Byron Bay

We pulled up in Byron Bay today. From what we heard it was meant to be similar to Nimbin, in the way that it was very relaxed, and the population has a penchant for locally grown weed!

We arrived in the afternoon. Myself and Christy were a little behind the rest so we arranged to meet up with them in one of the car parks by the sea. By the time we arrived, we could tell it was a big tourist attraction, especially compared to Nimbin. It was nice and clean, and really small, and the whole town was full of visiting campers, ranging from Wicked Vans drivers like ourselves, to full winnabagos driven by middle aged couples.

The town itself was just like any regular small town we encountered. It had its coffee shops, its supermarkets, few pubs etc. The only difference really being the locals. They had managed to combine the "hippy" lifestyle of Nimbin, with a more civilised, more mainstream lifestyle, probably due to the good surf experinced there, which brough all sorts of people to the town, and obviously you can't really surf too well if you're half baked all the time! Not safely anyway! :p

The beaches were nice, the town was nice and its most famous atraction, the lighthouse, was worth the few dollars entry fee into the car park! The lighthouse was situated at the cliffhead up atop the hill. From here, you can see for miles out into the sea. This is good whale watching country, as wel as for watching dolphins. I can see why, as it is surrounded by water on nearly all sides. You've got about a 300 degree view of the water.

We had a look around, took some photos, and headed back, but not before seeing what we thought was a snake. We thought we saw out first snake of the whole trip...but alas, as we got closer, we saw it had legs. Just another salamander, or whatever they're called! :p

We headed back to town after a while to look for accomodation. The place seemed quite busy so hopefully we could get accomodation without too much hassle. We went back to the road and start asking in a few places. They were all full. We even had trouble finding parking around the town. We wanted to stay here the night so we probably would have found a spot on the side of the road somewhere if we were stuck. After all, we were in camper vans, so we may as well get some use out of them. Luckily, we found a caravan park a few minutes out of Byron Town. We stayed there the night and headed off in the morning. Byron was a nice little town but we decided to head on down the highway, and see where it took us...

Nimbin

Nimbin - what can I say. If there was ever a strong argument against legalising cannabis....this is it!

I've been to Amsterdam and I have seen first hand the marijuana culture over there. Nimbin is similar. As far as I know, its not legal here, but the police just turn a blind eye. The place is full of stoners and hippys who's lives seem to revolve around smoking weed, weed history, and uhh....I forget....wait....what?


The town itself is one street, fairly run down. It is way out in the middle of the mountains about 2 hours drive from anywhere remotely recognised as civilisation. People flock to the place based purely on its reputation for good weed. The visitors stand out like a bar of soap in a pile of cow dung, owing to the lack of "Free the Weed" or "Dont drink and drive, smoke weed and fly" t-shirts. Walking along the street, I saw a man sitting on a stool outside the marijuana museum (a thinly disguised hash shop with a few "the history of..." posters, and Jimi Hendrix pictures) who was smoking a pipe. He must have been pushing 70. The mans arms were stick thin, his flesh loosely hanging, his hands shaking, and in between coughing he would take another smoke of his pipe. I got the impression that this guy had been sitting there since his younger days, and had probably been stoned ever since! These people grow their own product, and make money from selling to the tourists. I didn't like the place. It was populated with the people I hate the most....that is, people who overly promote hash as this wonderous substance that is completely harmless, and wear "Weedboy" t-shirts made from hemp! I was surrounded by them. It was nasty. Of the few locals I spoke to, the only ones that were nice to you, were selling some form of hash brownie, or cheap weed. The ones that werent selling simply came across as idiots.

We bought a sampling of the local produce anyway, and tried it out later back in the camper vans. Dave rolled a pure weed joint for Donna, and she was on the floor after about 5 minutes. The rest of them smoked regular joints with tobacco mixed in, after seing what happened to our guinea pig!

After the 1 night there, we all agreed that was enough, and made our way out of the town. Onwards to Byron Bay. Hopefully it will be a better experience...