Category Archives: Australia

Rainbow Bay and Snapper Rocks

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Even when we are sleeping in, we still manage to see and do lots of stuff. It was super cloudy this morning anyway, so we didn’t miss too much getting out at noon. We had brunch at Cafe Kirra (pancakes and smashed avo sourdough) and then walked to Rainbow Bay Lookout and over to Snapper Rocks. Two lookout points south of Kirra, where we are staying. When the sun came out, it was so warm and lovely today.

And the best part about today? We saw whales and dolphins! At first, we saw them breaching. I saw a really big one jumping and splashing. Mikael missed it but saw the splash. So wow! When we got to Rainbow Bay Lookout, we saw plenty of whales blowing water far out. Still super cool! Then we also saw dolphins breaching, I think three at most. I’ve missed seeing whales and dolphins, it’s been 9 years since my last year in California.

Rainbow Bay Lookout:

Whale blowing water!Dolphin (above the surfer). Unfortunately the best I could do as I only filmed and these are screenshots.

Snapper Rocks:

And yet another sunset picture of Gold Coast:

Winter Solstice 2024

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Yesterday was the shortest day of the year on this side of the equator. Back home, everyone was celebrating Midsummer, the longest day of the year. But down here, today was just like any other day. We decided to not celebrate Swedish Midsummer, even if there was celebrations in Gold Coast.

We only had one plan and that was to watch the latest sunrise of the year at 6:38. So we walked out to the pier below Kirra Hill. As usual, the sunrise was incredible!

For brunch we went to Haig’s again and had the smashed avo sourdough. I think we are eating avo’s almost every day here, they are just too good! The rest of the day was very calm, Mikael had a massage and I have spent a lot of time reading on the balcony. Even if it was 24C, it was windy and surprisingly chilly so even if I at first thought that I would want to be at the beach and in the ocean, that didn’t happen. Oh well, it is midwinter.

These pictures are from Mikael’s fancy Sony camera:

Kirra

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Four weeks down under has gone by so fast and we have made our first move. We left our tiny granny flat in Mermaid Waters this morning and took an Uber down to Kirra in Coolangatta, the most southern part of Gold Coast. It only took 30 min, but when we are standing on the beach here and watch the skyline, it looks so far away.

I got one last beach session in with Cici and Katja at Surfer’s and we all had lead legs for some reason. Might be the cold. It’s really cold right now in the mornings. The sunrise was incredible as usual and I’m not even sad to have alarms set at 4:45am when I get to start my day with 1,5h of beach volley practice while the sun is rising.

Mikael and I cleaned out the AirBnB and had the luxury of checking in at the next place as soon as we arrived. And what a place! We have a room in a two bedroom apartment on the top floor. We are staying here through a friend of a friend of a friend and she matched us up with another friend of hers that plays beach volleyball as well. But she doesn’t seem to come until the end of the month so we have this two story apartment to ourselves for a bit. We can see the ocean from both balconies and it is super cosy with ocean theme.

Bye granny flat!

We packed up and then went out to explore a bit. It is truly beautiful here. Much calmer, not as many and not as high skyscrapers and they are not as tight together. We had lunch at Haig St Cafe and Restaurant and wow, we are definitely going back. Everything on the menu looked incredible!

We walked past the beach volleyball nets, walked all the way down to New South Wales and then a quick shopping on the way back. Right in Coolangatta, there is a state line which means that we walked to NSW today. Pretty cool!

The public restrooms are really nice here! Our first koala! Central Gold Coast looks so far away. QLD and NSW boarder.

The sunset on the way back was amazing! We are a bit further east than the rest of the Gold Coast, so we saw the skyline being lit up by purple and the sun set behind the mountains. Even if the sun sets behind land, it still colors the sky amazingly!

More beach volleyball

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What an amazing day it has been! The weather has been flawless, 25C and basically no clouds. Winter’s not too bad, haha! It just started though, I am counting on it getting colder.

This morning started with my alarm going off at 5am. I was hunting sunrises! Me and a couple of girls were gonna do some drills on the beach while the sun rose. Unfortunately, the poles were down at Surfer’s so we had to go down to Kurrawa and actually missed when the sun rose above the horizon. I guess I will have to do this again sometime.

I had such an amazing feeling after this morning, the sun was so warm, I was hungry and read on the beach until Mikael joined up so we could go to Elk Espresso and have a really nice brunch.

After that, I went in the ocean for the first time since getting here, in my new swimsuit. It was incredible! Wow! Mikael definitely missed out.

At 3pm, the next beach session of the day started for me, but this time social 4s and 2s with Beach Volleyball Gold Coast and Mikael got a haircut. I only did 4s today. My foot is really swollen after a mysterious twisting a week ago. It looks really bad and now it has started to hurt even when I’m running in sand, previously it was only hurting when I was walking on flat ground. Oh well.

