I was watching the news, here on the Gold Coast, and was amazed to see what had happened to the West Pier.

I was born and raised in Goring and, in the late Sixties, my mates and I would take our surfboards down to the pier whenever there were waves - and quite often there were.

When there weren't, we would go to West Beach in Littlehampton.

We were an intrepid bunch, surfing summer and winter. The last I saw of the pier was in 1975, when I returned to Australia.

Seeing the state it was in brought back memories of us having fun there.

-Rowan Ayres, Queensland, Australia