here for the weather, takes me on a
Jet Ski ride that could be, perhaps
not so coincidentally, a chase scene
in a James Bond movie. We careen
around multimillion-dollar yachts
and game-fishing boats, zoom past
slow-moving barbecue pontoons and
sailboats. Helicopters and parasails
fly overhead as we speed around
sandbanks, through mangroves
and along mansion-lined canals
until we reach McLarens Landing,
a sugar-white beach that if not for
a cocktail bar and pontoon could
be a set for the Survivor TV series.
When Bond and I mosey up to the
bar for a drink, I learn we’ve left
the mainland and are on South
Stradbroke Island, a speck of sand
only 200 meters from the northern
end of The Spit. Australia’s sixth
largest city is just around the corner,
yet we may as well be in a distant
corner of the South Pacific for how
perfectly tropical it all is.
A HEADLAND WITH a row of
Norfolk pine trees protects one of
the best swimming and surfing
spots on the Goldie. I’m in Burleigh
Heads, and looking back northward,
I’m struck by the contrast of the tall
buildings that make up the skyline
just 20 kilometers away in Surfers
Paradise, though the locals call it
Gotham City.
It’s Sunday and the parklands in
front of the beach are crowded with
families and groups of friends with
their barbecues, beers and cricket
matches on the grass. The surf is
pumping hard so most swimmers
are bunched up between the flags
where volunteer lifeguards watch
the crowd diligently. Watching them
from a stilt house on the promenade
is chief lifeguard Warren Young, a
leather-skinned gent with a strong,
friendly handshake who, like me,
initially discovered the Gold Coast
as a teenager on weekend sojourns
from Brisbane.
“It was like someone turned the lights on,” Young
says. “We lived in a housing commission in Brisbane
in the late sixties, and to suddenly see girls in bikinis,
the nightlife and all these people chasing freedom....
The Goldie was a dynamic kind of place back then. But
what really got me were the beautiful beaches. I couldn’t
believe how lucky I was when I was offered a job as a
lifeguard in 1973 and I still don’t believe it today. It’s an
awesome responsibility.”
Like all Gold Coast lifeguards, Young, now 67,
must complete a grueling biannual fitness assessment
composed of a 750-meter swim, a 1,600-meter beach
run and a 800-meter paddle—all in under 26 minutes.
When we stroll down the beach to see a group of trainee
lifeguards in actions, he tells me about his travels to
Indonesia and the Maldives and how it gave him fresh
perspective on life. “You learn about your home when you
travel,” Young says. “I reckon the Goldie is pretty hard to
beat. Where else in the world can you stay in a high-rise
hotel, then walk one minute to the beach where you’ve got
pristine sand dunes and transparent water?”
Dinner is at The Fish House, a Gold Coast seafood
institution set in a plantation manor across the road
from the beach. Johnny Depp, Penelope Cruz and most
of the movie stars who’ve worked on films at Village
Roadshow Studios in the hinterlands end up coming
here to try the signature Patagonian Toothfish: a silky
smooth, melt-in-your-mouth masterpiece served with a
choice of 260 handpicked wines.
I find myself comparing this haute dining experience
to the deep-fried crap and mystery-meat pies that fueled
my introduction to girls and booze nearly three decades
prior. Sometimes change is good. I decide to seek out
more of it. The following evening I drive 10 minutes to