The degeneration of Byron Bay, as described in various residents’ recent letters, is exactly what I saw growing up in Surfers Paradise in the 1950s and 1960s. Byron Bay still retains some of the incredible charms that Surfers Paradise once had. By far the most beautiful town that I have ever seen, Surfers Paradise consisted of timber houses and accommodation cabins within a coastal rainforest that one walked through to access the wild beaches alive with seabirds and seashells. Quaint timber shops covered with jasmine vines and flower beds exhibited the first bikinis. At night, giant green tree frogs climbed these illuminated windows, watching for the big emperor gum moths that bred in the great gum trees, beneath which open-air garden restaurants served local food. Honeyeaters sung in the banksia trees that lined the streets along with palm trees, hibiscus and frangipani flowers glistening in the sunshine. The air was fresh and fragrant.
The Surfers Paradise Hotel, one of the first brick buildings, had a large fernery tea garden cafe, the walls lined with staghorn and elkhorn ferns. This was a time when families were of the greatest importance and profit, bars, and alcohol took second place to children, food and tea. The hotel’s extensive botanical gardens interspersed with aviaries and enclosures exhibiting wildlife, stretched all the way from the main road almost to the beach where the only tourist attraction, a unique six-legged dairy cow, grazed on the grasslands with several dunes before the water was reached.
The wild Nerang River was clean, clear water where we watched the bottle-nosed dolphins chasing the thousands of mullet, whiting, flathead, and bream. The Broadwater, into which the river emptied was alive with thousands of pelicans, black swans, cormorants, and wading birds of many species. Three species of sea eagle were always to be seen soaring above the town.
Steam trains with railway stations all the way to Coolangatta brought most of the visitors from Brisbane. Attractive motels with swimming pools replaced the old timber homes and shops. The tiny police station had a safe where the constable would exhibit upon request the only police revolver on the Gold Coast, that had never been used. Walk the streets of Surfers Paradise now where sunlight struggles to illuminate the litter amongst the traffic in the deep shade of accommodation towers. Where alcoholic taverns dominate, technological attractions try to attract visitors, and you can see something of the future of Byron Bay.
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