Byron Bay

Click here for photos from Byron Bay

We flew up north again for our winter escape. Brisbane airport has become very familiar to us. It felt a little surreal as we were there only two months ago after coming back from America.

We had an early morning start from Canberra. At the airport, Virgin Airlines check-in was packed, and flights were delayed. It took us a while to get through and our flight was also delayed about an hour. Once we had finally arrived in Brisbane and collected our luggage we got our hire car, a red Toyota Camry hybrid, and drove straight to Byron Bay with a stop at an Aldi for groceries and sandwiches from a Foodary. It was a beautiful day, and it was so nice not to feel cold.

We were still a bit early for check-in at our AirBnB so we stopped at Main Beach in Byron Bay. Catherine went straight to the sand and played as she usually does when we go to a beach. It felt good to be at the coast. We found some gelato and went back to main beach to eat and take in the relaxing atmosphere.

The drive to our AirBnB was interesting. It looked like the map was leading us to the lighthouse. It turned out that we weren’t very far from it. Going up (and down) the driveway to the house was really interesting too. We had to go up two steep driveways with a sharp turn in the middle. Catherine refused to be in the car afterwards every time we went out for a drive. The car camera was very useful.

As with the overall vibe in Byron Bay, we mostly chilled during our three-day stay. The house had a spectacular view and was the perfect, idyllic beach house. We could see dolphins in the water and kayakers navigating the choppy waves.

The next day we explored Cape Byron Lighthouse and Wategos Beach. It was busy driving up to the lighthouse. Phil dropped us off at the top and went in search for parking. We saw more dolphins and whales in the water. Our eyes were going a little cross-eyed scanning the coast for a while. It was a cool and gloomy day. There were some showers by the time we left the lighthouse. The views were amazing but unfortunately, we couldn’t walk to the most eastern point of Australia as the track was closed for maintenance. We walked to Wategos Beach later in the day which was a short path from the house. We could see the lighthouse and our AirBnB from the beach. Because of the weather, the beach was very quiet. There were some surfers in the water. We had a wet walk back to the house as it started to rain.

Our last full day in Byron Bay was wet. We stayed in for the morning and decided to catch the latest Indiana Jones movie in the afternoon. It wasn’t surprising that it was a full house by the time the movie started. The movie was fun and entertaining. We went out for dinner afterwards at Chihuahua Taqueria. The kids inhaled the nachos while Phil and I had tasty tacos. The rain had stopped by then.

We woke up the next morning to a glorious warm day. We checked out of our AirBnB before 11am and drove down to Clarkes Beach. It was quite busy but there was still plenty of space since it was such a wide and expansive beach. A lot of surfers were in the water. We walked to Fisherman’s Lookout and soaked in the view. We think we spotted some more whales in the distance.

As we drove out of Byron Bay, we stopped at The Farm to have something to drink before we drove back up the coast. We waited a while for expensive milkshakes, but we found a scenic spot to sit and enjoyed watching some pigs before we got back on the road.