Beautiful morning in Brisbane – skies clear, temperatures cool and breezy. Woke up early – yeah, that’s a surprise! - went out for our morning walk and found the most amazing park right behind out hotel. Called the Roma Street Parklands, it’s an oasis of rainforests, gardens, lakes and fern gullies right in the heart of Brisbane by the train station. It was truly beautiful and a great hour long walk that really made us feel better after our flying ordeal the day before.
After cleaning up, we were back on the streets and heading toward our river cruise and koala encounter. We were scheduled to board our river cruise for the Koala sanctuary at 9:30 – of course, we were early, so we took a stroll down the boardwalk on South Bank. Fabulous walk down the river side with lots of parks, open spaces and restaurants/cafes. Heading back to the pier for our cruise, we passed a Nepalese Pagoda where a film crew was setting up. One of the producers called us over and asked if we’d mind walking into the Pagoda, looking around then walking out for the cameras. Hey – we’re hams! So of course we agreed and – so now we’re famous! LOL – anyhow – look for us on NBC or AOL when they start to air Australian Travels!
Made it back to our pier and boarded the Mirimar, the oldest wooden hull ferry ship still working today. Cruise took 1 ½ hours and was a great learning and visual experience. We got to see Brisbane by the river, including an island with thousands of flying foxes (otherwise known as fruit bats!). That was something, let me tell you. All of those little bats hanging there from the trees making that lovely screeching noise. It really was amazing – all bat grossness aside!
Once we hit Lone Pine Sanctuary, we headed straight for the Koala cuddling. Line wasn’t too bad and we managed to get through it in under ½ hour. The koala was just adorable. His name was Neon and he actually smelled really good – like Eucalyptus which is the only thing they eat. He was like a lump of warm fuzz – a big old warm blooded stuffed animal. Too cute. They take very good care of the Koalas here too – they have special dispensation to allow people to hold the animals – it’s illegal everywhere else in Australia. They have over 100 Koalas in the preserve and they switch them out frequently. They are only allowed to cuddle for 40 minutes every 4 days. Keeps them from being totally domesticated.
You can go here to see a picture of our Koala cuddling:
www.koala.net/photo/0904021495.htm
After cuddling, we proceeded to feed the wallabies and Kangaroos. They are all kept in huge open compound that you can walk through. They go hopping around – in front of you, away from you, it’s really quite amazing. We fed them a whole bag of food – then wandered over to the other Koala enclosures. The sanctuary separates the Koalas by age and sex. They have Kindergarten for the babies, Bachelors and Brides for the reproducing set. Retirement home for the oldest koalas. Just seeing them in their natural habitat was really cool.
Oh – and Steven – we did see the dingos – but they didn’t eat any babies!
Finally watched a sheep herding show where the border collies ran so fast you could barely see them. Then for the finale, one of the dogs actually climbed up on the sheep’s’ backs and walked across the top of all of them. Then he laid down on their backs. That was pretty wild!
Back to the ship, cruised back to Brisbane and walked all though South Bank, across the Goodwill bridge, through the Botanical gardens and to Eagle Pier. Must have walked 10 miles – looked at all the restaurants trying to figure out dinner and ended up heading back to the hotel with nothing in mind. Everything was either closed (closed on Mondays or public holidays, which this was – Easter Monday?) or really pricey (I mean really pricey!!).
After resting and cleaning up – we headed out to a place called the BrewHouse, but ended up next door at Ashala’s – mostly because the maitre d’ was a hustler and really impressed us. Plus the menu looked really good. Sat outside and shared a chili encrusted Calamari dish for starters. Ed had the Snapper special which was a huge portion of fried Snapper with French fries. I had the Barrimundi wrapped in Nori with champagne hollandaise. Really, really good!!! (Ok – so it’s the foodie journal – what can I say?) Everything was great – except the bill which had a 15% holiday surcharge on it. We’ve noticed that here – virtually everyone charges a holiday surcharge up to about 20%. Nice way to inflate the bill!
Back to the hotel to prepare for Cairns and the Great Barrier Reef!!!
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