There is a fairly set pattern to Friday nights in Bundy and it is a pattern that you ignore at your own risk as backpackers and locals join together with the aim of having a good time by consuming fermented vegetable juices and gyrating rhythmically to audio popular beat combos.
The night kicks off around 7pm at the Queenslander on Woongara St. This is a pleasant little bar with a striking mural painted on the outside that makes it impossible to miss. A live band normally plays the main bar while a DJ tries to get things kicking in the relaxed tropical garden out back, usually with little success, and don’t worry if it rains as the owners have recently covered the garden with a massive awning. The clientele includes travellers, locals and a wide variety of inbred weirdos who will want to talk to you. Zo is the bartender imported from Essex in England, serves up local brews XXXX Gold and my favourite XXXX Bitter (known locally as heavy) for $3 a schooner or $4 a pint. Other facilities include a video jukebox, a unisex toilet and the ubiquitous pokie room.
Around 10pm, the action moves down the street to Central where the prices are slightly cheaper and a can of Bundaberg Rum and Coke will set you back $6 (the locals choose cans over draft as the Coke used in the draft is considered too syrupy). As well as the relatively quiet bar facing the street, there’s a lively back bar with a dance floor and DJ and a large beer garden with a live band on stage. This place gets absolutely packed out by 11pm as the whole of Bundy turns out. The facilities are limited, the toilets are dilapidated (use the disabled if you really have to go) and there isn’t even a pokie room but if you’ve ever wanted to pull a farm girl (or boy) this is the place to be.
For the adventurous courtesy busses leave for Kristals Night Club in East Bundy between 12am and 1am where underage girls cavort in skimpy clothing and underage boys try and look hard, and everyone else looks embarrassed to be there, best bet is to give it a miss and stick around the Central until things start to wind up at around 3am. If after all that you’ve worked up an appetite the fast food café under the City Central Backpackers on Bourbong St. stays open late serving up some particularly nasty burgers and kebabs, although I can strongly recommend the chips.
Bundy is a small town and there’s rarely any trouble but it’s best to keep your wits about you as you wind your way home.