G’day mates, and welcome to Brisbo! The first city we have been in for ages where we look just like the locals – oh the joys of anonymity.
Ahhh Brisbane, how we love you so. Like a pair of comfy old flip flops or a favourite aunt this excellent city opened its arms to us once again for just a few days of reminiscing, some excellent food and a bit of cheesy tourism too.
For those of you who may not know, Noo and I lived in Brisbane around 8 years ago when we were on one of our other world tours. We settled here for a number of months to work and enjoy all that this super laid back and fun city had to offer. As a result Brissy has cemented itself in our hearts with great warmth and happy memories. Thus when we discovered that our flights to NZ would connect through here, and that we could stop off, we took this opportunity to enjoy a little wistful nostalgia.
With regard to travel from Bali, for the record the food on Emirates was better this time, the plane was a new Boeing with loads of ace features like excellent in seat entertainment, and the leg room in Economy was pretty good too. Singapore airport was a pleasant stop – this is the shortest time I have ever spent in a country: we transited immigration, checked in for our next flight and exited the country in just under 40mins, a new record for both of us. So following a challenging travel day from Bali to Singapore and then onto Bris we finally arrived about 20hrs later into Brisbane’s hot summer which actually felt quite cool to us. Coming from sultry Bali it was pleasantly fresh, as whilst the temperature is similar the humidity is much lower which was welcome change.
With just 3 full days in Brisbane we quickly set about making the most of our time here (which for Noo appeared to be code for shopping!). It will come as no surprise to you, that our limited supply of clothing is getting “well manky” (marinated as it has been for the last few weeks in a heady soup of sweat, sun cream, DEET and dust) it is perhaps not so surprising that we were both pining for some clean/new clothing. (I have already killed a white shirt which came back from the laundry yellower than when it went…) Therefore day one was spent hitting the excellent shopping malls of down town where I bought four new T-shirts and Noo bought an assortment of about fourteen items…. Hmmmmmm? This against a back drop of still needing to fit everything in our backpacks and not as yet being willing to throw much away as we don’t know when our shipping will arrive from the UK. Hey ho, you buy it you gotta carry it!
Our evening of day one was a food delight. We had long been planning to indulge in two of our favourite vices – Cheese and Wine, as we had neither of these since leaving the UK and personally I think ten weeks without either is blatantly bad for your health. Our evening meal was a banquet of cheeses, crusty bread, antipasti, veggies and dip, all supported by a fine New Zealand Pinot Noir. Fantastic. The evening was further enhanced as we were fortunate enough to discover Christmas food still in the supermarkets here, and to my delight we managed to pick up a half dozen mince pies too. Yay for a touch of belated Christmas fare.
Now for some tourism stuff.
The other key thing we had planned for Brissy was a trip out to the Breakfast Creek Hotel and a river tour on the excellent City Cat ferry. BCH or Brekkie Creek as it’s known locally is famed for being the only place in Australia where you can still get a Schooner (about a pint) of Castlemaine XXXX direct from a wooden cask and not from the usual steal variety. History has it that following much complaining by the dock workers who drank there in the 1970’s, the brewery (based in Brisbane) agreed to continue delivering a limited run each week in wooden barrels just for consumption at Brekkie. Now surprising as it may sound, Noody never made it to the Brekkie to try the “beer of the wood” when last we were here, so we made a bee line out to the Creek to sample some of this locally famous brew.
What followed was a very pleasant afternoon of supping and sampling some incredibly quaffable beers in the fantastic surroundings of the old “grand dame” hotel. However, I must confess I discovered as we were about to leave that the bar we had used was serving XXXX from steel barrels not the wooden ones, so I still haven’t had a chance to try it – oh well there is always next time, the beer and company were excellent so you won’t find me complaining. We then went for a lovely stroll along, and picnic by the Brisbane river, before getting to Bretts Wharf (in sight of the international cruise terminal) and hoping on the lovable local river ferry called the City Cat (see pics) where we rode down the meandering loops of the river back into the heart of the City. This affords some great photo opportunities, and is an ideal way to see the city. Plus it gave us the chance to float by some of our old haunts and reminisce from the comfort of the boat.
Our final day (Sunday) has been characterised by another visit down town to do a bit more shopping, a river walk in the sunshine and a lazy brunch at the Coffee Club which has given me the chance to sit and write this post. It is here I shall leave you. Our return visit to Brisbane has without doubt brought back some fond memories, but it’s time we rode off into the sunrise and made some new memories in New Zealand. And so with a fair sense of trepidation we depart early tomorrow for Auckland and the next leg of the big adventure.
Happy new year all,
Noody
PS: with regard to cleaning teeth. When away from home it’s often the little things you notice most… specifically the delight I felt at actually being able to clean my teeth and toothbrush in water from the tap for the first time in months without fear of catching anything! Oh the decadence and heady abandon of not having to use bottled water.
Planet Noody 
Mince pies? Not like Mum’s I bet. Good luck on next step.
Love Mum and Dad