14th January 2010
Off to Brisbane this morning, so we caught the train from Nerang to Roma Street where Anna and Sofia met us to take us back to their lovely shaded apartment in the suburb of Cooperoo. After a quick pit-stop Anna dropped us in the city centre so we could get our bearings and find out some information about the transport system for getting about in the next few days.
We started at the main mall in Queen Street where, because it was lunchtime, everything was really busy. We managed to find a space in one of the many food courts for a quick sandwich. We then walked up through the mall towards the river, past the Treasury Casino and Brisbane City Library. We crossed the river over to Southbank where because we were so hot by this time (it’s much hotter here than in Surfers because of all the concrete and it not being on the coast) we headed into the museum with its lovely air conditioning.
There were loads of young children running around because it’s still school holidays and the museum is doing a special exhibition on dinosaurs with lots of events. We visited some really excellent exhibitions including one on three Australian solidiers who had won the Victoria Cross in the First World War. Then we went to the natural history section, where we spent an interesting time checking out all the dangerous bugs and sea creatures that Oz has to offer, well it is better to know what these things look like so we can avoid them!
The only thing about air-con is that after a while you tend to get a bit too cool, so we made our way for the exit. By this time, there were a lot of children around the doors, screaming and running about and when we got to a balcony overlooking the foyer we saw why. A very life like dinosaur was terrorising them. I’m sure there were a few nightmares that night! It was like one we had seen in Sydney with a man inside but with animatronics in the head which made it look really life-like.
We walked over the Kuripila pedestrian bridge to get back to the city. This is the world’s largest tensegrity bridge, or a bridge of structures where its integrity is based on a balance between tension and compression components.
We headed back out to Anna and Nathan’s place in Cooperoo where we enjoyed a lovely evening, catching up with them both over some fabulous home-made pizza expertly made by Nathan, so delicious :).