For this week’s Travel Inspirations series we’re off to Australia with travel writer and photographer Cecil Lee who shares with us one of his most inspiring travel destinations. Travel photography fans, be sure to check out Cecil’s photo blog Travel Feeder to travel around the world in images. Welcome, Cecil!

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I love Gold Coast. I love the weather, the people as well as the environment. Though it was a few years ago when I visited this theme park capital of Australia, many memories  on Gold Coast are still well kept in my mind. Why? Not only was it my honeymoon trip, Gold Coast had also inspired me a lot in my future travel and also my blogging tour then after.

Gold Coast is to most travelers the attractive city located in the Southeastern corner of Queensland. Its sub-tropical climate with bright sun all year long, surfing beaches, high rise resort apartments on the shore, 60 Km of beautiful sandy coastline, and happening nightlife have made it so popular to, not only foreign visitors, but also the local Australians. If you look at the statistics, out of those over 10 million visitors to Gold Coast each year, 40% are from domestic travels. So it is also an inspiring local getaway destination. Why is it so attractive?

My first impression when I arrived in the city was its liveliness. Everything in Gold Coast seems to be full of energy all the time that I couldn’t find any weary moment. The sky is superbly clear and bright without any hint of air pollution. You could get fresh air everywhere and perhaps this is the reason why I felt like traveling more than ever before! If you think it’s too hot for you, drive up to the rainforest mountain hinterland in the West of the city to have a cup of mountain tea with breezy weather. It had made me an avid traveler!

How it had inspired me? I started blogging about travel not long after my visit to Gold Coast. This tourist city of Queensland Australia has everything for me to blog about. From good to bad, there are so many different aspects of travel I experienced during this trip. The people here are extremely friendly that you can always think of a topic and start talking to a stranger. They are also too honest to cheat anyone including tourists! The city is so safe that you could wander around the downtown or back lanes to explore the inside stories without worrying being disturbed. The driving culture is very healthy as motorists do behave themselves most of the time, which is great for pedestrians especially when cars and bikes are the most common transportation around the city (motorists will even stop their cars in favour to any crossing pedestrians even under green light!).

For a travel photo blogger like me, Gold Coast had also given me tremendous photographic inspiration. There are almost too many photo opportunities in the city attractions, including surf beaches, various theme parks such as Dreamworld, Sea World, Warner Bros’ Movie World, various wildlife park like Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary, Lone Pine Santuary, World heritage mountain range in the Hinterland and also off course the 60 Km long beautiful sandy beaches including Main Beach, Surfers Paradise, Broad Beach, and other canal cruising.

Perhaps I have seen only the best part of Gold Coast, but the travel inspirations I got from it was priceless.

Cecil Lee is an avid traveler who is also a passionate travel blogger and travel photographer living in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. He writes about travel for MNUI travel insurance and on his own travel photo blog, Travel Feeder.