Gold Coast Pt 1 - Harbour Town & Surfers Paradise (16-23 Jul)

After all the flying we did getting to Sweden and back we had a stack of frequent flyer points and decided we needed a trip to unwind and take advantage of the points.  We settled on the Gold Coast for a few reasons, it was warm and sunny (22-26 C) while Adelaide was cold (9-15 C) and rainy, one of our friends had just moved up there, Kris and I had previously been there for our honeymoon and it housed the Movie World, Sea World and Wet 'n' Wild theme parks.

We booked 8 days, arriving late on the Monday and leaving the following Tuesday.  We aimed for these dates as they had the cheapest flights (so we could get them completely free with our frequent flyer points) and it lined up with South Australian school holidays but not Queensland holidays, hopefully meaning the parks would be quieter.

Bye to the 'lovely' Adelaide rain

We stayed in a cabin in Labrador, a few minutes north of Surfers Paradise.  It was a comfortable and spacious enough, if a little run down. By the time we picked up our hire car and made it to our apartment it was almost 11pm, but we managed to get settled in quickly and had a good night sleep.

Our cabin - two bedrooms (double and single bed in each), bathroom, toilet and kitchenette

The kids were a bit excited to get going

On Tuesday we were up pretty early and decided to head out to Harbour Town, a shopping area with a large number of factory outlets.  The Queensland one opened in 1999, and Kris and I went there on our honeymoon in 2003.  It was where I bought my first sword, but sadly there dont appear to be any swords for sale there anymore.  We had always planned on a visit to Harbour Town as we all needed new clothes, and we picked it first for a few reasons.  Firstly, we wanted to do it before the kids got hyped up by the theme parks and secondly we needed to do some food shopping to stock up for the week.

Welcome to Harbour Town

We ended up spending most of the morning at Harbour Town, stopping for Chinese food for lunch.  Cameron got some new shoes (and was happy to throw out his old ones with no soles left):

Ceremonial dumping of the shoes

We all picked up some new clothes and then got our food shopping done.  After spending way too much money (but getting some nice gear), we headed back to the cabin to drop off our stuff.

Harbour Town

We then headed down to Surfers Paradise for the afternoon/evening, walking along the beach and stopping for dinner at the Surfers Paradise Surf Club:

The kids were excited to get down onto the sand

Surfers Paradise

The kids obeying the rule to keep dry

Sunset and the moon

The Hardest Post (13-Jun)

This will be a short one as it's hard to write, but I figured I needed a post to capture this.  On the 13th of June 2019 we lost my best friend, Daniel J.  We'd known each other since we were 12 (about 26 years) and his loss leaves a huge hole that can never be filled. A legend on the rugby field and a gentleman off it, he will be missed more than words can ever say.

 

 

RIP Daniel, you will be sorely missed. Catch you on the flip side.

<3

Tree Climb (2-Jun)

We had a social club event with my work to do the Tree Climb in Town.  The area was divided into an adults and children's course and all of us were big enough for the adult course.  This was further divided into four sections varying in difficulty, green, blue, red and black.  We started with the green and blue then split up, with Kris and Tomas tackling black, while Alana, Cam and I did the red and then the blue again.  The reason for the split was Alana and I wanted to do the Tarzan swing on the red and Tomas wanted to do the black course as it was the hardest.

The weather had been a bit iffy, but we ended up with decent sunny weather all day. After arriving we were suited up in our harnesses and taken through a tutorial track showing us how to hitch and unhitch our carabiners as we went along.  Each harness was hitched in by a trolley that locked into place and two carabiners that were hitched on and off as you went around obstacles.

Ready to go

Cam showing off the carabiner

Tom was ready to go

Tom tackles the first obstacle - the cross shaped planks

Cam walks the tightrope logs

Tom takes on the circles

Alana breezed through the swinging planks, while Cam waits

Kris takes on the circles - it was much harder for the adults as being heavier caused the platforms to twist if you weren't dead center and you risked being tipped off (although the harness would stop you falling)

Tom clips his carabiner on for the flying fox

Tom on the flying fox

Alana on the flying fox

Tom takes on the small crosses

Alana finishes the small crosses

Tom takes on the swinging logs

These were tricky as they swung apart as you tried to step between them

Cam completes the swinging logs

Tom works his way across the tightropes

Alana takes a leisurely stroll along the tightrope

and slaloms through the twisting planks

Another flying fox for Tom

Kris and Tom take on the black course

Alana does the Tarzan swing

Hitting the cargo net and then climbing up

Cam tried to be smart and swing through the logs but instead hit them all and got tangled.

All in all it was a great day.  We all got some decent exercise and had fun climbing around.  I managed to jar my shoulder a little on the Tarzan swing, but otherwise we all came out in one piece.