Two Days in Brisbane

After six fun-filled days in Sydney, we hopped on a flight north to Brisbane, Australia's third largest city and capital of the state of Queensland.  On a map of Australia, Brisbane looks like a quick skip up the coast, but it's actually over 900 kilometres.  Brisbane is a pretty city sitting just inland on the river after which it was named. [Chad: from the air, the coast between Sydney and Brisbane looked like one long, sandy, idyllic beach.  Again, no wonder Aussies do water sports.]

We stayed in the neighbourhood of New Farm, around a river bend from downtown.  This turned out to be a great place to stay; lots of cafes and restaurant, and every convenience you could want, but a great neighbourhoody feel instead of a big, downtown feel.  We spent our first afternoon in Brisbane just wandering around and checking out our 'hood.

Downtown Brisbane, with the Story Bridge in the right of the photo.

Chad dangling riverside.

Brisbane has been reclaiming its river front, and one of its big projects was its old power station.  Now the Brisbane Powerhouse, it is home to a nice restaurant, a hip waterfront bar, and several theatres.  Very cool stuff.

Inside one of the dinner theatres.

Outside the bar (we're too poor to buy drinks in it!)

The next day we took a suggestion of the host at our guesthouse and took the city ferry (a passenger-only fast catamaran) for an hour and a half long 'tour' up and down the river (i.e., on its regular route transiting to and fro).  At $2.85 each, this was our kind of tourist activity!  And we got to see a lot of the city from the river before getting off the boat and wandering around through more reclaimed riverfront area.

(A note that in December 2010 and January 2011 Queensland suffered horrible flooding, and Brisbane was very affected.  Normally you could walk along the river to downtown from New Farm on a boardwalk, but this was washed out in the floods and the rebuilding isn't yet complete.)

Many people were throwing shrimps on the barbie in New Farm Park as we walked to the ferry terminal.

Ready to ferry tour!

The murky brown waters of the Brisbane River.

It appears this house might have been somewhat attractive until someone decided to tack on the massive white columns in front.

At high tide the river laps at the pathway through the park.  No wonder there was so much flooding.

An Australian cruise ship anchored along the banks.

Power station theatres

Just as you could climb Sydney's Harbour Bridge, you can also climb the Story Bridge, though it's much smaller.  [Chad: Cliff Claven fact of the day: the new Port Mann bridge in Vancouver just took over from Sydney's Harbour Bridge as the widest in the world.]

The old Customs House downtown.  Now looks like the home to a fancy club.

Seems every city is copying the London Eye now.

After we got off the boat, we took a wander along the river front.  The first thing we came across was this pagoda:

Which we then learned was built by Nepalese craftsmen as a tribute to peace for the 1988 World Expo, hosted in Brisbane just two years after Vancouver's Expo '86.  It appears that both expos kick-started waterfront reclamations.

Because we're so cultured, we went to both the Queensland Museum and the Queensland Art Gallery (the fact that they were both free and both air conditioned on this hot, sunny day had nothing to do with it... I swear...)  Both were actually really good.

The view from the Art Gallery.

This dragon sculpture was really cool, and part of a regular Asian art exhibit/exchange.

We then wandered back through downtown, busy with Christmas shoppers everywhere, and made our way back to New Farm.

Outside town hall.

Also walking along the path...

Back in New Farm, we treated ourselves and went out to dinner at Brisbane's very own Alibi Room!  Not as good as our Alibi Room by far, but in an expensive town they have happy hour and serve cheap and decent meals.  We'll take it.