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Byron Bay, Broken Head, Mullimbimby, & Bangalow

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4/2/20259 min read

After leaving Dungarubba, I was headed to Byron Bay and pretty excited to check this part of NSW out! I've mentioned in previous posts just how wet it's been and the weather continued to be soggy...I stayed at the Broken Head Holiday Park for two nights and by the time I got there and checked in, I was really looking forward to taking a shower as there weren't any shower facilities at the Hipcamp...So I rolled into Broken Head mid-afternoon and got Vinnie set-up, took an icy cold shower (every shower I took at this place was chilly!), and then settled in to cook some comfort food (African Peanut Soup!) while it poured rain outside the van...I spent the rest of the afternoon planning out the things I wanted to explore including visiting the lighthouse, going sea kayaking to spot dolphins, visiting a local distillery, and just wandering at will to soak up the Byron vibe...

There was a break in the rain the following morning and this campsite was right next to the beach so I grabbed the boogie board a friend gave me and headed down to the beach and had fun with the surfers...Happy girl!

After the beach I headed into Byron Bay which is about 8 km down the road from Broken Head...My first stop was the hippie Byron Farmer's Market where I picked up some passion fruit, pumpkin-macadamia dip, and had a Choc-Nut smoothie...Really enjoying all of the smoothies I'm finding along my travels here!

After the Farmer's Market, I headed up to the Byron Bay Lighthouse which is located on a wedge of land that is the furthest Eastern point in Australia in case you're interested...The lighthouse is a beautiful white beacon up on the point and, of course, I love staring at the sea and watching the waves...And lucky me! I bought a NSW National Parks pass for my stay at Woody Head and it included an hour of parking up at the lighthouse...

And now for a small tangent...You've got to love the USA for inventing the concept of National Parks and you can buy an America the Beautiful National Parks pass that gets you into EVERY SINGLE US National Park PLUS a variety of other recreational areas (over 2,000!) and it only costs $80 a year! In Australia, you cannot buy a single National Parks pass that covers every national park in Australia even though there are parks called National Parks in every state of Australia...You have to buy a parks pass in each separate state...WTF? Then why aren't they called State Parks? And so far, not a single Aussie can answer me this question...And then it's really confusing figuring out which parks pass you need...For example, here are all of the choices when buying a NSW national parks pass:

Confused yet? Yeah...And this brings me to my second tangent...Another observation that I hadn't made before in all of my previous visits to Australia...I'm actually quite surprised by how "separate" the six states of Australia are (FYI - Australia contains six states—New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia, and Tasmania—and two internal territories—the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory, which contains Canberra)...Less than 100 years ago none of the railway lines were standardized so if you traveled from one state to another by rail, you would have to disembark at the border to another state to board their rail line...Stuff like this...Even today it feels like each individual Australian state has more power than at the national level....It just feels like a much stronger identity between states than in the US to me...

The Aussies are about to vote on a new country leader and here's where you really gotta love the Aussies...In Australia, you are fined if you do not vote...So guess what? They get very high voter turnout; much higher than in the USA...

Ok, back to my adventures in Byron Bay and environs...After the lighthouse, I decided to get some good Mexican food at Costa Taco (very good baja style fish tacos!!) and then wander at will around their CBD (central business district)...Byron has a laid back surfer hippie vibe going but you'll see all sorts of people there...It's not too big - basically one main street looping through from one side of town to the other - and easy to get around...It reminded me very much of living in Lahaina on Maui...This is the first place of all the places I've been in Australia over the years where I had that "I could live here feeling"...

Had a massage while I was in town; definitely not the best I've ever had but it did help work out a lot of kinks in my neck and shoulders...

On Friday, I decided to check out some of the neighboring small towns called Bangalow and Mullimbimby and really liked both of them but especially Bangalow which is tiny but packed with a lot of interesting nooks and crannies...

And then back to Byron to pick-up some macadamia nuts and then I as supposed to go to the Cape Byron Distillery to go on a Gin Rainforest Tour where they walk you through their regenerated rainforest and show you the different botanicals they're putting into their gin...

And then this happened...

Let's just say I was lucky this happened while I was in an urban area, that it happened early enough in the afternoon that I was able to be rescued by NRMA (same as AAA in the USA), and that I was able to find a tire shop that could put four new tires on Vinnie that afternoon if I got there by 4pm as they closed at 5pm and wouldn't reopen until Monday...

The NRMA guy that came to my rescue was just great but he really had to work hard to get the very long and very rusty bolts holding the spare underneath the rig out but finally got the spare on and I was able to roll through the door at Tyrepower back in Mullimbimby right at 4pm and they had the new tires on in less than 30 minutes...AND, the Cape Byron Distillery was able to move my tour to the following day...

I shifted to a caravan park in Byron Bay that evening and was now able to just hop on my bike and buzz into town around 5-6km from the caravan park...Feeling like a local!

The next morning (Saturday) I headed out with Cape Byron Kayaks on a sea kayaking tour to spot dolphins and there were heaps and heaps of them! And apparently they were feeding on tuna as we saw several tuna leaping out of the water (literally running for their lives!) and then periodically, a group of dolphins would go into a frenzy of some sort splashing around and cornering a tuna...Apparently dolphins work cooperatively to catch their food and then share it...

It was really beautiful out on the water and the view of the lighthouse from the water was dazzling...Wish I had pictures to show you but I opted to leave the phone behind this time and just be in the moment...

But I did get these shots of ironwork decor on the beach bathrooms featuring aboriginal designs that I just love...

And later that afternoon my Gin Rainforest Tour/Tasting was cancelled due to a staffing problem but they still welcomed me down to the distillery and I got to taste seven different gins! And the rainforest you see in the picture below was regenerated by the owners of the land...They bought it 30+ years ago and it was just barren dirt with no trees and completely stripped of the subtropical rainforest. When they showed up to the auction of the land, they were the only ones who turned up...Loving how many people are choosing to care for the land and regenerate it...

And I forgot to mention that on my first or second day in Byron, I ran into an RBT (random breath test) checkpoint where the cops are randomly flagging drivers to pull over to the side of the road and I was one of them...I haven't been pulled over by a cop in more than 30 years so this was an interesting experience...The first thing he asked me for was my drivers license which of course I had with me...Then he told me he wanted me to count to 10 while he held a tube of some sort near my mouth...I got to about 5 or 6 and he told me to have a nice day and he got ready to pull in his next victim...This was around 2pm in the afternoon and it's good I hadn't had anything to drink...Apparently, they often set these up in the mornings (and in fact I saw one in Toowoomba earlier this week when I was on my bike ride!) and catch people who are still intoxicated from the night before...SOOOO, I made sure to hang around the distillery for a nice long while after sampling the gin and then had a snack in the van and lingered some more before driving back to the caravan park. And just for good measure, I took a country back road to where I needed to be instead of going right through Byron...And later that evening I went to the Twilight Market and opted to ride my bike back into town vs. driving...Australia has a very heavy drinking culture so I think it's good that they are taking this seriously!

I was a little sad the next morning to be leaving Byron...But gearing up for the next set of adventures!