Dinner at home in front of the latest Star Wars series The Acolyte and now bed. Such a long but magical day! The sun makes you tired and so does two two hour beach sessions, haha!

Goodnight!

Burleigh Head National Park

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WOW! We have had the most amazing day down in Burleigh Heads today. We were told that Burleigh Head National Park was incredible and it sure was. We followed the Ocean View Track in the national park. There were beautiful beaches in the beginning at Tallebudgera Creek, and it was almost a jungle feeling inside and along the small walking path and then we walked along the ocean with amazing views over the ocean and northern parts of Gold Coast. I will let the pictures speak for themselves. The coolest thing we saw was a Kookaburra sitting on a branch overhanging the walkway. It was just sitting there while we took pictures and lots of people walked by. So cool! A group of people we met along the way just told us that there was a Kookaburra ahead of us. People are so friendly here and just tells you about these things to brighten other people’s days.

After the short “hike”, we sat by the ocean, watching the surfers down below and just soaked it all in until the sun set behind the buildings. We had sushi at Oi Izakaya, a small place in Burleigh that had amazing sushi!

Today, we have taken a ride on the local bus and it worked just as well as the tram. Practically locals, haha!

SeaFire 2024

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First official day of winter is here! And what a day it has been. I had 16k steps before Mikael and my day even begun so to say that I’m tired would be an understatement.

Today, instead of Mikael being out early going for a run, he slept in while I spent the morning at the beach playing social beach volleyball with BVGC again. Stella from Wednesday was there again and we started strong together and kept going strong. It was so much fun! The morning started with no wind, no sun, but still like 20C. Optimal conditions. The wind took off a bit later, but wasn’t too bad. 3 hours later, and I was done! Got to talk a bit more with the locals, and apparently there is only social beach volley over here. No organized trainings or groups  for development. Like where are all the good teams? Apparently they all move to Europe to continue with their beach volleyball careers.

After a shower back at the granny flat, we took the tram up to Cavill Ave where we first had lunch at Pancakes in Paradise (savory mushroom and chicken crepe and sweet pancakes with syrup and chocolate fudge), then some shopping (Mikael got a pair of thongs and a sweater for $60, this years bikini models didn’t fit me at all either, so I will wait for my old ones to be sent down, haha) and then the big event of the evening: SeaFire!

SeaFire is a fireworks competition that I think goes yearly? Anyway, we had little expectations, just heard that there would be fireworks on 1st June. We were not disappointed! There were three firework displays, Italy first at 6pm, then UK at 7pm and Australia finale at 8pm. They all had choreography to music; Italy more towards local opera and such, UK to a little bit of everything and Australia movie music. Italy was good, some parts of UK was good and Australia was very relatable with Harry Potter, Indiana Jones, Jurassic Park and more. It was a great experience! And the displays were all non-comparably better than GP’s New Years firework in Gothenburg. Shot from boats out in the water and viewed from the beach with thousands of other people was magical! It was raining quite a bit, and we were super cold in the middle of it all, still soaked when we go back home, but it stopped before the final. Stella joined us too. She’s here on a WHV (working holiday visa) and will move on to Perth on Monday – we had a good couple of days together).

All in all, great day!

In short: yesterday we didn’t do much. We learned how Aussies recycle (everything recyclable in one bin, everything else in the other). And in general, it’s very clean here. Hardly any garbage on the street at all. No chewing gums, no trash, no nothing. Some shopping carts here and there (but that might be because we live close to a shopping center). The public restrooms are also very clean! Back home, I would hold it until I was back home, but here, no worries at all.

Videos from the display are on my Instagram, under highlights “Down under”. I should be able to upload videos here, but the wifi here is just too bad…

Surfer’s Paradise. Super touristy. Not for us. But now we’ve seen it!

Today’s adventure: Local tram

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We are still completely knocked out in the mornings. We set the alarm for 8am, but snooze through it and wake up at 10:30. But that’s not too bad. If we spent more time outside, walking and taking in new impressions, than these half days, I think we would be completely dead.

Even if we didn’t get out until like noon, we still managed to see a lot of things. On today’s agenda was to use the public transit here. There are several buses going around here and one tram, G:Link. It was super easy to buy a card at the station (we live by the end station in the south), they leave every ten minutes on average and stops at every stop. They were super clean and the cards were so easy to use. There are machines on every station, so you tap the card before you go on, and then when you get off again. Very convenient.

So we are living in Mermaid Waters and decided to go up to Main Beach and check it out. There is a scenic point called The Pit Gold Coast which didn’t look like it was too far. We gave up after going a third of the way from the tram station.

We live on the orange dot, took the tram all the way to the light green dot and walked to the dark green dot. That’s when we got tired and turned back.

Today’s realization: GOLD COAST IS BIG!

Much bigger than we thought. And it’s long. When we move onto our next place (Coolangatta) in three weeks, we will be one hour south of here, which is already kinda south in GC), even though it looks so close on the map. Insane!

