't have many pictures from Byron Bay, but it is a great place to check out if you ever make it out this way.  Except for one tiny detail that I thankfully learned after we left town--apparently it's also popular with sharks during the Australian summertime, who are attracted by the warm water.  So it's probably better to check it out in the wintertime--I saw something about 32 shark sitings in December last year.  Next up is Brisbane, Australia's third largest city..

The only dolphin we say up close in Byron

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Paul and the Lighthouse	The Lighthouse	Paul	Pretty bug
Lighthouse	Close up of Lighthouse

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