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River Plaza
where the market is located on a Sunday After our brief stay in Sydney its onto our final destination in Australia, Brisbane. We have chosen to stay in a rural small town called Brookfield once again using Gumtree to find our accommodation, which described itself as being absolutely idyllic, a peaceful zen setting in the middle of the countryside. We make our way from the airport utilising their excellent train service which delivers you into the heart of the city. From here we take a bus and make our way towards Brookfield. We leave behind the city and after about 30 minutes we are right out in the countryside where houses seem to have at least 4 acres each, it is very rural indeed. We are dropped off at the local village shop and ask for directions to our destination, it will take about an hour to walk or 10 minutes by taxi, so 10 minutes later we arrive at our new home. We are renting a wooden type lodge from Paul which is much larger than we had expected, however the previous occupants were staying an additional night so we had to use one of the spare rooms in the main house for the 1st night only. The
South Bank Beach
in the heart of the city... house was very secluded and as described, quiet and settled in amongst rolling hill land and forests, the nearest neighbours were a bus ride away. I would think that if you wanted to book somewhere in the UK of the same equivalent you would need to pay in excess of £1K a week during peak season, we were paying just over a £100 a week.
Facilities included a gym, swimming pool, bicycles and for those of you can ride horses, there were 7 to choose from. The only drawback we could make was that you had to share the house kitchen as the wooden tee pee as we now call it was not equipped. We were hoping to do plenty of cycling during our stay, however the terrain put paid to that, far too many hills for us not so fit people, so it was plenty of walking instead. As you walk through the forests, horses were notably used a lot, every few minutes someone would be galloping by. It transpires that this is the main area for thoroughbred Arab racing, and that there was an astonishing 100km race within the next 2 weeks. I thought this was impossible
River Brisbane
View from the City Cat but its correct, in fact only a month away was a 24hr race which covered 160km. We were talking to a lady who we had seen a couple of hours earlier and she had done 25km during that time and I swear the horse was not even breaking a sweat.
Being so out of the way and with the nearest and only shop an hours walk away, days were beginning to get long, so much in fact that we offered to cut the grass and hedges which took me back to my early days working for the council. Paul was kind enough to offer a lift to the University where he worked and from there we could take the City Cat into Brisbane. The university itself was absolutely huge, it really is a city within a city and we could quite easily have spent a day there, over 37,000 students attend the Uni. The ‘City Cat’ ran on the Brisbane River and for a couple of bucks each was tremendous way of seeing the city, the fact that the ride was a smooth as silk also helped. We made our way to the North of the city where there
Brisbane City
Approaching the city via the City Cat was a market being held, however it was not the biggest in the world so after about an hour we headed for the south pier, home to the manmade beach and large swimming pool. You can hardly believe that your in the middle of a huge city, its amazing really. There is lots to do here, street entertainers, loads of bars, another small market and of course swim should you desire.
We also visited Australia Zoo, previously home of world famous Steve Irwin which is situated approx 75km north of Brisbane. It’s a decent place to visit however we were both not too sure Steve would have appreciated the direction the Zoo seemed to be taking. While we were there his daughter Bindi was performing with her 'Croc Men', and the show to be honest was cringe worthy to the highest degree, still most of the young ones seem to like it and I guess this must be the audience they are now targeting? I don’t think it was any coincidence that Steve’s father had recently left the Zoo in a blaze of publicity as it looks like he had fallen out with Terri, Steve’s wife. They were also
Koala Bear
it's snooze time at the zoo filming the day we were there and there are rumours that a buy out was imminent by the people who own the Discovery Channel?
Apart from visiting a couple of small towns near Brisbane life was pretty simple and the urge to move again was growing. We were beginning to have strong thoughts on returning to Thailand as we both loved it so much and there were things we missed doing when we were there in November. 10 days later and were back in Phuket, the urge to move was just too strong.
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busseysontour
brian bussey
Way out of Order
Dazza, you got it all wrong me olde. Karen is still in Brisbane mucking out the horses, I have come to Thailand on my own to make sure I didn't miss anything after our first visit. Just as well I did as there were a new batch of Ladies waiting for me when I arrived. Pics will be in the next blog. Now back to work you lazy sod and no good going to the job centre as all the cleaning jobs have been taken. Brian Ps..Only needs Chelsea or Man U to buy Cesc and Arsenal will be in the poo eh Scott.