We walked around in the Marina north of Main beach where huge yachts were stationed. We also saw that there are whale watching boats there. Humpback whales are migrating from Antartica now so we might just take one of those tours out one day.

Main Beach.

Southport, where we will stay our last three weeks.On the way back, we actually struggled to find a restaurant to eat at. We jumped off the tram at Surfer’s Paradise, but all the restaurants seemed to be at the stop before: Cavill Avenue. So we went to Broadbeach and had dinner at a bar, The Lukcy Squire, by the shopping mall The Oasis. The Philly Steak Sandwich was actually really good. And even if it was simple, it ended up costing 35 AUD per person with one soda as well. It’s expensive here.

Beach volleyball

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We slept much better last night, but were still super tired when we woke up and didn’t leave bed until like 10:30. Started the day with a little bit of shopping since I’m missing sport bras for instance. Found one at LSKB, another brand I’ve never seen before, there are lots of new stores around here, and got to use it for my first beach volleyball session later. We also got some food at Woolworths.

Beach Volleyball Gold Coast had social games today at 3:30pm and I was a bit nervous about the wind. Even if it was strong, it was consistent and I tried to use it as best as I could which actually felt really good, up until the point where I got a set from a player I didn’t know and didn’t time it at all. My reception was surprisingly good, and most of the setting. We also played 4vs4 and mixed which also confused me a lot, haha. But it was so much fun playing again (even if it was only a week ago I played back home) and the sand at the beach was so fine! I could get used to this.

We had dinner at a pub nearby and then walked back home through the more central parts of Broadbeach.

Chicken and mushroom pie with coleslaw and chips.

Jetlag?

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It’s been two really slow days after the intense two first days in Brisbane. I don’t know if we got delayed with the jetlag or something but we’ve both been so tired and sleeping bad.

Yesterday, we spent all day unpacking and going over our clothes that we managed to bring. I have everything I need normal-wise up top but am missing everything bottom except two pair of shorts, the jeans I flew in and the two new pair I bought in Brisbane. When it comes to my exercise clothes, it’s the opposite. Several tights and shorts, but only one tank top and one sports bra. Mikael missed all his exercise clothes plus lots of underwear and all his extra shoes but had decently even with everything else. To leave the house a little, we went shopping, both more food but also shoes and workout clothes for him.

Yesterday, we also cooked dinner in our tiny kitchen. Spaghetti and meat sauce but without the pasta since we only have one cooker and didn’t want to wait. We had avo on the side instead. And wow. What amazing avocadoes they have here! And for only 1 dollar each! And they’re big! Amazing!

Today, Mikael took his new workout outfit for a test run while I took a shower and fixed a bit at home. I didn’t go to bed until midnight last night, but woke up at 3 am and was super awake and couldn’t go back to sleep for another two hours.

When sleeping until 11, doing a little bit of fixing at home, the day is over in no time. Had leftovers for dinner and watched a documentary about Australia wildlife on Disney+.

Oh, also! We saw our first cockroach today! It wasn’t anything special, only like 2cm. I will update again when I see one the size of my hand. But for now, every first is still cool! 😎

First day in Mermaid Waters

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First day in Gold Coast. Last night, we were so tired and went to bed at 8pm. Set the alarms for 8am. I woke up at 6 and just couldn’t go back to sleep and finished The Hero of Ages by Brandon Sanderson, the third and last Mistborn book (review can be found here, this is still a travel and book blog 🤓) – WOW! Mikael didn’t wake up at 8, but that was fine since I wasn’t done with the book just yet. At 10, he started to move a little and at noon we were ready to walk 5 minutes to Pacific Fair, the big shopping mall. On today’s agenda was buying food and sunscreen, which is a bit of a jungle. It’s important to buy the right one due to chemicals and stuff. Good thing it’s cheaper here than in Sweden, but the good ones are as expensive, if not more so. Shopping at Woolworths was fun, but surprisingly similar to a Swedish store. I was prepared for something completely different, like in the US. I remember loving going grocery shopping there because it was so different. I guess it was different here as well, obviously, but not as much. There were many things we recognized, but also so many more options of everything. It took us a while to go through a fraction of it, haha.

Our next stop was the beach. We’ve been here three days now and I haven’t seen the beach. It took us maybe 20 min to walk to the beach and got there just in time for the sun to set behind the skyscrapers. It was not cold with full pants and a thin cardigan, but it wasn’t warm either. Even if it is around 20C, it’s not really warm. When it’s 20 back home, it is warm. Definitely different climates.

The beach is huge! It’s super wide and as long as you can see! I don’t think I’ve ever seen a beach this big, haha! And the sand was squeaky, hilarious. I wonder how that affects playing beach volleyball.

The waves were pretty high, and there was only one place on the beach where you could go swimming, right in front of a lifeguard tower. There was a detailed sign about today’s conditions. The water was 23C while it was only 19C on land.