Back In Byron : Surfin' In Paradise

Hi everyone, wassup ?

Here's the last post of this blog. So enjoy it as much as it deserves to be !!

It all started by checkin' out the swell forecasts for the weekend. 5 feet of E/NE consistent swell ---> Good Waves !!!! So let's go to Byron !! It's been pretty much a while since I wanted to go back to Byron anyway. So this is the perfect occasion to do so... I didn't do as last week : I booked the shuttle and the accomodation pretty soon this time. Pretty smart, hey ? O_o

So, back to our stuffs... Saturday, -too- soon in the morning: I reach the shuttle. After a couple of minutes, I see two people that looked like French guys. And I was right : they were actually French. So I started chatting with them, and they were pretty cool. It was the first time they went to Byron, so I almost was their touristic guide !! No kidding. Pretty funny, hey ? After a not-that-long ride, we eventually overtook the Byron Bay roadsign : we were in. Great. A couple of minutes later, I grabbed my board and the phone number of the French guys to keep in touch for the night coming.

Sympa le YHA de Byron, non ?

Then I walked to the hostel I booked (the Byron Bay YHA) and put my stuffs in the 4-people dorm (important for what's comin'). I took my backpack, surfboard, wax and wetsuit and headed to the Billabong store to ask the guy where the action was today, and buy THE perfect gift for Pmalet. "The Pass", a right pointbreak at the eastern end of the mainbeach. Alright, let's check it out. Well...... The swell was not as good as expected. Inconsistent, weak and only 2 feet --> a lot of longboarders and surf schools. "Bof"... Anyway, I decided to go in the water just to see what it was like. and I must say it was pretty shitty : the good waves came like one every 10 minutes and they were picked up by the longboarders before I actually started paddling... You guessed it, I went out of the water after about 30 minutes of paddling-pumping-paddling-pumping... Then decided to check what was goin' on at Tallow Beach. I knew that it would be pretty shitty because of the blasted South wind but I decided to have a look. I then realised it was really crappy and on the way back I met these French guys in a van. Pretty cool guys, all surfers. We started talkin' about everything for almost one hour and they offered me the ride back to The Pass to see if it was better than before. The wind indeed started to calm down and the swell was supposed to get bigger at the end of the day. Always worth checkin' it out, hey ?

Getting back to The Pass, the swell was actually a little bit bigger and the wind had smoothened quite a bit. It was really better and we stayed in the water 'till the end of the day. With the sun getting down, the water started to have some deep and beautiful colours. Pretty nice to surf in this...

The Pass quand ça a commencé à grossir. Stylé, non ? Vue depuis le promontoire rocheux où les badauds s'agglutinent pour mater les surfeurs

The Pass, le Soleil commençant à descendre, et moi sorti de l'eau, fatigué de lutter contre les longboarders...

In Byron, even when the Sun passes down the mountains at the horizon, the skie remains orange and pink for soooo long. So beautiful.... Enough to make you fall in love with this place. What I obviously did... But good things always got an end : we all got out of the water because of a fuckin' bastard that crashed into the girl of the crew, without any excuses or whatever. He started to run away and we ran after him !!! After a loooooooong oral fight, he finally gave the girl 20$ (nothing compared to the way he smashed the board)... We almost smashed his face. He was a 40-year old guy, pretending to be a local (what he wasn't) and acting like a 12-years old kid, runnin' away after having done something wrong... Stupid wancker, go to Hell !!

After this (and a couple of joints for them), they braught me back to my place, where I met Ben, an Aussie, one of my roomates. He had nothing to do tonight (long story) so I proposed him to go with us (the Frenchies and I) and hang out in Byron. We didn't know that yet, but this night was gonna be pretty crazy !!!

I called Emilie, the French girl form the shuttle and we met each other at the information centre, with the rest of her crew. After the classic introduction, we went to a good old pub : the Railway Pub. A Funk/Rock band was playin' and the beer was cheap. Perfect. Because of Ben, the Australian guy, we had to speak english... The French guys were barely able to understand a single word !!! Funny !! After a couple of beers, we decided to move on to the next bar. The Beachie's hotel, one of he best bars in Byron, just in front of the main beach. Pretty nice. A heavy metal band was playin' some hudge, heavy shit !!!! Cool. After one or two beers, something pretty unlikely happened : I was ordering a beer at the tap and there I met the blond guy from the Coolangatta YHA (cf posts 6&9) !!! No way !!!!!! He was a little bit drunk ---> funniest as ever !!! He told me "Next time you go to Cooly, come by the YHA, free accomodation for ya". Styyyyylééééééééééééééé !!!! (C'est pas le genre de truc qui arriverait en France)

Oh, I almost forgot : there was this blond girl lookin' for some cash. We met her three times in one day !!!!!! Her eyes looked deeply into void : she was definitely on heroin !!!!!!!! Welcome to Byron my friends !!!!!!!!

