Surfers Paradise: Shotgun, Sea and Sharks

In 2009, at the age of 22, I took a year off to do some travelling, with my first stop being Australia. I started in Sydney and worked my way up the East coast, enjoying a blend of sun, sea, and booze. Carefree and living the dream, I indulged in adrenaline-filled activities and a fair bit of partying. Was loving Oz living!

While in Surfers Paradise, I met two American travellers who shared my taste for “living on the edge”. One evening, after several rounds of drinks, the harbour looked beautifully inviting under the moonlight. Fueled by alcohol and bravado, I suggested an incredibly foolish idea: a midnight swim in the harbor, despite knowing it was a shark hotspot at night. The water seemed calm and inviting, and a platform for jumping in sealed the deal—what could possibly go wrong?

As we swam, we spotted a luxurious yacht anchored nearby. The massive vessel, with its polished wood and shining metal accents, seemed to beckon us aboard. In our inebriated state, we thought it would be fun to explore, assuming the yacht was empty at this hour.

Laughing and joking, we climbed aboard, convincing ourselves we weren’t trespassing as it was all in good fun. We weren’t exactly discreet, making plenty of noise and stumbling around etc. We split up to explore both sides of the yacht, but our adventure took a sudden and frightening turn. A man emerged from a cabin, clearly just woken up, carrying a shotgun. His voice, filled with anger, commanded us to “get the fuck off my boat.”

The sight of the gun and the fury in his eyes sobered me instantly. I mumbled an apology, called to my friend, and we made a quick escape, both jumped back into the dark, shark-infested waters. The idiom “out of the frying pan and into the fire” seems to fit quite nicely here?!

The swim back to shore was a bit of a blur, with a fair bit of the good old fight-or-flight response. But we made it back to tell the tale. We got out of the water quietly, so no one saw us, and walked back to our hostel in silence before going to bed.

Reflecting on that night, it’s clear how dangerously stupid we were. The story could have ended much worse, but we woke up with just a hangover—NOT a shark bite, NOT in a police cell, NOT with a gun shot wound. This incident was a stark reminder of how being drunk can lead to poor decisions. I’d like to say I learned my lesson, but being young, I had plenty more of my nine lives to use. The moral of the story? Don’t wait until your 30s to stop being an idiot, like I did, do it ASAP. Furthermore, dont be put off by the sharks and other dangerous animals in Australia, it’s a great country and I recommend Surfers Paradise too, it pretty cool