Charis: Arriving in Australia was a return to familiarity after almost three months in non-English speaking countries. The flight itself was fairly long and tiring, but the temperatures were so much better once we hit the ground in Brisbane. We stayed in a quite nice youth hostel in the centre of town, with everything we needed within walking distance.
Our first evening we decided to go for a wander in South Bank, a lively and quite fancy neighbourhood, where we got dinner and even found a shop that would do us vegan churros!
The next day had us checking out Queensland Museum, which had an excellent exhibition on Australian South Sea Islanders and how their history intertwined with European colonists. I had a fairly good understanding of the history of the slave trade in America, but hadn’t realised that something quite similar had also occurred in Australia so this was definitely eye-opening for me. The natural history part of the museum was also excellent, with so many of the fauna being so unique to this part of the world.
We also went for a wander around the gardens in the city centre, where they were setting up for an evening light and art show – we particularly liked the swirly blue spheres above!
Derek: Looking around for fun things to do I found the Brisbane Planetarium and adjacent Botanical Gardens.
While there weren’t any sky viewing sessions available, they did have a number of planetarium shows running including a Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon experience. Charis loves Pink Floyd and we absolutely loved the show.
After the show we walked through the Botanical Gardens and managed to catch the Bonsai hall just before it closed. Somehow we’d managed to go through Japan without going to any Bonsai exhibits there. The botanical gardens also had some sculptures including these fun bats.
Charis: We decided to do an escape room and saw that Fox in a Box had excellent reviews. We did Tesla’s Mystery and managed to get out with a pretty good time, even though there were a couple of things staring us in the face for a while!
One of the highlights of Brisbane was definitely the famous Australia Zoo, of the Irwin family. It was great to see some of the beautiful Australian creatures up close and even the lunchtime ‘show’ was performed respectfully with free flying birds and free roaming crocodiles! I’m not usually the biggest fan of zoos but this one had obviously put a lot of care and attention into making sure their animals were well cared for and put a lot of money and effort into preservation efforts.
We also fancied finally getting out to see Deadpool & Wolverine and popped in to a cute Five Star cinema which had comfy seats, food and drink in the screen and a little arcade in the waiting area. The film was pleasantly ridiculous and the spicy margarita I had with it was the perfect accompaniment.
Derek: I spotted the Queensland Telecommunications Museum and dropped in for a look around their extensive collection which covers early use of morse code and telegraphs, manual and automatically switched telephone lines, and mobile cellular service. I really enjoyed talking with the guides about the point to point radio links which brought phone and data to remote locations across Australia. They had some old maps that the brought out showing the solar powered towers which were in use into the 2000s. The museum also had several pieces of equipment from shore to ship maritime voice communications including a very large vacuum tube based amplifier and recently decommissioned operators console pictured below.
Charis: We had considered hiring a camper van and driving down the coast to Sydney, but in the end decided it was likely to be a bit too pricey and time consuming for what we wanted to do. We didn’t want to miss out on some great bush walks though, so on our last day in Brisbane we hired a car and headed up to Springbrook in the Lamington National Park via the Gold Coast.
As this was a bit more remote, we Airbnb’d a cute little cottage with a wood burning stove for a few nights. Our first morning was pretty magical, with wallabies and bush turkeys and parrots all joining us on the patio with our cups of tea. The Australian countryside is so much noisier than back home, with a lot of the land animals being much larger and the birds a lot more flamboyant!
We headed out for a walk through the bush, catching some incredible views and getting caught in a thunderstorm on the way home! Thankfully we had time to make some dinner before the power went out, leading to a very atmospheric evening snuggled up next to the fire and listening to the rain pattering on the roof.
But before long it was time to return the car. We came back through Robina, catching the Wild Robot (great film!) and some tasty sushi on our way through. We also stopped off at the Wynnum Mangrove trail on our way back. As the tide was high we didn’t see nearly as many crabs this time but we still got to admire the cool and bizarre biome of the trees stretching out into the sea.
Derek: With just an evening in Brisbane before our flight we found a fun hotel in Fortitude Valley, a little over from where we’d been staying and exploring before. This kept us close to the airport, but the big draw was an arcade games bar and restaurant called Netherworld. This diner/bar had some fun sour beers, ginger beers, and quite the cocktail menu as well as a good assortment of vegan food. We grabbed some coins, played pinball, raced cars, shot zombies, and tried some classic Galaga (Play online here, “x” “z” and arrow keys). The place had a great vibe and I’d love to go back sometime.
The next morning was a quick hour and a half flight directly south (and +1 timezone interestingly). I spent several years living in Vienna, Austria while growing up. The American school there was full of the kids of families whose work or life brought them there for a few years and Claire and Jane were two of the friends I made then. They moved back to Australia after my first year there but our families have stayed in touch since. We got in touch and were invited to stay with their parents Sarah and Maurice on the edge of the beautiful Georges River National Park.
It was fun to catch up with all of them over the week. We had a weekend lunch where Claire and Jane were able to come over along with their young children and Jane’s partner Josh. Charis cooked several dinners through the week and we thoroughly enjoyed being back in a home. The woodland immediately outside the house was full of lorikeets and sulphur crested cockatoos which was great fun to see and listen to. I was able to do a practice session for my PhD Viva defense with my supervisor and do a little work which needed completing.
Maurice took us to Wattamolla Beach in the Royal National Park. Spring was in full swing, thankfully without much rain. The white flannel flowers and brush-like Banksia were in bloom and with the weathered rocks and cliffs made for a gorgeous afternoon hike.
We took the train into Sydney’s central business district (CBD) one day, caught the main sights of the bridge and Opera house, walked through the Botanical Gardens, and went through the Art Gallery of New South Wales and the Australian Museum. Diggy Doo’s Coffee was a tasty discovery hidden in the basement of one of the many office buildings. We had had a great dinner in Brisbane at Zeus Street Greek and grabbed lunch at another branch here in Sydney.
We did a few hour walk from Coogee Beach to Bondi Beach. This bit of coastline is right in the city and has Sculptures by the Sea, the world’s largest free sculpture exhibition, though admittedly they were actively installing the new art as we walked by. There were several swimming pools right in the ocean which looked far too cold to enjoy.
I was also interested in visiting the Maritime Museum as they had a tall ship at dock. The ship is a replica of the Endeavour which Captain Cook sailed from Europe to Australia. The replica has actually sailed around the world twice, and visited Cardiff in 2003. We also walked through the Australian submarine Onslow and saw several other ships owned by the museum. There was a special exhibit on about James Cameron and his various deep sea dives on the Titanic and the Mariana Trench which I particularly enjoyed. I hadn’t realized that he is a Sydney local and several of the test dives for new submarines were done in the harbor.
From Sydney we’re flying to New Zealand, our last country on the trip!