After 10 minutes or somethin' our crew splitted : the grandpa's went to bed and the true rockin' guys went to the........... Cheeky Monkey, THE night club of Byron !!! After a second thought, and because I had to wake up early to surf, Ben and I decided to go back to the YHA. By the way, we gave our free drink vouchers to the most beautiful girls in the long entrance queue with an eye-blink !!! (on se refait pas désolé !!)

We grabbed some beers and headed to the YHA. We expected to drink these beers with the other guys at the hostel but everyone was sleepin'. WTF ?? And then the unlikely happened : the japaneese guy from our dorm had picked up o_O. Yes, p-i-c-k-e-d u-p. Amazing.... Obviously, I made fun of Ben, who was single : "the japaneese geek picked up and you didn't". Ouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh !!!! But there was a problem : the Japanese guy took his girl in the dorm ---> they would definitely have sex, which means we can't drink our beers peacefully in the dorm !!! After a small apart-talk with the Jap guy, Ben and I decided to leave them some time to do their stuffs . But what to do ? Head back to the Cheeky Monkeys, of course !!!!!!! So we headed back. But I still had two beers and I had to finish them before I entered the club. You know what it's like... Because I didn't want ot get blasted (remember I had to wake up early to surf) I skulled one (cul-sec) and gave the other one to a good lookin' girl on the street who was celebrating her 21st. "You're the best". Ouais, je sais, je sais.

After a small queue to get in, guess what ?? We didn't find the Frenchies but we found..... The blond guy from Cooly YHA !!! He was really drunk and transformed into some kind of Snoop Dogg on the beat !!!!! He tried to convince me to cheat on Julie for one of the bitches around !!!!! he was so blasted !!! We laughed louder than ever seein' him dancin' ! And there were aaaalll these good lookin' chicks arround !! OMG !! But Ben didn't pick up... Bouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh !!! (C'aurait été moi...)

Then we came back to the YHA and told the whole story (he Jap --> the beers --> The Cheeky Monkeys) to the English guy (the fourth guy of the dorm). He could'nt stop laughin' : the Japaneese guy picked up !!! o_O Je m'en suis toujours pas remis....

After a short-but-good night, it's time to take a small brekky (Aussie breakfast) in front of the beach... M-a-g-i-c. The bay is soooooooo beautiful in the early light... Etienne, you know what I'm talkin'bout, right ? But enough of wonder-watchin' : let's head to Tallow Beach before the wind blows up and see what it's like. On the way, I was overtaken by a guy on a longboard skate. I met this guy again once at the beach : he was checkin' the waves, just like me. So I talked to him and he was.......... French !! We analysed the ocean and concluded it would be better one hour later. So we came back to the camping where he lived and we started talkin'. He really was pretty cool. After one hour, we decided to go back to Tallow. It seemed to be a bit better. It was really difficult to get behind the waves, especially with my shortboard (he had a fish board, bastard !!!). We took a few waves and we came back to the beach after getting smashed by a 8-10 waves serie. Everybody went back to the beach after this hudge serie !!! It was pretty destroyin' !!

We then sat on the beach and watched the pros go in the shorebreaks on the northern part of the beach. They were god damned good !! After this, we headed back to the camping and ate with his friends (free meal for me, héhé). After a huuuuuuudge meal, we decided to check Tallow again : shitty because of the South wind. We checked The Pass : way to small for us shortboarders. Bof... I decided to bodysurf a little bit on the beachbreaks in front of the camping. It really was a shame the swell wasn't bigger 'cause this wave has a huge potential...

Anyway, time to get back to the shuttle and to Brisbane. In spite of the not-that-good surf, Byron bay was still as beautiful and magic as ever. This place definitley has somethin'...

Remember the first lines of this post ? This is my final cool weekend in Australia.... Too short man !!!! F*** !!

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed reading all the articles concerning our fabulous adventures in Paradise !!!!!

See ya 'round buddies !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Tomato Ketchup/Bilbon le Canard, from Somewhere In Paradise....

PS : skonvavoumettreavectomalarentree !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

PPS : comme quoi, c'est les weekends où on est le plus à l'arrache qu'il nous arrive le plus de trucs stylés !!!!!!!!!!!!!!