The blog of the Jewell Whanau in Wellington, New Zealand.

Monday, 15 October 2007

Surfers Paradise

Perhaps the apostrophe police (I’m looking at you, Jenny) can comment on whether there should be a possessive marked – and if so where.

Anyway Noreen and I spent three days over in Queensland. The occasion was the 30th birthday of the firm I work for – Intech Software (probably the worst web site in the world). All the company plus partners (28 people) were flown to Brisbane from where it is an hour’s drive to Surfers. The staff had to participate in two half day conference sessions – the usual team building, analysis of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats plus training. We decided the web site needed updating!

We had two half days free. The first was spent cruising around the waterways (a mixture of dredged rivers and man made canals linking them).

Quite a fierce storm blew up but soon passed by with no untoward effects.
Surfers is a prime example of rampant capitalism ruining a wonderful natural attraction. The beach is long and sandy.
The surf was not too good when we were there.
High rises crowd down to the beachfront shading the beach in the late afternoon. Reputedly the largest residential building in the world (Q1 – 76 storeys) dominates the skyline.
Our hotel (22 storeys – we were on the 19th) was on the banks of the Nerang River
which must be the zoning boundary of the high rise section because there were few on the far bank.