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Published: April 20th 2007
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Last time I came to Brisbane it took two weeks to get there mainly because me and Dave stopped off in Byron Bay to, unsuccessfully as it turned out, attempt to woo travelling woman. This time I have a travelling woman of my own and it only takes an hour due to me and Bed being carbon-naughty courtesy of Richard Branson's airways. Not his literal airways, for one thing even Mr Branson's lungs don't fly, and frankly boarding via the beard would be a slightly unpleasant experience.
Debbies auntie Di picks us up at the airport and whisks us off to Redcliffe, a suburb north of Brisbane surrounded on 3 sides by the pacific and absolutely chock full of pelicans. I like pelicans. Actually I love pelicans. Nothing built like a barrel with a traffic cone stuck to the front should be able to fly but somehow they they manage it. We spent a happy 5 minutes speculating on how our first sighting was going to manage its crash-landing. (FYI- they sort of elegantly water-ski in which isn't as satisfying as the abortive splash-crash from 2 metres I was expecting). God alone knows how they manage to land on lamp
posts because every one has it own pelican attachment, a sort of fishy fairy on a metal christas tree. Di takes us on a whistle-stop tour of Redcliffe and I find the world's best street name. Even if I get reincarnated as a pelican and only manage a lamp post on Humpybong Esplanade I will die happy. Or be reborn happy. Or something.
We end up in the Yacht club for a beer and some nosh, Di's friend Mark ends up winning the meat raffle and we get ourselves invited to eat it the following day. I spend the evening on Di's verandah trying to count Geckos and failing miserably due to counting two of everything and forgetting where I was when I get to three. As far as I remember one eats a BBQ lunch, but we appear to have drunk one. I end up naming the Gecko family but the only one I can remember the following morning is Damper, so called because he mainly hangs out in the bathroom where he's got easy access to the bath taps. He's so small you can see right through his skin to his intestines which for some reason I find
quite endearing. He's a bit new on the Gecko scene so probably best he stays there until he's big enough to escape Millie, Di's softie of a cat. Once he makes it to Gecko yardie status he'll be fine, Millie won't take on stuff bigger than a moth. Lucky really, because another night we meet our first cane toad, a probable contender for the world's ugliest animal, and completely toxic to everything, including softie cats.
The following days see us visiting a couple of market towns via the lunacy of Brisbane's highways. I may be a bit premature in saying this but these Australians man, they drive like the loony. A tire blow-out (not ours), some dodgems, and a reasonable amount of luck see us into the Glasshouse mountains which look like God forgot about erosion for a moment. (Adam was probably annoying him about creating woman at the time).
BTW, I forgot about Nancarrow's bed barn, which we passed on the way. (FYI, for those of you that don't know my middle name is Nancarrow, from my gran). Never seen another Nancarrow before, let alone one who owns a bed barn. Sounds like an entrepreneurial soul, having a barn
full of sheep which aren't making him any money he goes into breeding beds, which is a much better idea I must say. It's just down the road from a house shop, where there are lots of houses. You drive round, pick a house, they cut it in two down the middle and put it on a truck, then deliver it to a plot you've bought previously. You know what I mentioned about mental drivers? Imagine one with a hundred foot of house on a giant truck. Apparently they quite often miscalculate and get half your house stuck in underpassess, across roads and in trees. If you're lucky enough to manage to get a whole house Mr Nancarrow can deliver you a freshly slaughtered bed to put in it.
Another day on Mad Max's highways see us to Brisbane centre where we catch the river cat to tour through the city centre. Much fun, except when you're trying to take pictures which are invariably blurred as the boat is being driven by an australian. When we get off we find that the australians have built a beach right in the centre of town. I think its because no-one told them
you couldn't, the same way no-one told them not to cut houses up and crash them into people. Novel idea, I quite like it, I have to say.
We'd like to thank Di for hosting us, we had a great week, most relaxing. By way of an apology for the picture Di, there's also a nice one of you and Deb. Many thanks, we'll be back.
Next installment is due soon,including how to drive on mars and the moon.
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Anna
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Nancarrows
Alright dosy, Sounds like you are having a ball. Just like to point out that this Nancarrow is in fact the 2nd other one you've seen as your nephew is Digby Nancarrow. Lots of love from the Wriggles x