Gold Coast and the real Sunshine Coast

Yesterday Jenny took us to Noosa Heads on the Sunshine Coast for our first beach day in Australia. It is very important to swim between the flags on the beaches here in Australia because there are often dangerous strong rips that can drag you quite far away from the shore in a matter of seconds. I went for a swim and tried bodysurfing. We finished the day by going on a little hike in Noosa National Park and got some wonderful views of the coastline upon this viewpoint known as Hell's Gate.

Hell's Gate

Today we visited this tropical fruit plantation which had the world's largest variety of tropical fruits just across the New South Wales border. On the tractor tour through the plantation we saw trees bearing fruits which we'd never heard of, such as custard apple, black sapote, babuco and sapodilla. The best part was being able to taste a large selection of these fruits picked straight off the tree. It was also very interesting to see where more common things like avocados, mangoes, macadamia nuts come from.


Miracle fruit, so called because they change the sensation of your taste buds.

 On the way back, we took the scenic route along the beach and stopped in Surfer's Paradise on the Gold Coast. As soon as I saw the waves, I understood why they named it that. It was a lot of fun just to be tossed around by the waves and I could have stayed in the waters the entire day if there was more time. I also caught sight of some hardcore Ironwomen training for their race tomorrow, which is not a triathlon but a life surfing competition consisting of ski, board, swim and run legs.


Gold Coast

Off to Melbourne tomorrow!