Snapper Rocks

Liz works for Camp Quality, an organisation that arranges events for kids with cancer, and last weekend she was running a 'surf camp' down at the famous Snapper Rocks in Coolangatta. It was an early start, with us out of the door at 6am and arriving on site at 7.30.

My plan was to get us down there as safely as possible and then find a comfortable tree to doze off underneath. Then go for a ride, maybe go for a swim or a bodyboard or maybe just stay under my tree reading a book. Unfortunately the weather had other ideas and it rained continually and consistently all morning, so I had to content myselt with wandering around in a leaky gore-tex trying to find coffee shops to lurk in.

We weren't the only ones suffering. There was a kids surf lifesavers competition on the beach just around the headland

This is a really big thing in Australia - all the local surf lifesaving clubs have a 'gromit' section for their under 16s and the competition between them is fierce. The competitions are mainly based around running, swimming & surf skis, skis being bouyant surfboard-type boards with a cutout section for kneeling on whilst paddling with the arms. You can see a line stretching out mid-picture here Despite the rain, the water looked very clear and inviting

I'm not the best of swimmers, but figured with that many lifesavers around I was probably pretty safe. However I'm ashamed to say that I didn't venture in all day - in fact after the event was over we looked at the drizzle and headed straight back to Brisbane. At least some of the locals were enjoying the rainMost importantly the surf event was a success - the surf school still ran its lesson, pro-surfer Jeremy Flores turned up to sign autographs and 30 kids had a great morning.