Days 492-498! Woah… almost to 500 days of traveling! This week was filled with a lot of rain unfortunately. BUT I left my new friends in Mooloolaba and headed to the surfer town of Noosa. I was able to sneak in a couple fun surf sessions and even caught one of my best waves to date! I made a couple of new friends in Noosa and had a blast hanging out with them during the week as well!

Thursday, May 8th was a beautiful day! I laid in a bit waiting for the weather to warm up, had breakfast, did some laundry, and then immediately headed to the beach. It was bright, sunny, hot, and the ocean was looking perfect.

The Mooloolaba main beach has some really fun waves, but they crash fairly close to the beach. However, they’re perfect for body surfing! I spent an hour swimming around and catching big waves, probably around 3 foot at the small size and 6 foot at the big size. I was having a blast!

Unfortunately, I did get smacked into the ocean floor a few times and the left side of my back got scratched up… and I got dumped on my head at one point. BUT other than that, it was a fun time!

I sat on the beach for another hour and then went to the grocery store before heading back to the hostel for lunch. After lunch I started working on some video editing… but then I decided to put that off another day because the weather forecast for the week was shaping up to be full of rain.

So… I went BACK to the beach!

I got another hour of mega body surfing in and was catching wave after wave. I even caught a couple of barrels where the wave was cresting over me, but that usually led to getting thrown about by the wave. It was a very joyous afternoon.

I spent the next couple hours sitting in the sand and then sitting in the grassy area. I was pretty exhausted from 2 hours of intense body surfing and really enjoyed the time looking at the ocean. The ocean is truly my happy place and even just being by it brings a big smile to my face!

I spent the rest of the night hanging around the pool table (playing lotssss of pool) and meeting other hostel goers. It’s a real treat being back in a social hostel environment and everyone being friendly and open!

The weather forecast on Friday, May 9th wasn’t great. This was the start to a very rainy week…

Because of that, I started my morning with working on some freelance video editing for the engineering firm I used to work for. It’s nice that I’m able to still help out and work on video editing even on the road!

While I was working, it was it was constantly raining on and off. Unfortunately, it wasn’t just sprinkles either, there were torrential downpours happening periodically as well.

After I finished up editing and while I was waiting for rendering to finish, I tried to go to the beach… but the water was not very swimable due to the strong riptides. I took a tiny dip into the water, but sadly there was no bodysurfing for me today.

I took a walk up and down the beach to try and find if there were any areas of the beach that had waves to play in… but I didn’t find anything. So I headed to the grocery store again for food for dinner and then walked back to the hostel. I of course got soaked on my way back.

Later in the day, I saw the sun come out and tried going back to the beach for a swim. But the waves still weren’t good. So I just sat by the beach for about an hour and saw another storm rolling in… but I left a bit too late and got soaked on my walk back to the hostel.

While I was eating dinner, I met a new traveler from Germany, Mona, who also was a divemaster on Koh Tao!! She left around the time I started so our paths didn’t cross. But we had such a fun time sharing stories about Koh Tao, geeking out about scuba diving, and getting to know each other. I’m sure we were boring the heck out of the people around us but I was so excited to chat about it with her! It brought back a ton of amazing memories.

After dinner, I busted out the playing cards and we played Shithead and golf/memory/a game that has many different names.

It was a perfect way to end a rainy day!

There was no room for sleeping in on Saturday, May 10th. It was time for some free hostel yoga! The hostel I was staying at had a few events each week and every Saturday morning, a yoga instructor would come and teach people that wanted to participate! There were 3 girls and 1 guy from the hostel joining and also a lady from the community I believe! It was a nice way to start the day!

I went back to sleep afterwards and when I woke back up it was another very rainy day. So I ended up playing pool for pretty much the majority of the day. Cards were played again too, but mostly pool today.

The fun began when a group of us decided to go to a Latin night in the town over from us, called Coolum. A Latin band was playing at the Coolum Beer Company. In my mind it was going to be a fairly chill event, but it actually ended up being a packed house of a couple hundred people, all shaking their hips to some really lively Latin music!

It was a slow start to the day on Sunday, May 11th. But when we finally got up, Mona, Sam, Colin, and I decided to go to the local Sea Life aquarium! A good rainy day activity.

It was really fun seeing fish I knew from diving in Koh Tao and also seeing fish I had never seen before! Also, in one of the tanks, there were sea urchins with cowboy hats, which I thought was very cute.

We were able to catch the aquarium’s seal show, which displayed 3 beautiful seals who weren’t suitable to be brought back to the wild. Honestly, some of the skills the seals were able to perform were very impressive. I wonder how they were able to teach them! Lots and lots of fish I bet.

The aquarium also had a glass tunnel full of sharks, huge stingrays, and other fun fish. It was pretty dang cool too. All the marine life would swim by you or over the top of you, it was really well done! Mona wasn’t the biggest fan of having these animals “trapped” in a glass box, but at the same time, they probably wouldn’t survive very long out in the wild… so it’s definitely a mixed bag.

