Brisbane, the River City
Trip Start
May 01, 2010
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38
58
Trip End
Oct 03, 2010
Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
Monday, August 9, 2010
You wonder why you yearn for the outback, wide open spaces and small rural towns until you hit the highly congested freeways of a major city. You also wonder why you pay GST, fuel taxes and vehicle taxes when governments mismanage their finances so badly that they cannot build or maintain roads and leave it to private enterprise who slug you four dollars twenty just to cross a bridge to get to your destination on a national highway! Welcome to Brisbane, the capital of Queensland, where the road system is such that you get sucked in to paying these exorbitant amounts before you know it, especially if you are a visitor without knowledge of the road layouts.
Now that is off my chest, Brisbane is an attractive city located on the Brisbane River with a population of about 2 million and ranks third to Sydney and Melbourne in size. As we drove towards Brisbane, we were impressed with the six lane (in some areas ten lane) motorway where the traffic flowed well and the interchanges were well planned. From our experience with the public transport system here, they seem to have got this right in that it is fast, clean and efficient with dedicated busways built alongside the motorways so that they have an uninterrupted trip into the city where they disappear into underground bus ports so not to congest the city centre too much. A seniors day pass costs $5.20 and gives access to busses, ferries and river cats from sunrise to the last trip of the day which is fair value for money, if you travel off peak this reduces to $4.00 for seniors. On our first day here we managed to hit the wettest August Day since 1887 but even this didn’t dampen our enthusiasm as we set off to explore the city.
We got off the bus below King George Square and climbed the stairs to find ourselves in the city centre near the imposing Brisbane City Hall with some sculptures in the City Hall Square.
This grand sandstone building was unfortunately closed for renovations so we couldn’t climb the bell tower which apparently gives good views over the city. Queensland seems to be a state with a Royalist history with statues of King George, King Albert and Queen Victoria and the streets named after many from the English Royal family.
We headed towards the Queen Street Mall where the main retailers have their stores and found the opticians where Margaret bought some cleaning fluid for her contact lenses.
After this we found a McDonalds to take advantage of their free seniors coffee which was especially welcome after eating one of their big Macs! I still wonder why I am attracted to these even though I don’t really find them appetising! I suppose they are cheap and trying to be careful with money makes me waste it sometimes but you certainly get what you pay for. We called Lesley’s friend Kayleen and arranged to meet her and her boyfriend Luke for lunch downstairs in the Telstra Centre.
They both work for Telstra and as everyone else, they are pleased with the new modern Telstra Centre where all the departments are housed in two adjacent buildings with restaurants and cafes on the ground floor. We bought takeaway pizza on the ground floor and then went up to the fourth floor with Kayleen to a pleasant canteen area with comfortable settee type seats and a coffee machine. Whilst there I managed to track down Tony Bates, one of the data testers of my era with whom I had spoken to often in the course of my work, but never actually met. It was good putting a face to a voice. Tony is now testing other Telstra products as most of the systems we worked on are gone or quickly disappearing with the advancement of technology. I am so thankful that I am out of it now. My head has been cleared of the knowledge I had and I now have space to fill it with what I want instead of what was necessary to make a living.
We wandered around the city looking at the various monuments and buildings before deciding to call it a day and head back to the caravan park for the evening. It was just as well we did as it wasn’t much later when the heavens really opened up and drenched the place with heavy constant rain for the whole night which broke their August rain record.
Rising the next morning, a quick look out of the caravan door wasn’t too promising as the rain had stopped but the clouds still hung around without any sign of the sun trying to penetrate them. But it was at least dry and we decided to visit Mt Coot-tha, where the Brisbane Lookout is located.
This lookout has spectacular panoramic views of the city that stretches out to Moreton Bay and around to the distant mountains. The restaurant serves very nice coffee and snacks which were irresistible. We sat down and enjoyed them while taking in the view through the glass windows keeping out of the cold wind.
