Rainbow Beach

...... doesn't the title just say it all. This past weekend we went up to the Sunshine Coast and stayed at Rainbow Beach. It is a four hour drive from where we live but it felt like a million miles away.

When my DH and I first moved to Australia my family had decided that they wanted to do a trip away all together and we were defintely up for that. I am always up for relaxing days by the ocean and just relaxing in general.

After work on Friday afternoon my DH and I hit the road with my two brother-in-laws and nephew for the long drive up north. It was quite interesting sitting in a car with four boys - I didn't know what to expect but we had a good drive up. We were listening to some really good road tripping music and had fun singing along to ACDC, Nickleback and Bon Jovi. Anywho........ we got to Rainbow Beach at about 10pm and sat around and chatted for a while (the rest of the family had driven up earlier in the day) and then we called it a night.

We stayed at Rainbow Beach Holiday Village - people could either rent a cabin, camp or caravan there. We stayed in a cute little cabin - apparently these cabins were used in the 2000 Sydney Olympics as part of the Olympic Village. Our cabin was perfect for what we needed. It had a mini kitchen, bathroom, bed and most importantly - air conditioning!!! It was really really hot while we were there.

On the Saturday morning we all met up at the BBQ area for bacon and eggs. Too bad if anybody else in the Village wanted to use the BBQ, just my family alone filled up the area. There were people staying in a tent just nearby the BBQ area - I am sure they were glad to see us leave after our few days there. It has hard to be quiet with 8 kids and 10 adults!!

After breakfast we headed out to the sand dunes that were nearby. My mum had been telling us about this area for quite some time and she wanted us all to see what it looked like. After a quick drive and a short walk through bushes we found the sand dunes. They were just magnificient - it was so amazing to see. I did take some photo's but it is truly something you have to see to believe. All around is just sand until you look over to each side and there is a cliff with the beautiful blue ocean all around. It was absolutely breathtaking.

After our morning at the sand dunes we headed down to the beach and went for a swim. The water was beautiful.......... a little rough but the kids loved jumping the waves. We had heard that there were jelly fish around and those things really hurt when they sting you. We kept a watch out for the jelly fish but we were all good - no stings on us. Unfortunatley, as we decided to leave the beach a little girl that was there with her family got stung. The lifeguards are well prepared for this and had an icepack on hand.

After the beach we headed back to our resort and had some lunch and then a swim in the pool. You would think that we would have had enough of water by then but it was so hot and it seemed like the best way to cool down. For some reason the men/boys decided to act out the final dance scene in Dirty Dancing while in the water. My DH and my brother were attempting to lift each other up in the air - it was actually quite funny and I got some great shots. None will be posted on my blog though - I don't think my DH would appreciate that.

For dinner that night we again took over the BBQ and had some sausages and steaks then the girls adjourned to one of the rooms and played poker whilst they boys drank beer and talked. It was a great way to end a great day. Us girls had lots of fun giggling, drinking and playing our version of poker.

We only wished that we could have stayed longer. My DH and I have decided we will try to do the trip again - this time staying longer than a couple of nights.

I love being able to do little getaways like this - it give you time to chill out and pretend you are far far away!!!

till next time.............