When we were heading out, we caught the penguins being fed. It was so cute! Somehow the worker was able to keep track of each one and make sure they all got their fair share of fish.

I started my day on Monday, May 12th with a FaceTime to my parents! Not just for our weekly catch up, but it was also Mother’s Day! Now every day is Mother’s Day (and Father’s Day) in my book. They were at my aunt and uncles house, so I was able to say hello to them as well and catch them up on what I’ve been up to the past week.

Today, I was heading out from Mooloolaba and going further north to another beach town called Noosa! Noosa is known for its beautiful beaches, national park, AND amazing surf!

I hung around the hostel for the morning, playing pool, and around 11:30am I headed to the bus stop. It unfortunately started raining as I was waiting, but the bus was quick to arrive, so I didn’t get too wet.

I had to change busses at one point of the journey and met an English traveler, Maddie. It turned out she was heading to Noosa as well AND the same hostel. So we chatted pretty much the whole bus journey up the coast. Noosa actually wasn’t that far from Mooloolaba, but because we were taking the public transport, it took almost 2 hours (for a 40 minute drive).

The bus dropped us off close to the hostel and we checked in and parted ways. The hostel was called Halse Lodge and it was a beautiful pub and hostel. Most of the rooms were located upstairs or in another building on the premises… but my room was smack dab in the middle of the outside section of the pub.

I ignored that fact at first and the weather was good enough, so I walked toward the beach for lunch. I found an $8 burger and ate it while standing at the beach. There were a bunch of surfers out (probably 40-50) and the waves looked like a ton of fun! So I ran back to the hostel, threw on my rash guard and swim trunks, and found a surfboard rental directly next to my hostel! It was only $30 for 4 hours (which for some reason they gave me for $20, very nice of them)!!

I didn’t need 4 hours, but I was going to have some fun! Just before I got to the beach, I ran into my friend Tom who I met in Mooloolaba! He decided to get a surfboard as well and joined me to the beach. He was just starting out, so he stayed further in than me, but it was fun to meet up and surf at the same time.

This was my first experience in a true surf lineup. Noosa is packed with surfers and there’s always multiple people trying to snag each wave. The important part is giving way to the person on your left (or closest to the most critical point of the wave). The most fun part about Noosa, is the waves are for long boarders! They are the waves I’ve been searching for this entire time!

In Yamba, the waves were steep and quick to break, making it hard to have fun, cruisy long rides. But here, in Noosa, the waves were slowly breaking all the way to the shore, making for nice LONG rides. While I was in the lineup, I met an English surfer, Nathan. He was a super friendly guy and we chatted on and off while trying to catch waves and handing waves off to each other (while also cheering each other on when competing against other surfers).

I had a blast over the next hour and caught 4 good waves. One of which was one of the best waves I’ve caught to date! It wasn’t the biggest wave I’ve caught, it was about 4 feet, but it was an amazing long ride! I obviously didn’t have a timer, but it felt like a good minute or minute and a half! I rode the wave from the far out lineup across a quarter of the beach (there’s a swimming zone we had to avoid) and all the way to the shore!

By this point, my shoulders and back were starting to get tired. There was a very strong northerly rip which kept us having to paddle back to where the waves were breaking. It was very exhausting. But after a couple weeks of not surfing, I was STOKED to finally have a good session under my belt. It was raining on and off the entire session, but I was already wet, so it didn’t really matter.

I put my surfboard on the beach and then went over to my friend Tom who was having fun catching the white wash from the breaking waves. I also gave him a couple pushes too to try and help his learning process. He called it quits too and we sat on the beach for a little bit.

There was an ultra triathlon finishing up on the beach. It was an event over 3 days consisting of a 10km swim, a 421km bike, and a 80km run… Talk about IMPRESSIVE! The running was finishing up as we were sitting on the beach and people had been running for 10 HOURS STRAIGHT. It was wildly impressive to watch people cross the finish line and the whole beach was cheering them on.

After surfing, I showered… and this is when I realized how awkward my room placement truly was. I walked back to my room and there were people all dressed up to have a nice night out at the pub… and they were sat right outside my room. While I’m walking around barefoot and shirtless from the beach and from the shower. Oh well!

I walked to Coles after this experience to get some food. This ended up being a 25 minute rainy hike up and down a large hill, but worth it to be able to cook my own food over the next few days.

While I was cooking dinner, I met two travelers from Mexico, Iz and Lia, and also an Australian who worked as a hypnotherapist, Sam. We all chatted and ate together and after dinner we played cards late into the night. Sam went off to bed and a German traveler, Vanessa, joined us as well. We all chatted till around midnight and exchanged WhatsApp’s to hang the following day.

