Sean’s Friends, Vince, Brisbane, and Bluesfest.

Date: April 10th – 13th
Friday 10th –


A LITTLE BACKGROUND:
Sean’s friends were coming up from Sydney to Brisbane the weekend of the 10th, Easter weekend, which also happened to be the same weekend of Bluesfest. Bluesfest is a huge 5 day festival in Byron Bay and Sean and I had already purchased a ticket to Bluesfest for Monday. On top of which Vince had a week off break from studying in New Zealand and was flying into Brisbane on the 11th. Sean and I decided we would head to Brisbane Friday and Saturday to meet up with his friends and pick up Vince. We would then proceed to get a Sunday morning bus to Byron Bay, stay at Noah’s dad’s house Sunday night and attend Bluesfest Monday morning. You’ll quickly discover that not everything (very little in fact) went actually as planned.


MY WEEK WILL BEGIN WITH:

THERE WAS NO BUS.
After careful planning throughout the week we discovered we’d missed our bus to Brisbane. And by careful planning I actually mean we woke up Friday morning, the day we planned to leave, called around, and found out there were 3 buses. One left at 7am, one left at 11am, and our only option left at 6pm. The 6pm bus only had 1 seat on it. We were screwed!


UNTIL
I remembered the night before Tommy mentioned he was headed to Brisbane for Easter break. I called up Tommy, he said he had extra room and would be more then willing to drop us off at …


OUR EXTREMELY SEEDY HOSTEL
It happened to be the only one available. Sean called numerous hostels and they were all booked, we ened up getting stuck at this hostel I can even remember the name of. It was converted from a house into a 12 room, 2 to 8 beds per room, 2 toilet, 1 shower hostel ran by a really slow Asain lady.

The reception *desk was closed so we had to walk around until someone pointed us at the right person. We walked into the reception **room she sat down and then charged us the $28 for the room. She proceeded to tell us most of the sheets and pillow cases were wet because it had rained and handed us two semi damp sets of sheets and our key. When we unlocked our door and entered our room we were hit with the huge stench of BO. It smelled like a locker room. Our storage consisted of a 2 x 2 x 2 locker which thankfully I could fit my backpack into. The only other hostel experience I had was in Surfers Paradise where there were 4 of us, we got our own room, and bathroom. We got in pretty early so Sean and I decided to meet up with his friends and head into the Valley where all the pubs/clubs were.

*by desk I mean converted closet just barely big enough for a desk chair and computer.
** see desk


THE FAMILY/MONASTERY SITUATION.
Tommy used to work at a couple clubs in the Valley, we asked if he could get our names on a list so we wouldn’t have to pay. Low and behold he texted me saying we were on the list at the Family. The family is a well known club out in Brisbane and has apparently won several awards for best night club this best night club that. We were more excited about not having to pay the 20$ cover. Ouch. Me and Sean hopped in the VIP line as Sean’s friends stepped into the standard line. 5 min later Sean catches his friends being pulled out of the line by the bouncer. Apparently Sean’s friends were to overdressed to come in. They were wearing a button up, khakis, and nice Dockers type shoes. After a long talk, and a very disappointed Adam, we decided to try a different club. Tommy said he was in the Monastery so we b-lined it for that one. Again, same situation. Shot down because Sean’s friends were too overdressed. Striking out we chose the Mustang because they didn’t have any kind of dress code and we were sick of walking around.


WE GOT LOST
We really had no idea where our hostel was in comparison to the valley to begin with. But everyone had the great idea of walking off in the wrong direction. After a couple blocks of unfamiliarity we quickly hailed a taxi to ask for a ride. He quickly refused because there were 5 of us and only 4 seats but tried giving us directions anyway. We walked back to the valley, found some familiarity and was off in the correct direction. Only by this point it was raining. I’m still safe and sound, so it can only be assumed we found where we were staying. Haha.


SATURDAY 11th -


VINCE AND THE AIRPORT FIASCO
Vince called Ashley, she studied here last semester and knows Will and Noah. Noah and Will live in 14 (my “apartment” complex) and we hang out on a daily basis. Very coincidental. Ashley called Will and Noah for my number and ended up reaching me at 2:30 am (Sunday morning). At this point I decided I was going to wait until morning. The city trains stopped running and wouldn’t start up again until 5:30, and I wasn’t about to pay 50$ for cab to catch a ride there. It’s a good thing I waited too.


