Surfers Paradise

Last weekend H and I went to Queensland with Martin and Claire, Chris and Anna. We stayed in Surfers Paradise on the Gold Coast and it was the first time I have left NSW since arriving here. I had been to Surfers before though, when I was last here as a backpacker.

So the reason for the trip was to celebrate Claire's 25th birthday. She is leaving Australia soon and wanted to see the Gold Coast before going back to the UK. We managed to book a three bed apartment in the new Q1 resort. It's the tallest residential building in the world and the 20th tallest building in the world and. Our apartment, which was a Big Brother meets IKEA hybrid, was on the 54th floor, which meant we had a stunning view of the Gold Coast.

We flew up on Thursday, the flight taking an hour or so from Sydney. On Friday we headed off to Dreamworld, which is one of a few amusement parks in the area.

We had a quality day out, and get this. We got stuck on a rollercoaster. It only happens on the movies right? Well no, it doesn't. It happened to us. Fortunately is sounds a lot more impressive than it actually was. We took off on the Tower of Terror, a ride that accelerates you from 0-160kph in 7 seconds (it used to be the fastest in the world) and shoots you up the side of a tower (38 storeys high) before free-falling back down.

Well no sooner as we accelerated but the ride slowed down and we came to a stop at the foot of the climb. We sat there for twenty minutes or so until three guys and a winch came to our rescue. The ride had actually done the same thing three rides before us but we decided to brave the technical issues and go on the ride anyway. The staff compensated us by taking us to the front of the queue of the Giant Drop. It's the tallest free-falling ride in the world at 39 storeys (although surely the one on top of The Stratosphere in Vegas is higher!). Don't you just love theme park statistics? This ride was superb. And having just broken down on the ride before, which was attached to the same tower, those thoughts were very much in our mind. I am not sure how I would've coped if I'd had to stay in my seat hundreds of feet off the ground. Anyway, all was good and it was a great experience, even though I had been told off by the same member of staff who took us to the front of the ride, for trying to smuggle my camera on the ride.

While we were on the Giant Drop we could feel the Tower vibrating as they continued their tests on the malfunctioning Tower of Terror. Feeling the whole thing move as you were sat in your seat only served to increase the apprehension, and adrenalin levels. But when we got off the Giant Drop we were told that the first ride was now working and that we would be taken to the front again if we so wished. Of course we would!! So off we went. And this time the ride worked. It was a beauty and so much better than I expected. So breaking down on rollercoasters does have its benefits.

We spent the rest of the day in the park checking out the other rides. These included The Claw, Wipeout and some lame water ride were H and Anna got a soaking. There was also a Tiger show which wasn't particularly good.

But it was a top day out and we were all knackered by the end of it. We ate some tasty Thai for Claire's birthday meal.

We spent Saturday in Surfers Paradise. Surfers Paradise doesn't seem to have changed in the last 7 years. It is the Blackpool of Australia in so much as it is full or trashy bars and clubs. The beach, however, is a beauty, although the waves looked pretty average to me. When I was last here I remember a huge poo pipe running the length of the beach. This has now been cleared away (or covered up) and the beach is a lot better.

We spent the evening in Broadbeach, which is ten minutes south of Surfers. It's much nicer.

Sunday was our last day on the Goldie and we headed back to Broadbeach for lunch after checking out the Oberservation deck on Levels 77 and 78 in the Q1.

Our flight was due to leave at 6ish so we then headed south to Coolangatta to have a look around. I was pretty excited by this as it meant I got to see two world class surf breaks; Snapper Rocks and D-bah. The swell wasn't big but it was nice to see decent waves after the mush at Surfers Paradise.

What a great weekend.