Brisbane City

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Trip Start Aug 15, 2005 Previous
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  Brisbane, Australia
Sunday, November 20, 2005

Wednesday 16th November 2005

We woke up this morning with slightly bad heads, I didn't know how Alex and Hayley would of felt as they had to be up at 6am to go diving on the Barrier Reef! We decided not to spend money on the reef as we had done the diving and snorkelling in Fiji which was second to none. We were flying to Brisbane later this afternoon so once we'd packed our rucksacks and put them in storage we went to grab some breakfast from the cafe on the street. Another scorcher of a day so hot it was uncomfortable at times. We got some postcards and sat by the lagoon in the shade writing them and reading up on South East Asia in preparation for our arrival there. At lunchtime we took a walk to the 'serve yourself' buffet and sat in the nice air conditioned mall which was sooooo nice! Dan picked up a massive mailing box for his Didgeridoo! Around 2.45 pm we got a taxi to Cairns airport where we were flying with Virgin Blue to Brisbane. We boarded our plane the only blue one, the 50th one made so we were very privilaged! We also sat front row. The flight was nice and wasn't long, as we took off we could see the blue lagoon out of the window and the view of the city, it was a really hot clear day. The flight to Brisbane was 2 hours or so. As we approached the sky was a beautiful bright purple colour and the sun was the brightest RED we've ever seen, we actually saw it go down over the mountains in the distance, it was amazing.
When we landed in Brisbane, it was a cooler 23 degrees and going dark.

A croc at Lone Pine Sanctuary

As the plane was only small, it didn't take us long to collect our bags and off we went to catch the shuttle bus to the City Backpackers hostel at $10 each. The city was all lit up as it was dark and it reminded us a bit of New York, you could see the reflection of the buildings in the river. After dropping everyone else off on the bus first we were last off and arrived at the hostel around 8 pm. There was a BBQ on for $3 per person so Dan had his burger and after a few beers and a viewing of the Uruquay v's Australia footy match we hit the sack.

Thursday 17th November 2005
Brisbane

It was a loud night last night, doors slamming and all night! I had my ear plugs in so managed to get a bit of shut eye! We decided to stay here again tonight as it's only a walk from the town so we let reception know, picked up some leaflets and took a walk into the town to get some breakfast. Corssing the road we got chatting to a local guy, a nice guy...too nice actually, he showed us some of the sculptures in the town and gave us a bit of history on the river and what not but also gave us his mobile number to give him a call later tonight as he offered to pick us up and take us to a lookout to see the city at night, a nice offer but nowadays you have to have to be careful so didn't bother giving him a call! We nipped into a cafe for some breakfast and a cup of tea which was nice. We checked out some films at the cinema as I'm desperate to watch 'in her shoes' as I've just read the book.

Brisbane

We picked up some local papers, stocked up on water and walked over the bridge to South Bank Parklands. The grassy areas were full of school children having picnics, dressed in their matching uniforms of green shorts, t-shirts (steve irwin style!) and hats with long white socks. When we were walking in the Financial District it was full of workers rushing around, a bit like New York.
Walking down ther river front we came across a beach, City Beach a blue water and real white sand beac with a lifeguard on duty! People were sunbathing and building sandcastles, very bizarre. We found a nice little spot in the park overlooking the river and read our papers. There were some really strange birds with huge black beaks just walking up and down, up and down. After a nice afternoon lazing, and walking back towards the City we came across a free exhibition 'Kylie' so we nipped in an oh i loved it! It had all the outfits from her tours, videos and music awards!
We took a walk back through Queens Street Mall and back to the Hostel to freshen up and sort some stuff to post back home. We decided to catch the movie, so walked into town, it was good!!!!

Friday 18th November 2005
Brisbane

Alex and Hayley were due to stay in the backpackers last night but were arriving late so didn't stay up long enough to catch them so when we woke this morning we found their room number and knocked them up so they walked into town with us and our parcels, nipped to the post office and then took a walk to a little cafe in the Mall for some breakfast which was lovely.

Dan and Squid!

We had a good chat and catch up, they were leaving on a train for a few days North of Brisbane but were coming back and also hoping to catch up with us in Sydney again before we leave next week. We sat with them until they had to go so said goodbye and Dan and I made our way to catch the local bus to the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary, this is what I'd been looking forward to the most, cuddling a Koala (how sad!).
The Sanctuary is only about 11km from the City so it took us about 1/2 hour to arrive there after stopping every few hundred yards! When we got there we got discount with our travel cards YEY and it was FANTASTIC, they have around 130 Koalas in total and they are SOOOOO cute! We even got to cuddle one and have a photo, (pictures to follow soon!). We saw Tasmanian Devils, Wombats, Snakes, Crocs and just loads of Koalas! We got a 50 cents bag of Kangaroo food and actually walked round the park, with loads of them just hopping around us and were able to go up to them and feed them, it was well cool! The Koalas were definitely the highlight for me! After a nice afternoon, we just managed to catch the bus back to the town where we nipped into the food mall for....Sushi! Yes Sushi, me and Dan had Sushi, I don't know what came over me but it was nice and I will deffo be eating it more often!
We took a walk back to the hostel and didn't have a late night, just a couple of beers then hit the sack.

Saturday 19th November 2005
Brisbane

Another noisy night last night so seemed like we'd hardly slept.

Dan feeding Skippy!

We had decided to have a last lazy day here today as to not spend too much money so about 9.30 am we walked into Queen Street Mall and had some breakfast, a nice fresh apple juice and fruit salad Yum!
It was a lovely roasting hot day, the hottest yet so we stocked up on bottles of water and walked over to the South Bank where the beach was. The town had a much different feel to it today with it being the weekend, much quieter and the food stalls were closed in the Mall. Just over the road at the beach though was a different story, it was packed with people taking in the weekend sunshine, people queuing up for ice creams and river taxis. It reminded us of Central Park in the sunshine after working hours in the week. We sat sunbathing with everyone else until it became just too hot so we got some lunch of sandwiches and sat in the Piazza, a kind of stadium with a big screen showing the Aussie Cricket. A few people had the same idea to escape the heat from outside. For the rest of the afternoon we sat in the shade by the river just taking it all in with an ice-cream!
We took a lazy walk back into town to pick up our postcards from Brisbane and then walked back to the hostel to pack our bags, we need to leave the hostel in the morning at 3.45 am to catch our flight to Sydney.
We had a couple of beers then went to bed.

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Lazy Koala!	South Bank Beach in Brisbane!	The moment I had been waiting for!!!	Vicks feeding Rooey!

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