Transportation and Living in the Gold Coast

Aloha,
As stated in previous blogs, I lived in Surfers Paradise which is a city directly on the beach. This in my opinion is probably the best place live for someone who is temporarily living in the Gold Coast and is new. This is because the city has an assortment of options for all your living needs and has the best transportation. Plus the beach is always really close! This was the view of my apartment and the beach that is practically a 1 minute walk from the front desk.

I am so fortunate to live in an amazing location and will always recommend people the same place I stayed. The apartment I lived in was called Surfers Century. At the time I lived there it was filled with other international students who also attended the same university as me, Griffith University. During my stay it was a lot of Americans for some reason all were from Pennsylvania. However, every semester it is filled with international students who all typically attend Griffith University. 

Transportation was also something that made life so easy in Surfers Paradise and Gold Coast altogether. To go to school I would use the light rail system that travels up and down the coast. From my apartment to University it would take about 30 minutes to get to class. What made this system so simple was their paying methods. I got a gocard which is what they called it and this card worked pretty much like a debit card for public transportation. You would use this card to tap on every time you got on a bus, light rail, train or any public transportation provided by the state. And all you had to do was transfer money onto the card every time your balance got low. What I would do was put 50$ on at a time which would typically last a month or so. However, what I really loved about their public transportation was the ability to bring your surfboard. In Hawaii, the bus is our only transportation and surfboards are not allowed. In the Gold Coast, you were allowed to bring surfboards and but it gets better. It the light rail train system there were even board holders inside the train. This allowed you to lock your board up safely while you road to where ever you were going. The transportation was amazing and I was so lucky to have a system like this to facilitate such a great experience.