Brizzy

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Get to Brisbane and get the feeling that it's going to be a bit of a quiet one so my first night is spent sleeping.


It's now my first full day and I decide to go explore. Over the bridge I go and past a museum with dinosaurs outside of it. Definitely on my list of things to do (anything with dinosaurs is automatically on my list!)

I end up wandering around for the best part of three hours, finding little walks along the river which was quite cool.

For the next three days in no particular order, I did the following:

Visited a man-made beach in the middle of the city which was very pretty but a little strange;

Went to the casino, bought two chips, wimped out on placing a bet and cashed my two chips back in; and

Checked out the dinosaur museum (actually named the Queensland Museum but my name for it is waaay better) and learned lots about the natural history of Australia.

On Friday morning, I tagged along on a free city tour from the now closed city hall. It was easily one of the best city tours I've experienced and I discovered that Brisbane actually has a really interesting history. Who knew?

Friday evening consisted of myself and many many Germans from the hostel heading over to the square outside the casino, where every Friday night they hold a free salsa evening. You can go have a lesson there first and then afterwards show off your skills.

Saturday brought with it my idea to see the Botanic Gardens. They're so completely different to the gardens in Sydney but still beautiful. After approximately ten minutes of walking into the centre of them, the heavens, out of absolutely nowhere, opened and it poured with rain. I ran under a tree for some rain protection which worked temporarily. I was soon getting soaked until a random Japanese man appeared and sheltered me with his umbrella. " Is it always like this in Brisbane?" he asks.

"I don't know, I'm not from Brisbane."

"Oh. Where are you from?"

"London. And it's always like this in London." I can't help but get the feeling that the rain is following me around the world.

The rain stopped but the Japanese man continued to follow me around Brisbane for about 40 minutes before I made my excuses to leave.

Saturday also gave me my first and only experience of Brisbane's (in)famous 'Valley'. The Brizzy club scene. I was supposed to be meeting Jamie (from the flight over to Oz) but it somehow all went wrong and I must have only been in the Valley for 20 minutes before I decided to leave.

I end up leaving Brisbane on Monday morning which is the only day I saw the Sun shine there- the day that I have a five hour bus journey up to Rainbow Beach. Typical.

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