SUNDAY 12th -


SUNDAY MORNING
The next morning I woke up at 6:45. Me and Sean had previously booked a 9:15 bus to Byron Bay for Sunday morning in order to get back early enough in hopes to get to Bluesfest a day early. After packing all my things I walked 8 blocks or so to central station and bought myself a ticked on the train to the airport. About 10 minutes into the train ride I get a call from Vince. He’s staying at the Rendezvous hotel… right across the street from Central Station. Bummer! I quick hopped trains going the other direction and met up with Vince around 8:15 but still had a train ride to catch out bus.


STRANDED
The bus we were previously told was arriving at 9:15 actually left at 9:45. So in all our rush, we really had 30 more minutes then we thought. We arrived safely in Byron Bay (after a short hour half nap on the bus) around noon expecting Noah to be waiting for us with his car. We had previously agreed that Noah was going to drive 3 others from SCU to Byron for the concert and then he would take all our bags and drop them off at his Dad’s where we would be staying that night. Plans, for some reason, got jumbled and Noah left without the other three for a lunch with his Dad. When we arrive at noon we couldn’t reach Noah or anyone else so we walked down to the beach. We weren’t about to walk the shops carrying all our baggage from the past weekend and Vince had all his stuff for the week. We finally got a hold of Meghan around 2pm and she informed us that Noah was currently on his way BACK to Lismore to pick everyone up and then would meet us in Byron. Thankfully the weather was nice, it had previously been raining for the past week and a half. It was literally the first partly cloudy day I had seen in awhile. Noah arrived around 4pm and we all decided we were just going to walk the streets/shop instead of trying to get into Bluesfest that day. (I don’t think anyone realized the festival went till midnight, we were all thinking it would be to late). Walked the shops a little bit, went to a couple local bars at night and then headed back to Noah’s dads house so we could wake up early for Bluesfest!


MONDAY 13th -


FRESH COFFEE!
Noah’s got a beautiful house. Stuck in the middle of the rainforest he also had a trampoline and a pool. Just slightly disappointed I didn’t get the opportunity to use either. I think the most enjoyable part about Noah’s house was the freshly brewed coffee. First cup of REAL coffee since I left. I still have dreams about that cup. Ha. Just kidding. Aussie’s aren’t big into coffee, they’re more of a Tea culture which gets frustrating when you’re looking for a standard cup of coffee in the morning. I’m stuck with instant. And Instant coffee is gross. On top of that, Noah’s dad had a record player so we got to listen to The Beatles and the **Arctic Monkeys.


BLUESFEST
Skip ahead to later that day. We didn’t arrive at Bluesfest until late. We spent most of the afternoon trying to get everyone together and meet up with others that had come to Byron for BF. Today wasn’t like Sunday, it was cloudy and sprinkling almost the entire time. From time to time it would pour rain. Stuck with only my flip-flops (not wanting to get my fresh white Nike’s dirty) we walked our way to the festival. The fields, if you could even call them fields at this point, were caked in mud. Mud ankle high with puddles knee deep. It was quite enjoyable actually. Thankfully the stages were set up under giant circus like tents so you didn’t actually get wet unless you went outside. There were 5 stages in all but only 2 had bands we came to see. The first band we watched were the Blues Travelers. They put on a pretty good show but they weren’t who I was actually here for. I have to say though, he’s a master at the harmonica… In between Blues Travelers and Jason Mraz (the REAL reason I bought tickets to BF) we got some food and went to get a drink. They were sold out of beer (Laaaaaame [capitol L]) and only had pre-mixed spirit drinks in a can. Those cost 10$ a piece, what a rip. I still bought one, but only one! They weren’t going to take ALL my money. Jason Mraz kicked ASS (capitol everything). He put on such a good show. Around the end of his set everyone from the Blues Travelers got on stage and everyone was just jamming away. Again jamming away on his Harmonica. (Him being the lead singer, cant recall his name, my apologies). **Ben Harper was up next, yet again another stellar performance. He’s an amazing guitarist/soloist on top of which he ended his encore with “Under Pressure”. So perfect.

Noah drove everyone back that night, my ears rang for a day after, but it was well worth it.

**Both bands will be playing at Lollapalooza 2009 check out the lineup. http://2009.lollapalooza.com/ Anyone interested?

Although nothing really went smoothly, it was still one of the more enjoyable weekends here!