Gold Coast

Brisbane, what a great city. Two nights was definitely not enough time for this fabulous city but we had an apartment reserved at the Gold Coast and have to move on. We had to go for a 20 minute walk to pick up the rental car for this leg of the journey but it was a better option than going back out to the airport. This time I got another Nissan, a fairly new Almera (I think its a Micra with a bigger body, pretty ugly but a great boot (trunk) that takes all of our luggage.) A lot nicer to drive than the Tiida!

We had about an hour drive to the Gold Coast. You would think we were in SW Florida here, an 8 lane expressway, real pavement on the straight road, 30 C, palm trees and a fair bit of traffic.

Our apartment is in Labrador (nothing like the Canadian Labrador). We are right across the street from an inner bay that was full of kite surfers and wind surfers enjoying the stiff breeze. I think I found the ultimate live aboard vessel here! Even better hiding out without an address like the ones we saw in Key Largo FL.

After unloading our luggage, we went on a walking tour of Marine Parade (our street). Is it ever humid here, sort of like Florida in the summer! We walked a few km and decided to go for a bit of a drive to check out the real ocean beach across the bay. It was only a few km to get to the ocean seashore.

There were lots of cruising boats anchored on the inner bay.

Also some hazards. Especially the "Dangerous Aquatic Orgasms" no ... organisms. Damn spell checker... ha, ha Doug...

We drove along the shoreside road to Surfer's Paradise, about 5 km south. I'm not sure how to describe it, lots of hi-rise condos, a beautiful walkway along the beach, lots of malls, restaurants, shops and bars along with lots of shirtless, tattooed backpackers with more cleavage than the Grand Canyon. Sort of a blend of Miami's South Beach, Fort Lauderdale and Daytona Beach.

And of course the "selfie" taking Asians...

There was a Disney sand sculpture contest going on and we had a chance to stroll the boardwalk and see the sculptures.

Some were under repair as a result of last weekend's rain storms.

We needed to stock the apartment with provisions so it was off to the supermarket for a supply run. Prices were a combination of higher and about the same as Canada. The only exception was dairy which was more like US prices.

Next stop was the "bottle store". Apparently the tax on the second highest drinking country in the world has not had a deterrent effect! Check your local prices but I think that $52/24 Budweiser and $70/24 Heineken is a bit out of line with North America! The absolutely cheapest beer is around $40/case. You make up for it on the gas price, only $1.18/l today.

I did a check on the cost of living in Australia and found this interesting chart that puts things in perspective.

Once we got back to the apartment it was getting dark, sunset is early. I had to spend a half hour on the phone with Vodafone to get the data working on our smartphone but was finally successful.

We had a relaxed pasta dinner courtesy our shopping expedition and I had time to work on the blog using my expensive wifi connection ($10/Gb).