We packed up our apartment in Terrigal and took off around 9 am on Thursday 16 January. The rain was just starting as we drove out of the secure car park and it quickly became heavy…and then it became biblical…and, as we joined the motorway it was downright dangerous. We couldn’t see the road ahead and we pulled off at the first opportunity to a service station. We sat there for a while but there was no sign of this abating any time soon – but it did start to ease enough for Richard to be confident in driving again. So we headed back onto the motorway and carried on. This was supposed to be a seven hour drive anyway so not exactly the best start to the day. Suddenly the torrential rain started again and this time there was thunder and lightning thrown into the mix – think they call this a supercell storm and we pulled off the road again. We found a local KFC as this would, at least, give us access to toilet facilities. We weren’t happy when an UTE pulled in alongside us and, in her hurry to get out of the rain, the blonde airhead whacked our door with hers…. I needed the loo so quickly got out – checked the door (couldn’t see any obvious damage) – and headed into KFC. OMG it was like Armageddon as I came out and looked across the main road, to see water bubbling up from the storm drains and it was flooding the roads pretty quickly. So we needed to get out of here quickly before becoming stranded! We drove on and, as we pullled away, we could see that flooding was going to be a serious issue for the residential properties very soon.
Relieved to be leaving that behind we were delighted when the weather cleared up a bit and the rain started to ease. We pulled into the next service station to get fuel to find all the pumps cordoned off…we used their facilities anyway and got a couple of wraps for lunch…to find that the station had been hit by lightning and that’s why the pumps were inoperable. It was a pretty big storm if the size of the hailstones were anything to go by as reported by Higgins Storm Chasers,
Luckily for us we still had half a tank we were just using this opportunity to change drivers. So I took over and continued north towards Byron Bay, our next destination. The rain continued on / off all day and we finally arrived at our Air BnB at 7pm. We found the cul-de-sac easily and the apartment – which was actually a loft apartment / granny annex in the bottom of the proprietor’s garden with separate access. We had stopped off at the bottle shop on the way and picked up some provisions at the grocery store too so had an early night after a long and quite challenging nine hour road trip.
Friday morning we decided to explore and headed first to the lighthouse. We were lucky to get parked about two thirds of the way up the hill and walked the rest. The forecast was for dangerous surf in the region and boy was the area getting pounded…. Was really hot so we stopped at the cafe for a cold recuperative drink before moving on.
Next stop was Ballina – this has an inlet which is notorious in big swells – so we wanted to walk the sea walls and have a look. OMG the sea was raging and this would not be a day to either enter or leave this area for sure – absolutely treacherous. We bumped into some locals who knew someone in London and did we know them?? It’s amazing how many times we get asked this type of question LOL. No concept of how heavily populated the UK is.
After Ballina we headed to the hinterland and enjoyed a walk around Bangalow – quite a historic old town. Very charming and we enjoyed checking it out.
Afterwards we headed towards Mullumbimby for the Crystal Castle and Shambhala Gardens This is like a theme park for crystal lovers and it is home to the largest natural crystals where we did actually sit in an ancient amethyst cave.
We wandered the tranquil gardens too, including a Kalachakra Stupa (sacred monument to Tibetan Buddhists to represent universal divinity). This is unique in the Southern Hemisphere and only the seventh in the world. We span the beautiful brass prayer wheels and walked around the stupa to lend wings to prayers of peace. Felt quite serene.
Check out some of the huge natural crystals which are allegedly the biggest and most beautiful crystals in the world.
We also visited the Peace Dome and joined in on a healing meditation session where we listened to Crystal Singing Bowls being played which was fascinating. All very zen LOL.
Moving on we returned to Byron Bay and visited the historic Northern pub – which was very very noisy and the live music wasn’t to our taste. We then found Woolworths to pick up some more supplies before going to the Tree House for dinner followed by a short walk along the beach before returning back to our loft.
Saturday we headed to the town of Mullumbimby and found it was market day. So we parked up and wandered through checking out the ‘magic people’ along the way. So this was full of hippies – young and old alike – and we were even offered blue methylated spirits by a couple of people LOL. In the middle of the stalls there were two guys playing live music so we grabbed a coffee and sat down to watch them.
Sadly very quickly the rains returned and we headed back to the car. Such a shame…. This didn’t stop us though as next stop was Scarabelot’s lookout where we watched the clouds scuttling across the sky.
Having left the countryside behind we headed back to Byron Bay and wandered around the main drag Jonson Street. Not a lot going on – lots of tourists like us – but didn’t quite have the hippy vibe that we had been expecting. Oh well, guess places change over time. We walked to the Beach House Hotel on the promenade and enjoyed a drink with snacks and live music. Afterwards we went to main beach to have a look but found it very busy. Of course the rain returned again so we headed back to our loft and had a quiet night in doing the laundry!
Sunday morning we awoke to a kookaburra singing away on our fence outside the door. Love these birds! We had decided that this was going to be “a sitting overlooking the beach” kind of day but, of course, the minute we got parked and found a bench to sit on the rain started again. What a shame!
So back to the apartment we go…. I decided to use the unexpected free time to write the Terrigal blog. In the evening we returned to the Tree House for dinner – good food and a great happening place, very popular with locals, tourists and backpackers alike. Was a good evening – Richard was very good and let me have a glass of wine whilst he was the designated driver. Arriving back we had some wine in front of the TV before climbing the stairs to bed. Had been a good last night in Byron Bay, just a shame that the weather didn’t play ball for our time there.
In the morning we were moving on again – returning to Queensland after a two and a half year absence – to Caloundra on the Sunshine Coast. Bye for now and come back soon for the next part of our Australian adventure.
Jan