After spending 2 days north of brisbane on sunshine coast, we drove down to the gold coast. The gold coast is more commercialized and has a lot to do.

nice view from our hotel room

partial sea view from our room

The first day was busy with all the things I had lined up:

We left early-ish and went to Currumbin Sanctuary which nicely opens at 08:00 (30mn drive):

Jennifer worked on her snake strangling skills since last time we went there :)

that poor quoka was going to come see us but it got bullied by big lizard

the kid play area was fun for Jennifer :)

they had an animal hospital where you could watch surgeries

tree kangaroos are cool

they had nice emus :)

Next door was Surf World Museum. Not exactly a planned stop, but we got free tickets from Currumbin Sanctuary:

motor surf board, cool :)

Next door, still, was a bee honey shop/museum:

Next, I drove to David Fleay Wildlife Park, a smaller park that wouldn't be as good in theory, but they had 2 nice finds: a Bilby that Jennifer was able to pet, and a baby koala:

they also have platypus, but we got there at the wrong time and they were not visible

best bilby shot I ever got

such long ears

baby koala

it was learning to climb way for its mom

sugar glider

Next, I drove to Holoverse, an interesting Star Trek like Holodeck simulation I found somewhat away from the main town center. It was a bit of a pain to get to, and the opening hours were non optimal (they close at 16:30, WTF?), but it was a super cool experience that cannot be had anywhere else as of yet (that I know of):

with 3D glasses you get a custom 3D view that is dependent on where you are and where you are looking

I ducked and then had my head under water

the next session was a 3D game based on your body location

From there, it was a short drive to paradise jetboat. Honestly the booking staff was cocky and borderline bullish in my opinion (the boat driver was ok thankfully), and the boat could not go full speed due to speed limits, but it was still fun and a nice ride, although they don't allow you to take anything or take pictures (I took my gopro for a few shots, though):

multi million dollar houses in gated water communitiies

Because the day wasn't over yet :) we then barely made it to aquaduck as they cancelled their last ride of the day, but we so barely made the previous one

sea world amusement park

Since we were back by 17:15, we had a bit of time to walk around town. I figured we'd skip the Ripley's since I've seen a few and there were other things to do, and instead we tried 3 movies at a 7D theatre, and then a walk on the beach:

It was then time for another 30mn drive to see our dinner show, Salute to the Light Horse. The food was close to appalling (at least my steak was uneatable), but the show was good:

The 2nd day was a bit easier, I booked a gold coast 4WD tour:

we found this barely alive baby in a tree, not entirely sure what species it was

nice walk through the shops at Mt Tamborine's Gallery Walk

very eager small parrots

After getting back, we still had a bit of time for:

We had been to Infinity attraction last time in 2011, but we went back as it was fun:

We just had enough time to get to Skypoint observation deck and made it there 15mn before sunset, which gave us nice day and night pictures:

On the way back, we hit a market by the boardwalk:

This eventually got us to Hurricane's Grill which I had booked in the hopes that we'd get melt in your mouth wagyu beef there, but sadly it was just ordinary and no better than a normal good steak: