Fun in Noosa, Brissy, Gold Coast and Sydney

Noosa Heads in Sunshine Coast: Surfing looks alot easier than it actually is especially if you are a small person. Like me. But it was way cooler than I expected. Cut to midget dragging the board which was too heavy for her and double her height. Cut to midget getting repeatedly slammed by waves. Cut to waves slamming board and board slamming into my head. But it was sooooooo fun! Bodyboarding was a thriller and alot easier than expected. But it is the attempting to stand without bending your knees while a massive wave was carrying you that was tricky. Human instinct says wave here, grab board by edge and kneel. Putting your hands by your stomach and doing a press up on the board with one leg in the air and your chin down sounds ridiculously unstable. It wasn't the balancing that was the issue but getting into an unnatural position while balancing that was the problem. And the waves were the biggest I have seen. You hear a roar, you turn around, you see some angry foam charging towards you, next minute you are under drinking copious amounts of salt water and back on the shore. I managed to stand up through about 3 times in 2 hours. Definitely coming back for more. Noose heads is gorgeous. White sand, beautiful people. Morning surfing, afternoon lunch and walking around the little towns and shops and evening a walk in the park or maybe building sandcastles by the beach. Night, some seafood platter dinner at Matise or pizza at Zachery's and drinks at a bar. I could do this alll month!

Gold Coast: Gold coast was so Miami that most of their street names, suburbs and attractions are named after places in Miami. Come on, they even have their own Miami beach there. It was fun to be with schoolies kids (Oz version of spring break but for year 12 kids) for one day than it became tiresome that they were drunk and rowdy every night. I'm to old and grumpy to watch 17 year olds pick up, get smashed and make a fool of themselves. Steak is fabulous at this place called Holy Cow. One of the best prime eye fillets I got. You don't even feel like you are really chewing, and when you do...explosion of juices and fats everywhere. Sangria was also good and strong at La Paella, to make up for their less than fabulous Paella which resembled a strange mixture of risotto and fried rice more than paella. There are so many asian restaurants and stores in gold coast that was kinda freaky.

Brisbane: We spent about 8.5 hours there, 1.5 of which was at the airport and 2.5 of it was running around like a headless chicken trying to return the car on time, pump petrol and pack away food from a restaurant that refuses to pack food for you. When shit happens, it floods your house. I was trying to get the cafe to let me pack food away because bob was trying to return the car. But they wouldn't. So i went to target to get a plastic container. And just when I was in a rush, i picked the container without a price tag so by the time i got to the cashier, they had to page someone to come down and give them the price. Second transit in Brissy was better. Brissy is alot bigger than expected. We spend most of the time dissing it because we were snotty melbourne elitists, but really it was very nice and laid back. Was nice to catch up with Vicky for lunch there. The crazy part: a completely artificial beach in the middle of the waterfront city, complete with lifeguards and sand.

Sydney: Sydney felt like a blind date with a long lost family friend. Bob got a job there and will be moving there next year, and there is a very high possibility that I will be joining him the year after. So this trip was really to suss things out. Shu and Tariq being the kind host they were, were doing a pretty good job selling sydney to me. But the hustle and bustle and pollution hasn't grown on me yet. Once again it is because I am being stuck up about Melbourne. Hey it did win most livable city in the world for a reason.

Brownie points for Sydney:

• Bondi beach's Hurricane for dinner. Massive dinosaur size ribs dripping with sauce. Clarence wasn't impress but bob and I were. (1 point)
  

• Best fried rice, duck with plum sauce and salt pepper calamari rings in Super bowl, this fantastic restaurant in chinatown. But the service was also the worst I ever had. The food took 1 hour to come. We told the waiter we had been there for 30 minutes, and he snapped back at us: "No! I saw you, you just sat down." He must have had a sad childhood. He would routinely walk away in the middle of people ordering and stalked around looking like he owned the place. It took talking to 6 waiters and finally the manager before our food arrived, dish for dish. With the rice coming first. Tariq looked so pissed I was raring him for a fight. (0 points..good food bad service cancels itself out)
• The existence of a Lindt's chocolate bar. (1 point)
• 4 story high Supre. (2 points)
• They have proper beaches: Manly and Bondi were beautiful (2 points)
• Alot of steak houses like Ribs Rump and Grill, Kingsley and Supper Inn, where according to sydneysiders and disregarded by the rest of the world, it was where crown prince of denmark and aussie girl Mary, now crown princess, first met. (2 points)

Total: 8 points (minus points for pollution, rude people and crazy drivers)

So there goes my 10 day long vacation up to the middle of the eastern coast of Oz. It felt good travelling with Bob again, this time as a more solid couple after our north-eastern coast trip of America last dec. We kept refering to ourselves on that trip as the demo version couple. Demo version Bob and Charissa took lots of photos. Real version Bob and Charissa burp at each other. That's the difference. It is endearing. Really.