It’s full-on Autumn here. The last two days have been cold and rainy, and today promises to be the same. By cold, I mean jackets and pants and closed shoes and chilly fingers and waking up with a cold nose and toes, and by rain I mean all day long, sometimes lightly and sometimes in sheets and scads. It’s the perfect indoorsy sort of morning. I think I shall spend it in my pajamas.
Some Time Later...
The morning passed pleasantly, in pajamas as I predicted, it was time for lunch. I headed for Mac’s Milk Bar. A local joint two blocks from my house, it’s been closed on every previous passing, but I had heard good things and was determined to try it out.
Third time’s the charm. Armed with my ten percent off coupon from Kool Katz Surf Lesson, I walked down the block, reflecting that distances are greatly relative based on weather conditions, and whether or not one has brought one’s umbrella. The last two times I attempted to visit the famed local burger joint, it’s been closed. Today, with my giant rainbow umbrella and a respite in the rain, the walk felt very short and easy.
Mac’s Milk Bar, open 7-3:30 seven days, is a subtropical treasure. Comfortable diner-gone-tropical-Ozzie-décor, free wi-fi, free local papers, friendly staff, it’s where the Scooby Gang would hang out if they were Aussie backpackers.
Burger with beetroot, roasted onion, barbeque sauce, a leaf of spinach-like lettuce and a perfectly toasted sesame seed bun. It’s enough to get you singing Jimmy Buffet’s Cheeseburger in Paradise, and I certainly was. (In my head. Outside my head, I was chewing, and not frightening people by singing loud, off-key American classic hits.)
From lunch, feeling fortified and brave, and went home to dress in the appropriate Aussie adventuring gear for my next venture; out to the lighthouse. Layering several shirts and sleeves over a pair of short mesh short and flip flops, a huge umbrella over my head, my body would stay warm and dry (ish) while my legs and feet went for a swim, an inevitable occurrence these days whether you’re walking in the streets or the ocean. The rain has been coming down non-stop for ages with only short breaks for sun, some days barely at all. There are periods of rain so heavy it turns the air white.
So, dressed for the venture (as the sign in Katoomba National Park said, there is no such thing as bad weather, only inappropriate clothing), I headed for the lighthouse. There, en route, on the path just above Wategos Beach, I spotted a dolphin. My second sighting of these marine mammals since coming to Byron Bay, huge dark gray Indo-Pacific Bottlenose dolphin leaping clear out of the water, it fills my heart with joy.
I continued the hike walking on air, watching the sea under the rain. As I neared the top, I could see a huge gray mass of air rolling in across the sea from the south, turning the air opaque from clouds to sea. I was just reaching the height of the trail, where the clifftop trees grew short and the sea swelled to the side a plummeting drop below, when the thunder started.
Drat.
I was near the top, and desperately wanted to ask the park staff at the lighthouse whether or not the whales had begun their migration, so I walked the rest of the way, pulling the umbrella closer over my head, trying to look very short and un-lightening-rod-y from the perspective of the sky. I’m only five foot three, so this wasn’t very difficult. “Park” staff in this case has a double meaning – the parks and wildlife staff affiliated with the Cape Byron National Park (a public service permitted by the Aboriginal owners of the land) who are the parking wardens, wear bright green rain jackets and excellent blue Indiana-Jones style hats, and are the ones who work standing outside the lighthouse in full view of the open Pacific, where everyone comes to stand and watch for whales. Only two spotted so far, they told me, and those being very early frontrunners; the whole population of fourteen thousand will largely migrate north in June and July and August, turning back to migrate south again August through October.
Information gathered and soul flying high on dolphin spotted, and the thunderstorm looking like it might settle in, I started back down the mountain via the shorter route under taller trees. As I neared home, the pathways turned to rivers, small leaves running like fish through actual currents which had sprung up as the massive influx of water rushed downhill and into stormdrains. The sports fields near my street were completely flooded, and hundreds of seagulls and black-headed ibis were happily feasting in the marshy grass. Some moments of the rain were so heavy and gusty I held the umbrella in front of me, walking entirely in its shadow, the rain pelting its exterior and my ankles and feet, the kookaburras in the trees overhead laughing at the absurdity of my rainbow shield. Laugh on, birdies, it kept me dry!
It’s still raining in the night outside, but I’ve had an amazing day, and in here, in this the Why Not café, the chai is warm and the roof is dry, and life is good.
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