The Vice Guide to Travel

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(Now Playing) Nimbin Mardi Grass

Dec 3, 2007

Everyone in Australia knows about Nimbin. Whether they’ve scored drugs there, gone as a tourist to buy rainbow hippie shit, or read about how it’s a fractured town filled with ageing idealists whose dreams are being trampled under a stampede of smack, speed, and ice, most people hold some sort of opinion about the village. We finally decided to check it out for ourselves, at the peak of its craziness: the annual Mardi Grass Festival. It turns out that we had happened to go to the Hemp Bar just before 4:20, which we soon found out is the most important time in Nimbin. When Dave Cannabis lit the gigantic 4:20 joint and started chocking, it was fucking crazy. He looked like he was gonna die; his face went completely red and the whole room silent. Instead of scoring off the streets, we decided to do right and buy weed from the Hemp Bar. We bought a bag off the dealer, then one of the owners rolled us a big, fat joint. None of us are particularly lightweight when it comes to most drugs, but Nimbin weed is something else. We got so, so stoned. We were hysterical for ages; couldn’t hold the camera, couldn’t talk, couldn’t stop giggling. It was so hot in the Hemp Bar and marijuana smoke filled the whole room and they kept playing the same 70s funk CD over and over. Everyone was trashed. After that first joint, everything else that happened over the weekend is blurry. It’s pretty amazing that we managed to film anything at all, cause the whole time we just wanted to lay down in some grass and keep on smoking. The locals basically divide their time between smoking joints and having coffee. So you get totally wasted and then have a coffee, sharpen up a bit, and then start it all over with another joint. The weird thing though is that the people we met there — and by people I mean the pro-weed locals, not the horrible tourists - were really on the ball. They were friendly, articulate, and motivated, which is way more than I can say about most people I meet in other cities. There is definitely a darker, nastier side to the town, but the people we befriended showed us that Nimbin is aware of its problems and doing the best it can to deal with them, while being really, really, really, really stoned.
- VBS Correspondent Hannah Brooks

  • Dividenconquer

    11 days ago

    I did the backpacking thing and lived in australia for a year. i have to say it was really enjoya...

  • AllstarFreakn

    13 days ago

    Its just the dirty hippies that make it look bad

  • AllstarFreakn

    13 days ago

    the 420 ritual is amazing! def.looks like an awesome place to visit

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In the Vice Guide to Travel, correspondents from VBS and Vice magazine are dispatched around the world to visit the planet’s most dangerous and weird destinations.

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