Brisbane

I got into Brisbane on Wednesday, Feb 15. I met a girl on the walk to the hostel who is from Germany. Luckily she was really easy to understand because she studied English in school. She has been to Utah before. Her family went to Bryce Canyon and some small dude ranch near there.

We had dinner together on Wednesday night. We went and bought some breakfast foods together later that night. I introduced her to peanut butter! She had never had it before. She thought it was good. The peanut butter here is not as sweet as it is in the USA. We spent all day together on Thursday. We decided to just try and get a feel for the city. We found the botanical gardens, went shopping, found a few cathedrals and walked around. One of the cathedrals we went in has the highest vaulted ceiling in the Southern Hemisphere. On the side of the cathedral was a building that used to be used as a hospital that nuns ran. Eventually in the 1970s the nuns decided they didn’t want to do it anymore because it was not up to code and they walked out.

We ended up getting really hot walking around and decided to come back to the hostel around four. Brisbane is not nearly as crazy and Sydney. They have skyscrapers here but not quite as big as in Sydney. There is a river that runs in the city. The next day we went on a river-cat through the city. The boat is used mainly as a form of public transportation but we took it just to have a look around the city. The suburbs in Brisbane are very beautiful.

The hostel in Brisbane is really nice. I think it was remodeled not very long ago. It has rooftop access with a nice view of the city. There is also a swimming pool on the roof. The room is not bad except that the train runs behind it and it is quite noisy all night. Brisbane is the second hostel I have been in that has a train nearby. I had a hard time sleeping at night because of it. I also felt like the room was not ventilated very well.

We tried to go to the Koala Sanctuary on the second day in Brisbane but we got a bit lost on the way to the bus stop. It was actually really funny when we realized later all we needed to do was cross the street at the point we started at because the numbers went up on one side and down on the other. We ended up finding the bus stop and going to the sanctuary on Saturday. We thought it was going to be bigger and ended up only needing to say there for about 2 hours. It was set up like a zoo except they only have Australian animals. They have this really fun place that had kangaroos out in a field that you could hand feed! We were able to pet them too. They were really soft and had sharp claws and really strange back feet. They are the strangest looking animals I have ever seen. I made a video of one of them because it was jumping around and later when I looked at it I realized there was a baby in the pouch! I would have filmed longer if I knew that. The best part of the whole zoo was that we got to hold a koala! I have heard Queensland is the only state in Australia that you can hold koalas. They have you put your hands together palm up and then they sit him on your hands. His name was Hugo and he was a big koala. I was surprised by how stinky he was. He was also eating some eucalyptus leaves that I could smell when I held him. I was surprised by how scratchy his fur was. The kangaroos were much softer.

I decided to buy an airplane ticket up to Cairns instead of taking the bus. The bus would take about 25 hours, give or take, and the plane will be two! I found a flight for only a $100. The only problem is I bought a bus ticket in advance that went from Sydney to Cairns. I am going to see if I can possibly trade the rest for a tour or something. They do that on a few tickets. If not, I didn’t lose that much money and it is good for a year! So if for some reason I come here again within this year and need to take the bus from Brisbane to Cairns I can. You really need several weeks to do the entire East Coast. I did not realize that when I started out. I thought it would be very doable in two weeks. It is but you really need more time. I get sick of constantly moving to new places. I really want to stay a few days in the Great Barrier Reef and so I decided that flying would be the best option. I don’t really want to torture myself with several 10 to 12-hour bus rides.

I am in Cairns now. I got a single room in the hostel. I had to pay about double the price, which was only $58 a night, but it is SO worth it. I really need to be able to sleep. I feel like I have a cold coming on too so I need to try and fight it off. I do not sleep well in the communial rooms.

I booked a couple of tours in Cairns. On Monday I am going to the Kuranda rainforest. I will take a sky rail there and then a scenic train back. Tuesday I am going to the Daintree Rainforest. On Wednesday I booked a tour on a boat where I will go out onto the Great Barrier Reef and I can do a short practice scuba dive or a guide snorkel tour and then we will snorkel for a few hours. I added an extra helicopter ride on the end. I have heard the helicopter ride is really amazing so I decided it was worth the extra money. On the airplane we flew over the reef. It was so beautiful just to see from the airplane.