New Horizons

October 7, 2001-RACQ
(photos:
No explanation needed,
Easternmost point in Australia,
Sand castle,
Mooball Cafe)

For a time-compulsive like David, the start of the day was inauspicious. We planned to leave two hours for the hour and a half drive to the bar mitzvah in Byron Bay. This gave us time to get lost. We ended up not needing “lost” time, but we did need extra time. Our car battery was dead. I must say that David did maintain his composure and called the RACQ (Royal Auto Club Queensland). Their computers were down, but they assured us that they’d have someone out within the hour.

David went outside to wait and I walked across the street to a service station where I learned two things. The service department is closed on Sundays and jumper cables are called jumper leads. I walked back across the street to see if David had started panicking and found him slightly more agitated, but managing. The people on duty at the reception desk in our lobby couldn’t help but did call the maintenance man to see if he had leads. While we went back to waiting for RACQ, I asked one of the shopkeepers if he had leads. He didn’t, but in typical Aussie fashion he went out of his way to offer help. He was willing to take the battery out of his car and ours, put our battery in his car to charge it, and then put it back in our car. Just about then, the RACQ truck pulled up and we got rolling. We were only 15 minutes late to the bar mitzvah.

Bucolic Bar Mitzvah

How can I describe the setting at the home where this took place? One hundred acres nestled on a hilltop overlooking the ocean and mountains. Do you have the visual? The service took place under a bower covered with palm branches. It was next to a pond and had a clear view of the valley where cattle grazed. The foliage was a mixture of landscaping and natural undergrowth accented by boulders, rocks, and dirt paths. David has done a wedding at a home where a dog settled itself under the chuppah (wedding canopy), but this was the first time he’d done a service with cows mooing in the background.

Those assembled were family from New York and friends. There is a hippie area in the neighboring town of Mullimbimby. I think half the town showed up. At least they dressed the part. The father of the bar mitzvah was in shorts as were most of the men. Children were barefoot and women wore sundresses embellished with shawls, sheer jackets, and an assortment of beaded or tie-dyed anything. Large brimmed hats were passed out at the start of the ceremony to serve as sunshades not as ritual head coverings. The boy read only his Torah portion and David did the rest of the service including all the singing. The woman with whom he’d spoken on the phone and to whom he’d hummed a few bars of “Lo Yisa Goy” decided not to sing. I spent the service following the dogs around as we searched for shade. Their Australian sheep dog & I bonded. I also kept an eye peeled for roos and koalas neither of which made an appearance. There was a reception after the service with music and lunch, but we didn’t stay. We were anxious to be tourists again.

On Our Own

They’d gotten us a room at the Beach Hotel in Byron Bay where our room overlooks the ocean and we can hear the surf through our open windows. We changed into shorts and headed for the once monthly market in town. This area seems to be overrun with youth so it was no surprise when David noticed a special crossing area with a sign designating it as an “aged person crossing.” In case the old people don’t make it across the street there are “refuge islands” in the middle of the street where they can stop. These are clearly marked. We have them too. I think we call them traffic islands.

At the market there were Hippie types who came to sell their wares: clothing, jewelry, pottery, t-shirts. There were food, massage and reflexology tents, and a stall for Greenpeace. Many come from a community an hour away called Nimbin where marijuana is freely, though illegally, used. We may go there tomorrow, although one woman told us it was a sad place. Most of the adults and children are stoned.

The Sight

I didn’t realize how tired I was from the heat, but after an hour at the market, I needed to lie down. I was actually staggering. I hadn’t eaten since breakfast and hadn’t had enough to drink. We grabbed lunch and water, but it took a two-hour nap to set me right.

The main site in Byron Bay is the lighthouse. It sits on the easternmost point of Australia and is a popular whale watching area. Alas, the humpbacks prefer the early morning, so we didn’t see them. We started the drive to the point at about 4:45pm hoping to see the sun set. The drive is up a winding road running along the coast. As we climbed, the scenery became more spectacular. This is the rugged, rocky North Coast of New South Wales. Beaches are set into coves where waves roll calmly in after crashing on the outer rocks. The backdrop for it all is the craggy mountains of the Great Dividing Range.

We passed several campgrounds across the street from the beach. It was as close as you can get in Australia to living on the beach. All beaches here are public and usually bordered by paths and parks. Imagine walking out of your camper and into the surf? When we arrived at the top, the lighthouse was everything it promised to be from the distance. It’s immaculately white sitting castle-like on its pinnacle. It’s a working lighthouse so when the sun set and the light came on, it was like a jewel in the crown.

But of course, this is Australia, so, to lighten things up, there were goats. I don’t know why there were goats, but they were busily trimming the undergrowth around the lighthouse which may be there only reason to be there. We’ve waited for sunsets all over the world and seem to be awed by each in their turn. This didn’t disappoint us. As we waited to get the perfect photo, we ended up taking several. Each change and gradation of shading seemed better than the one a moment ago. As the sky turned to pink, fuscia, and then red, we headed back to our hotel.

Winding Down

Before dinner we took a walk along the beach and came upon a sand artist. He does amazingly complex sand sculpture, photographs them, and sells the photos. The one we saw tonight had been illuminated with candles. It was a castle with figures of Neptune and a mermaid as part of the design. It was splendid.

We’ll tour the area some more tomorrow and head home in time for Simchat Torah tomorrow night. That’s the celebration of finishing the reading of the scrolls for the year and starting over again. On the way back we’ll be mindful to “stay in the left lane except when overtaking” as the signs say.

Life Savers

I have additional information about the surf life saving people. I poked fun at them yesterday, but kindly left out the description of the red and yellow rubber swim caps they wear. I would like to tell you that they are an incredibly necessary and respected part of life here since 1909. They are an integral part of the culture. I didn’t know until today that they’re all volunteers. The training is rigorous and the standards high.

October 8, 2001-Happy Hippies, Contented Cows

Our dinner last night at the Mango Jam Restaurant was more than leisurely. They forgot to put our order in, so it took two hours. We got comped 10% for the wait. Syd Bruce had quipped that Australia is the only nation that eats its national symbol, kangaroo. Not on this menu. We weren’t in a rush to go anywhere, so I started counting station wagons. We were perched on the 2nd floor balcony of the restaurant and had a bird’s eye view of the converging roads and the roundabout. I counted well over 50 station wagons. That seems to be the family car of choice over here. Vans and SUVs are available, but not as popular. I didn’t even know they still made wagons.

We drove back today along the mountain route. It was an easier, less trafficked drive, although I thought the coast road was more scenic. We skipped Nimbin since we’d seen the hippies at the market, weren’t interested in cannabis, and had toured tea and banana plantations elsewhere. Going through the mountains allowed us to see Mullimbimby. It’s as cute as its name. There’s not much to see except the people who live there. They were primarily dressed in vintage hippie garb and stores catered to the crystal, herbal, aromatherapy set. One woman typified the residents. She was 9 ½ months pregnant, wearing an ankle length granny dress, barefoot, and using an ATM. We also saw an elderly woman riding an electric cart. She had an open umbrella secured to the vehicle as a sunshade as well as an orange “caution slow vehicle” flag flying on a pole protruding from the back end of the cart. She wasn’t crossing at an “aged person crossing” sign.

We continued home through a town aptly called Mooball. The telephone poles were painted in a black and white cow pattern along with a totally cow splotched Moo Café and Service Station. The lawn trash wasn’t in keeping with the bovine theme: no statues of ducks, geese, roosters, and certainly not black lawn jockeys. One of the lawns did have a kangaroo pushing a cart of flowers.

Toby