Brisbane Wrap-Up

I wrote this post on the 18^th before flying to Sydney and saying goodbye to Brisbane:

Farewell Brisbane, you will be missed. Queensland seems like a great state, what little I’ve seen, and I’m sad that I don’t have time to explore more of the country. We were here four full days and didn’t even see all of Brisbane itself (though we saw quite a bit.)

The day after the Zoo we went into downtown and saw the sites. After a trip to the mall to eat, we entered the Brisbane City Hall, home of the Museum of Brisbane. The entry was free (as is the case with all the museums around here it seems) and the museum was decent, although the main focus of the exhibits was immigration and all the different periods and peoples in Brisbane’s history. The best part of the visit was riding the lift to the top of the clock tower. The lift is the original from the ‘30s, and the first built in Queensland period. It had an operator and everything, and he was a sunny, humorous man who was quick with the jokes. We got to view Brisbane from above, but unfortunately (because we didn’t know we’d have this opportunity) we didn’t have a camera.

Later that day we walked out to the suburb called Milton. It was quite fun to see my name on everything to include the Milton Brewery where they brew Queensland’s beer spelled XXXX but pronounced fourex (every state apparently has their “own” beer and they celebrate them—particularly in association with sports, not unlike our NFL.) The place had a tour so we decided to take a look inside the Milton Brewery where I learned a great deal about the Australian economy, for it is of particular note how in Australia almost everything possible is made here. The brewery used all ingredients grown somewhere in Queensland, and local coal (which is abundant) to fuel their engines as well. Our tour guide was excellent and told us way more than we needed to know about everything. The best part for me though was strolling through the packaging museum and seeing old labels for Milton Beer, which is long extinct.

While in Milton we also located the giant Suncorp Stadium where, on Saturday night, we returned to watch the QR Reds (the local team) loose to the Waratahs from New South Wales in a Super 14 Rugby match. The game was great, with lots of tension because it was a grudge match of sorts, but even when the Reds lost everybody still seemed in a good mood. I was disappointed because I half expected a riot.

Before the game on Saturday night, to backtrack a bit, I have to mention our trip to the South Bank. After leaving Milton on Friday, we crossed the Brisbane River to see the city from the opposite side by night. We got some great photos, and then we stumbled across the cultural heart of Brisbane. The South Bank was like another city, and on Friday night it was happening. There we people everywhere, including a group having an art exhibition for “Schizophrenia Awareness.” There were cafes and restaurants on the river, a beach, a miniature rain forest, and booths set up with people hocking wares. We ate at an Italian place where we were able to enjoy local king prawns in spaghetti (prawns are just big shrimp here.)

We came back the next day to the South Bank in the morning because we had discovered the free internet. The place was just as nice in the day, and had the water not been so cold, I might have hopped in the water at the world’s only inland beach. The weather was excellent, sunny and warm for the most part. It did rain briefly before the game Saturday, but the shower was over in minutes and forgotten an hour later. While it rained we ducked inside a place called Irish Murphy’s were a guy not much older than us, dressed in a kilt, was playing away on a set of Scottish bag pipes to a crowd of University students celebrating Norway’s Constitution Day. Befuddled and intrigued by all of the Norwegian fanfare, I asked a girl if any of them were actually from Norway. Turned out she was, and one other person, the rest were just along for the ride. They had just finished a parade of some sort. By the quiting of the rain, the piper had gone from Scotland the Brave, to a couple of reels, to Amazing Grace, then started all over sort of mixing them all.

We left the next morning, taking the train back to the airport. All in all, Brisbane was a great city and I’m glad it was one of our stops. On to Sydney.