I was excited to hang out with my new friends on Tuesday, May 13th. But I was even more excited to get back out for a surf! It was sunny out and after breakfast, I skedaddled to the surf shop, rented the board, and paddled out into the surf!

It was another packed day of surfing with at least 30 people out at our point and another 50 people out at a further point down the beach to the south. The waves were good for long boarding, but you really needed to know how to catch an unbroken wave to compete in this lineup, which I’m not really an expert in.

It was an absolute battle for the very small and inconsistent waves. Any time a wave came at least 5 people were vying for it! But, this gave me plenty of time to float and chat with the other surfers around me! I ran into Nathan again, which he immediately paddled over to say hello. I met a local, Jasmine, who we chatted a bit after she snaked a wave from me (when someone paddles around onto your left side to take the wave), which giving her crap for that was a good conversation starter.

But, after that wave, I was FINALLY able to catch one… which I accidentally “took” from a local. I looked both left and right and didn’t see anyone to my left, and successfully caught the wave beating the surfer to my right (who turned out to be one of my dorm mates), but then I heard an upset local to my left. He didn’t catch the wave which is why I put took in quotes but he was still not the happiest surfer. Oh well! I finally got a fun ride!

The biggest problem was the handful of really really good long boarders. They were able to catch a wave well before anyone else and then come back to the lineup and do it all again. Leaving very little room for error in your takeoff. That didn’t deter me and I kept trying and trying over the next 2.5 hours! My longest surf session yet.

Even though I only caught one wave, it was still a blast. I was having a great time chumming it up with the other surfers, watching the incredible talent of the experienced long boarders, and soaking up the sun… maybe a bit too much as my cheeks and nose got a bit sun-kissed.

Within all the battling, me and two other surfers went after a wave, which I kind of caught. But the other two collided making me stop to see if they were okay (not because it was my fault, I just wanted to check on them). Unfortunately one of them took the others surfboard to the back of the head and was bleeding… the dangers of the surf lineup! He went in to get checked up on by the life guards and the other surfer felt pretty bad, but it’s unfortunately just a part of the game with this many people out.

Thankfully, I escaped with no injuries and went back to the hostel to shower. I turned back around to sit on the little cove beach and watch more longboarding in person! I was trying to absorb as much knowledge as I could from the long boarders. Watching how they took off, how they moved around the wave, and across their boards!

After an hour, a big storm started to roll in and I decided to head back to the hostel. But, I got very soaked on my way back. I also happened to bump into my friend Tom again, which was pretty funny that we kept just running into each other.

I spent the rest of the afternoon hanging out with my new friends Iz and Lia. We chatted a bunch about life and traveling. Lia wanted to go for a swim, so we walked back to the beach in the rain and Iz and I chatted while she swam. We got back to the hostel and enjoyed dinner together and spent the night playing more cards and exchanging funny life stories. It was a really great day!

Another week had blown by and it was already Wednesday, May 14th… 4 days until I fly home!! I woke up early and walked in the rain to the beach to see if the surf was worth it today… it unfortunately wasn’t. It was smaller waves and more people surfing so I decided against shivering in the ocean.

I made the right decision because the rest of the day was torrentially down pouring. I met up with Iz and Lia and we continued our chatting from the day before. After lunch, one of the hostel employees came up to us and told us that they had set up games downstairs if we wanted something to do on the rainy day. So we went down to check it out! She also told us they’d give us a free drink too, so we didn’t pass that up. We ended up not playing the games that were set out and I grabbed the ones I brought with me while traveling.

We started with Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza… but Iz wasn’t the biggest fan of that. Even with being half English and Mexican, it was difficult. I’ve realized that it’s not the easiest of games with having English being a second language.

The hostel did have uno, and we actually ended up playing uno for a solid 2 hours. More and more people from the hostel ended up joining us and with the chaotic rules we had in place, the games kept on going! There was a ton of laughter and lots of good chats throughout the games.

I ran out of dinner food, since I extended my stay from Wednesday to Thursday, and so did Iz and Lia. So we ate at the hostel pub before continuing on with more card playing!

Despite all the rain, we made the most of our day! I had a blast meeting and hanging out with Iz and Lia as well. It’s crazy having these quick encounters where you get to know people on a deep level and then you’re off to the next place! I decided, because of the rain, to head back to Mooloolaba for a couple nights before I leave Australia.

I’m so happy I got another couple of surf sessions in and I can’t wait to get more in in the future! Noosa is a town I definitely will be visiting again as well, part of me wishes I made it here a bit sooner to get these incredible longboarding waves. But there’s always next time!

What’s really crazy… the next blog post will be from the US! On May 18th, I’ll be on a 35 hour travel journey back to Illinois. WILD! I can’t wait to see family, friends, and have a fun summer back home. I’ll still be keeping up with weekly posts, until I settle down, I’m still traveling!

See you next week!!

– Elie