Byron Bay

    This weekend was my first actually traveling in Australia.  A bunch of us decided to head down to Byron Bay in New South Wales.  So after spending four days camping and freezing my butt of in Girraween, I headed to the beach to do some more camping.  Luckily, it was warm at the Bay.  It was so nice to sleep through the entire night without waking up from being cold even in my ultra warm sleeping bag.  Soo, Amanda and I left bright and early saturday morning to meet everyone else at the car rental place by 8 am.  We all packed ourselves and our camping gear into six tiny Hyundais; five people to a car, laps buried in back packs and bags and set out on our first adventure driving on the wrong side of the road.   It only took about 2 hours to drive to Byron so we had camp set up and were hanging out on the beach before 11 am.  Our campsite was right on the beach; we only had about a two minute walk to the shore.  The water was beautiful and clear and the sand was so fine that it squeaked underfoot as we walked across the beach.  We decided to do some snorkeling, which was fun.  Then walked down to the point where you can climb some stairs to a look out deck... and we looked out (go figure) on the ocean and across the bay.
    Vikram mentioned that Sean and Shane wanted to go down the coast a bit to do some spear fishing and that they had two more spots in the car so I decided to tag along and just go snorkeling while they were catching dinner.  The current was really strong though so I decided to just hang out in the tide pools and climb around on the rocks with Clark.   While standing on the rocks watching the guys jump into the water, I looked out to sea and saw some whale spouts!  I even got to see a hump back jumping out of the water!  Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures, but it was still amazing and I wouldn't have seen them if I hadn't tagged along.  I spent quite a bit of time poking around in the tide pools looking at the sea stars, limpets, chitons, and anemones.  I even saw an octopus!  No it did not have blue rings.  Clark let me use his waterproof camera while I was exploring so I got a few good pictures and I'll post them when I get them from him.  I also spent a little bit of time poking through the rocky beach looking for pretty sea shells; I found quite a few... I probably wasn't supposed to take any so it'll be our little secret, shhhh.  :) The guys speared five fish, so we had a fresh fish dinner Saturday and Sunday night.  The fish were very tasty and free which made dinner even more delicious.  They were staying at a hostel, so a bunch of us hung out there for a while then went back to the campsite to sleep.
    Sunday some of us took a walk into town.  Instead of taking the streets, we walked along the beach soaking up the sunlight and watching the surfers.  There had been next to no one in the water on Saturday when the ocean had been as still as a lake, but Sunday the waves were crashing and surfers dotted the sea.  We stopped for a while to watch them and enjoy the perfect day.  In town, we walked along the main streets seeing what there was to see in all the shops.  I didn't buy anything, but it was fun just to look.  Everyone was still really worn out from Girraween, so once we got back to camp we took naps.  I pulled my sleeping bag out of the tent so I could nap in the sunlight.  We went back to the hostel that night for another fish dinner then called it a night.
     This morning,  my tent was slow to rise.  We woke up around 7, but didn't feel like getting up so the four of us just laid there falling in and out of sleep until 8 listening to all the strange birds and our friends shuffling about outside.  For breakfast, I treated myself to a cappuccino and some gelato.  Australia has the best cappuccino's I've ever had; they just taste so much better than any I've had in the states (except for the ones my Auntie makes, of course).  And my new favorite thing is sticky date!  We had some delicious sticky date pudding while in Girraween so I got sticky date gelato and it was amazing.  So, so good, I highly recommend it to anyone.
     Now, I'm just relaxing a bit before I do some studying and then head off to bed.  I've got Uni at 9 am tomorrow.  Normally, 9 am would be entirely too early for me, but my internal clock is all thrown off, along with all the other UC students, so I end up going to sleep between 10 and 10:30 every night and waking up between 6 and 7 without an alarm.

Good Night All

Jessie