I was dancing with Bipasha Basu and Antara Mali, singing songs with them, when suddenly Antara said “Wake up Ash..you Lord-of-the-Bed, haul your lazy, good for nothing behind and lets go” Wha??...I slowly and painfully opened my eyes, and saw Cookie, Jason and some other vague shapes prodding me in the ribs. ”Go away”! “Oye, we are going to Byron Bay, get your stuff and lets zoom”, chirped Cookie, which I resented, as it was a) 4 in the morning and she was too cheery for me at that god-awful hour, b) I had crawled into bed at 1 am after a “joyful” dinner with my boss, and, most importantly, c) It was a Saturday.
“Err guys, I am all for having you wonderful people for company, but, why Byron?” me asketh. “There’s a Jazz festival on Ash, ” said Wu, [Please remember this idiot’s name..its important] and I was immediately at peace with all mankind. You see, I love jazz, and the thought of all those jazz masters converging on one of the most beautiful places in Aussieland, filled me up with, what’s the word...starts with e... enticement? No..ahh, yes, excitement. Byron Bay is the Australia’s eastern-most point, and is in the state of New South Wales. It’s about, oh, 800 odd kms from Sydney, and 200 kms from Brisbane. [Due to the all powerful word limit, I won’t bore you good folks with the gory details of our journey, suffice to say, it can be a review in itself! We had a ball!! So, let’s jump straight to Byron!]
Ahh! Byron! What an incredibly beautiful place. Wallah! Lush, green surrounds, rolling hills, the Pacific Ocean in all its glory…heaven! Byron is so beautiful, that I felt it was almost a privilege to be here, to partake in nature’s spell-binding beauty! [Of course, there were a few beauties with us, but that’s a different story! :-)] Byron speaks with your soul. It fills you with awe and wonder. How can a place be so awe-inspiring!! At times, you almost feel like you are trespassing in nature’s laboratory, it’s such a special place.
We drove straight to the famous Lighthouse. Now, I, being the true Harry Potter fan, started comparing it with the one in the first movie, much to the deep disgust of the muggles with me! The light of this lighthouse [wow! What sentence construction! I amaze myself] is pretty hot stuff [heh heh! Pun intended] it has the output of some 2, 000, 000 candles!! Neat, eh? Apart from the lighthouse pre se, the best thing about the place is the barbeque! It’s right in front of towering waves with make so much noise that it’s pretty difficult to hold a conversation! How rude of them. And a particularly big one kept splashing us with miniscule droplets of salty water every now and then. Had a great time playing touch footy [will explain later] on the knob of extremely green grass after an excellent feed of bread, potatoes, cucumber, chicken; all grilled to charcoal like blackness [courtesy Jessica and Anil, the resident chefs] and good ‘ol nutritious coke!
After the game, [which my team of Jessica, Jason, Kevin, Rachel, Li and Choi lost badly, thanks for asking] some bright spark suggested we go for one of the famous walks along Byron. We took the [Cape Byron[ walking trail, a “comfortable” distance of 5kms, through beaches, rainforests, and hills. It was amazingly gorgeous! The trail starts at the Arakwal National Park; winding thorough some lush green rainforests and ends at Tallow Beach. All that walking was fine for the crazy lunatics among us, but for sensible people like yours truly, the idea of waddling along 5K’s after a sumptuous lunch, was asking too much! Still, we soldiered on, lured by the sight of so much beauty and splendor, and of course, the prospect of swimming in the ocean, and more importantly, of Jet Skiing!! For those of you who enjoy hiking, this will seem like paradise to you! There are many walks around the rugged cliffs, luscious rainforests, and amazingly beautiful and unspoilt beaches. This has got to be the one major trump card, not only of Byron, but of Australia as whole; the tourists are limited by Indian standards, and the places are maintained superbly.
Ahh, Jet skiing!! Bliss!! Or, so I thought! You see, we got into a rather unfortunate stunt, me and Cookie, that is. [Sorry, but it will have to be shifted to the comment section!] I was a broken man after that, and retreated with tail between the legs to a bar at the beach, where the bar girl, bless her, gave me a free drink, and some much needed sympathy! There are other sports like Scuba Diving, Kayaking, Para-sailing, Deep Sea fishing et al at Byron, and I strongly recommend then. Do avoid Jet Skiing if you have lunatics for friends! I thought Jazz would cheer me up, because after all, the primary reason we came here to Byron was for the Jazz festival! Well, the jazz festival at Byron is world famous, and all the top jazz bands and musicians come here from across the world, but in APRIL!! Not in May!! Wu [The priceless idiot from paragraph 2] had mistaken the dates!!! Well, after roundly abusing the poor chap, we went to this famous Jazz bar, called Cocamangas! It’s a super place, and luckily for us, Papa Lips, the famous Jazz Band was playing!! We had a great time listening to the soul-soothing jazz music, with some fine Yalumba wine! Heady Stuff!! And just when we thought it couldn’t get any better, we were in for a treat, as Miya Masaoka, the famous Japanese jazz guru, played with her legendary Koto [it’s a 13 string instrument which resembles a crouching dragon! Honest! Jokes apart] It was an unforgettable evening, and to those planning on visiting Byron, I would strongly recommend the Month of April, when world famous Jazz players converge here from across the world.
The morning was spent idling on the Tallow beach and doing nothing but drinking beer, vodka, coke, rum and Orange juice and chewing the fat with friends and locals. At around noon, some bright spark, I forget who, suggested a game of volleyball, a net was duly borrowed from the friendly lifeguards, and a great game was had, with half the crowd barely able to stand straight! Great fun! There are some truly outstanding beaches here, some of ones worth having a visit, are Belongil Beach, Main Beach, which is a very popular and hence crowded beach. The Pass is a very popular beach with surfers, given the enormous waves here. Belongil beach is famous for its “Optional Clothing” section; no we didn’t go there :-)
Byron is a small little sexy beach town which offers something for everyone. Go there with friends and family. Laze around. Visit the oh-so pristine beaches. Hike along some awe-inspiring nature trails which run thorough unspoiled rainforests. See the endangered animals like the Potoroo, the red-leg Pademelon, the Marble frogmouth, and the Stephen’s band snake!! Be prepared to run into Kangaroos when you are walking. Soothe your soul with the greatest music in the whole world called jazz. Bask and wonder at the glory of nature, and bow your head at the dazzling beauty of God’s creation; which Byron truly is.