Next stop was the Botanical Gardens, just down the road where we spent a pleasant couple of hours wandering through the Aloe and Japanese gardens admiring their displays. We found at one point we were at the start of the Children’s trail. We picked up the appropriate pamphlet and followed the fun trail which led us to various numbers with statues to describe the write up in the pamphlet, such as the Bamboo Bear and the Fiddle Tree. Walking through this 52 hectare gardens, we also found the Tropical Dome and Fern House where it was nice and warm, though of course humid. The day seemed much colder than the day before when it was raining, especially in the open areas on top of Mt Coot-tha and the Botanic Gardens.
It was a public holiday for the EKKA, which somehow translates into the Brisbane Agricultural Show so luckily the roads were not too busy. It would have been daunting to drive here during a working day as the drivers do not travel exactly at a sedate speed. Not withstanding this, I still managed to find my way into a lane that took me over a toll bridge without any way of escape, much to my dismay, when just down the road I could have crossed the river for nothing! The name of the toll bridge is simply GBB (Go-Between-Bridge). With so many bridges they had run out of bridge names! We were on the way to see the Heritage-listed Regatta Hotel built 1874, which we duly found and drove passed it, but after driving around and around a couple of times, we couldn’t work out where to park so weren’t able to stop to take a photo though it did look impressive. Mid afternoon we returned to the caravan and as the clouds moved on and the blue sky was visible again, the temperature dropped.
On our last day, with the forecast of sunny weather, it was time to see the city by cruising along the beautiful Brisbane River by the CityCat. This high speed catamaran stops at precincts such as Riverside, New Farm Park and South Bank Parklands. ‘Essentially a river city, Brisbane’s heart and soul courses through its centre with more twists and turns than a corkscrew. Travelling its steely waters by ferry is sheer delight. It’s a working river, busily ferrying passengers all over the city.
Once you’ve crossed under the mighty Story Bridge you’ll appreciate just how special it is to see a city from its river.’ So, it was time for us to see how special the city is in the beautiful sunshine, from the river. The first day when we went into the city by bus, the driver noticed us still sitting there when many moved off the bus and kindly told us that since we had bought tickets to the city, we had better also disembark and catch another bus that would take us there. On the way back we noticed our bus change was at Garden City (not in Melville!) so we decided the best way to get to town is to drive to Garden City and then catch one of the more frequent busses into the city straight from there. By morning, we changed our minds and decided that our car would be safer here in the caravan park than at a shopping centre. We left bright and early shortly after 7am and after a quick cup of coffee in the city, boarded the Inner City Ferry heading east.
Though the sun was shining, the wind was fairly cool but with our anoraks on we were still comfortable sitting on the top deck of the ferry looking out over the water and the places on both sides of the river. We were impressed by how many bridges cross this great Brisbane River which splits this city allowing easy access to both sides. We counted about ten bridges compared to Perth having only about three but then Perth city is not built around the Swan River so the bridges are only needed to get from the residential suburbs into the city or to the suburbs on the other side of the city.
From the boat we saw what a big modern city Brisbane is, much bigger than Perth. We were amazed how far along the river the tall apartment blocks spread with great views over the river. In the city centre the freeway is located right on the rivers edge with pylons in the water to not encroach on the city’s prime real estate. The first stop the ferry made was South Bank Parklands which is a fairly new area of restaurants, parks and apartments blocks overlooking the river. The next stop was the River Plaza where the Maritime Museum is located on an old war ship anchored on the river. Appropriately, the children’s playground by the jetty there has a nautical theme. As we sat on the upper deck of the sedate inner city ferry stopping frequently to pick up passengers, we watched the CityCats pass at speed to their pickup points. Close to the Eagle Street Jetty we saw a couple of well maintained paddle streamers anchored by the shore. We were quite comfortable on the quiet ferry and didn’t realise that we were the only people left on the boat which had turned around for its return journey to the city!
