1770

Ahh, that is the sound of complete relaxation. This is the Town of 1770 and Agnes Waters. The hostel we stayed at, supposedly one of the best in Oz is run by a bunch of surfer dudes with laid back attitudes. Very cool indeed. I already wrote this post once back in Airlie (now on Magnetic Island) but the computers seized up and the lady told us that the server for all of Australia had gone down. I waited for about 30 minutes and apparently Australia doesn't use the internet because it was still down. They handed off $1 off coupons to us and thought that they were doing us a favor. Not happy about that one. Such is life.

1770 rocked. Or, paradoxically, didn't. Yeah it was a completely quiet town and the last place to on the Australian East coast to surf if you are heading north. This is because of the Great Barrier Reef (might have heard of it?) and how it blocks all the waves from reaching the beach. I had never really thought about that before until i came here but it certainly rings true. So Jo has gone because she is leaving early to continue our travels so now it's JP and I on our own, with some Danish friends to boot. 1770 was a lazy time with surfing during the hot as days and watching a few movies at night. We arrived to see Zoolander on top of the tv (we usually watch crap) and our hearts nearly jumped out of our collective chests. We come back after a long day on the beach to settle down and have a beer and watch the film but it has been returned in favor of films such as 'Jaws Returns', 'The Naked Gun', and 'The Castle' an Aussie film so bad i just had to leave and go sit on the internet. There were a couple of good ones though i suppose so we ended up watching Catch Me if You Can and We Were Soldiers. Decent but certainly not Hansel.

There ended up being a surf competition on Saturday and Sunday so we watched that for a bit and all the hostel kids were surfing too and getting in the way. Don't think that the locals loved it but the competition wasn't big enough to warrant kicking people out of the water. Not too impressive but couldn't really see anything so i don't really know. We got a free jeep tour and it was like a mini Fraser trip bumping around down sand roads in 1981 model Land Cruisers. Pretty BA if you ask me. Got into a yarn with a dyslexic 19 year old English kid and some English and Canadian girls. Had to stick up for and explain America as best i could. I don't think that you guys would choose me as an ambassador if you had the choice though. J and i had a good mexicana night after surfing and that turned into lunch the next day. Always good to have that much food. Also made a barefoot trek to the bottle shop and i think my feet wanted to die. It was friday happy hour and the mullets were out in full force. I don't know what these guys do for a living but i do think that all they really do is watch footy and put money in the pokies. J reasoned that we buy a 30 pack of beers and save some for Dingo (up next yippee) and for 30 beers it was $40 which is $32 American or a little over a $1 a beer. Shit beer though. This is the reasoning he always does though even though he is leaving in like 2 weeks and has plenty of denero. He is also my trip planner for the last few weeks and pretty much till i leave Aussie. He does quite a job.

Got up at 6:30 for the last day of surf and the swell was over. We have had good surfing luck all the way and now on the final competition day and our last day of surf in oz there is nothing. Flat. Oh well, we made the effort and got screwed. Seems like that's the way it is sometimes. But i had some toast and tea on the beach which is nice. Off to Dingo and a supposedly big party for the last night of the cattle station hosting the Oz Exp kids.