Byron Bay

Pretty much every backpacker doing the East Coast has this place on their itinerary, and we’d heard good things about it, but accommodation was bloody expensive and ridiculously so over the Australia Day long weekend – hence an extra day in Brisbane and 24 hours in Surfers Paradise so we made it to Byron Bay on the Sunday instead of the Friday. That eased the pain a little – we don’t mind splashing some of Jonny’s inheritance on somewhere really nice once in a while, but really do object to paying almost £200/night for a pretty basic place. If we’d come on the Friday we’d have been paying at least £300/night for utter dross!

The Greyhound from Surfers Paradise took around 3 hours and dropped us about a 5 minute walk from Byron Central Apartments where the receptionist greeted us with “Thank God you’ve arrived” – odd but it turned out that reception closed at 13.00 on a Sunday (it was now 13.15) and they didn’t have any contact details for us so she was panicking about what to do. Get in touch through Agoda messenger like other places have managed to perhaps?? Debbie was disappointed with the apartment thinking that they’d obviously got a very good photographer for their website, and that they hadn’t thought through the aircon location in a place with a loft bedroom – at half the price she’d have thought it was OK but perhaps Byron Bay is just very expensive. It was lovely though – once a favourite with barefoot hippies, an influx of wealthy property investors has brought stylish hotels (not ours sadly), restaurants, lively pubs, chic boutiques and a fascinating mix of subcultures as surfie meets soap starlet meets free spirit. There’s a huge range of places offering alternative therapies, crystals, palm/tarot readings and even a circus school – all with a good dose of capitalism. A lively place with a nice vibe – far more to our taste than Surfers Paradise but way more chaotic than Noosa (and not as chic).

Byron Bay is the most Easterly point of mainland Australia, and sunrise from the Cape Byron lighthouse is a must-do, but a heatwave meant that there was no way we were dragging ourselves on a 45 minute walk before the crack of dawn, or at any other time of day for that matter. In fact we mainly spent our time in the pool to stay cool – venturing out only after dark for a curry and some beers.

Byron Bay is a pleasant and worthwhile stop between Brisbane and Sydney, and apparently Greyhound run 7 direct buses every night from Sydney to Byron Bay (but not the other way around) in the summer season, but we probably didn’t make the most of our very expensive stay there.

Port Macquarie

A 7.5 hour Greyhound journey south from Byron Bay, which was originally planned to be broken up with a stay in Coffs Harbour – but that was scrapped to make the Australia Day long weekend changes – and somewhere we were visiting for one reason only – THE KOALA HOSPITAL. Other than that we knew very little about Port Macquarie and had no expectations. And as is often the way, no expectations delivered big surprises and we absolutely loved the place. Despite the koala hospital being closed for re-building!!

We’d had difficulty deciding on our accommodation – somewhere in the Central Business District (CBD) walkable from the bus stop for convenience or a nicer resort hotel a short Uber ride away? Nicer won and Debbie booked Sails by Rydges, the same hotel group as we were using in Sydney and, as she’d somehow already qualified for gold level membership despite having never stayed in one of their establishments, we got upgraded from the cheapest room in the house to a junior suite overlooking the marina and had a couple of free drinks thrown in too. You do have to love hotel loyalty schemes!

The hotel location was amazing, with a beautiful pool overlooking the Hastings River and Pelican Island, and just a 15 minute walk along the river to the town centre. Pelicans were abundant, anglers fished, boats sailed or motored along the waterways, and in some ways it reminded us of our home village on the River Dart – very close to the sea but a calm and beautiful riverside spot.

The Port Macquarie Breakwall was an amazing surprise – a mile or so breakwater where the Hastings River meets the ocean – an iconic site adorned with community art, the rocks decorated with messages, tributes, memorials and celebrations, and which started as an art competition in 1995 but has developed into a living gallery that anyone can contribute to. A stunning sight – joyful and humbling at the same time. We may suggest to Brixham Town Council that they consider doing something similar when we get home!

And beyond the breakwater we discovered gorgeous coastline, crashing waves and white sand beaches – just a beautiful place really.

The CBD was compact and had just enough shops, bars and restaurants for interest – although Debbie had ‘fun’ finding new swimwear after her best tankini was destroyed by too much Chlorine in our Byron Bay pool, as most people in Australia seem to be tiny, or at least their swimwear is.

Now that koala hospital that was the reason for our visit – closed for a year for a A$6million rebuild, but the medical facility was being temporarily housed at Guulabaa – Place of Koala, a conservation & breeding centre run by Koala Conservation Australia about 10 miles from Port Macquarie. Of course we were going to be trekking out there in an Uber, and hoping that we’d have sufficient mobile reception in the woods in the middle of nowhere to get an Uber back again. The centre primarily focuses on its efforts to prevent the extinction of koalas – a very real threat due to habitat loss, bush fires, disease, road strikes and dog attacks – by taking bold action via a world-first ‘wild breeding’ programme. The facility is naturally forested and as close as possible to a wild koala habitat. Koala joeys stay with their mothers here for around 12 months before being released to selected wild habitats to boost wild populations. We couldn’t see this part of the centre as it needs to be kept ‘wild’ with no human visitor interaction, but it was fascinating to learn about the programme. The centre also houses some permanent residents – previously injured animals that couldn’t be released back into the wild. They each have their own large enclosure, which includes at least 1 tall tree – and during our visit, most of them were at least 30 feet up their tree. A lovely life for koalas that otherwise could not survive due to brain damage, blindness and other restrictive issues.

And then the medical facility – oh dear god, Debbie almost blubs every time she thinks about it! Through a huge glass window we could observe the treatment centre and at the time of our visit a young koala had just been brought in. ‘Simon’ had been found sitting by the side of the road nearby and was very unwell, so the resident vet was doing a thorough set of investigations on the poor boy under anaesthetic – watched by a couple of koala carers and some students from Sydney Veterinary School. It turned out that he had Chlamydia, as do up to 90% of koalas, probably passed on by his mother as he was only around 2 years old and as he was such a young boy the vet was going to do everything she could to give him a chance of survival. We watched in silence as the helpless tot was subjected to a series of scans & tests, a catheter to drain his bladder, insertion of a canula for the administration of strong antibiotics and a good washing of his bum. A bloke came out and explained what was going on, and said that they’d do their best but Simon may not make it – the strength of antibiotics needed to deal with the Chlamydia would probably destroy his gut ultimately. But at least they tried and we really hope that Simon made it. Steve was dispassionate and scientifically curious whilst watching the goings-on (he even thought about asking a medical question until the guy next to us mentioned that he was an orthopaedic surgeon), whereas Debbie was on the verge of blubbing for Britain! We were so privileged to witness some of the work that these guys do, and surprised to learn that Koala Conservation Australia are almost exclusively funded by public donations – our friends and relatives may well be adopting koalas for Christmas/birthday gifts in future years!

A final afternoon by the lovely hotel pool was planned before our Greyhound departure at 18.45 but Debbie couldn’t relax as she’d been tracking our bus and had spotted that it was running at least an hour ahead of schedule. Unsure whether it’d wait for us, she insisted that we set off for the bus stop far too early, but better to be safe than sorry as we were heading to a wine region and didn’t want to risk missing that! Next stop – the Hunter Valley…