We asked the driver how we could transfer to the faster Cats which went further down towards the mouth of the river. He told us to get off at Dockside, wait for the next ferry to take us back to Sydney Street where we could catch one of the CityCats. What fun we had on the top deck of the catamaran with the wind blowing through our hair. Further down the river we were moving out of the city centre and through older suburbs with smaller blocks and houses and less high rise buildings. We thought we might end up at the river mouth but at Byron Street the catamaran turned round and we made our way back towards the city centre. With so many great photos of this lovely sunny day with interesting buildings we knew we would have difficulty with selecting those to put on our travelpod!
We even managed to get a photo from the river of the Heritage-Listed Regatta Hotel built in 1874 where we weren’t able to find a carpark the day before! When we arrived back at North Quay, it was later in the morning, warmer and quite a few people boarded the boat. They were accompanied by excited children as it was a student free day at the local state schools. We stayed on and went on to the end of the line in the other direction to the University of Queensland. Here we had an extended stop and the deckhand told us in his strong South African accent that we would be leaving at 17minutes passed…! He told us that he had worked for South African Airways before immigrating to Australia. We had spent three hours on the ferries and had travelled as far as they went, both up and downstream and had a wonderful time. It was all included in our day bus ticket which cost us $5.30, and proved to be very good value.
After disembarking again at the jetty where we had first caught the ferry earlier that morning, we were soon back in the Queen Street Mall. Scattered around the adjacent square outside the New City Council Buildings are numerous metal balls of different sizes covered in what look like pressure pot baskets! Either someone once made too many baskets or else there are lots of pressure pots stored in some building without their baskets! By midday the wind was much stronger which virtually pushed us along the Queen Street Mall. Being a sunny day and close to lunch time there were so many more people walking around, buskers playing their instruments and the Ibis’s again scrounging in the dustbin. In the Mall we noticed that there were underground bus stations just like the rail system in London. There is a complete road system purely for busses running under the city streets and we in Perth thought it was an achievement to put one railway line underground. Not being too familiar with the bus routes, we headed back to the bus station we knew at the King George Square, found our bus and were soon back home for a late lunch. The busses are clean here and graffiti free as was Brisbane generally so either they are stricter with stiffer penalties or more people to clean up the graffiti quicker…..or they don’t have as many vandals as in Perth!
After lunch, with the forecast of winds at 90km/hr, we spent a pleasant afternoon in the best place we could be - the comfortable lounge of Linda and Ian Spence. With the help of our Navman GPS, we found their home in Sinamon Park on the far side of the city. We recognized their name the day before from our days in Zimbabwe, and phoned Ian who kindly invited us for tea the next afternoon.
Rev. Ian Spence is the pastor of Metro West Community Church (WPC Mt Ommaney) formally known as Indooroopilly WPC. They are a very friendly couple and we had a great time reminiscing about different things from our shared background. Before we knew it, the time was after 5.30pm and as we left, we couldn’t believe how strong and cold the wind had become during the time inside their house. Everyone has been telling us how unusual it is for Brisbane to get this kind of weather at this time of the year.
Needless to say we got lost on our way home as the road system is constantly being upgraded and our Navman had difficulty finding its way through the roadworks where roundabouts had been changed into interchanges. We drove on a new freeway where at one point, four other motorways passed over the road on which we were travelling. Brisbane has a network of motorways the like of which we had not experienced before in Australia, but no doubt will be seeing more of the same when we reach Sydney and Melbourne.
We move on tomorrow to the Gold Coast, a little further down the Pacific Highway and hopefully with a little less hustle and bustle. Southport will be our next home for the weekend.
Comments
Great entry. We loved Brisbane and did not see half of what you saw. We went up Mount Cootha one night. What a beautiful view from up there. Brisbane is a huge city - very spread out.
Enjoyed reading about your time in Brisbane. That RiverCat is a fantastic thing, hey! We did it with Mum and Dad some years ago and felt like we were on a special cruise - couldn't believe it was all public transport. A gorgeous city indeed.
Looking fwd to seeing you in our little part of paradise soon :-)
Blessings - A, L & Co.