canadian_turtle | Queensland recap #1: Brisbane

Mood:

|| Lazy
Tune : Watching Kyle XY (finally! Only just saw the new Chuck too)

Hello from Brisbane! (or well Ashgrove as that is where I am currently staying). Having an awesome time so far, though it's really hot here (what did I expect really, they do call it the Sunshine State). Yesterday I went to Steve Irwin's Australia Zoo where I pet koalas, kangaroos and even fed elephants! That was very awesome. But more about that later, in another post. I'l quickly write down below what I've been up to the last few days so I can share pictures :D

February 28: This was the bittersweet last day in Sydney. On the one hand of course I was excited to start my trip, on the other... I was leaving a great city and even greater friends behind for a few months.

Spent the afternoon going to a taping of Good News Week with Jules, Sherrie and Jess. It was hilarious again! Jules has a much better recap of it on her Livejournal though. The only thing I'll repeat is that as a special music star they had Wes Carr! He was the winner of the last Australian Idol (the one Jules and I saw the concert of in front of the Opera House) and we adored him. Was such an awesome surprise xD After the taping we went to this cut out from Bananas in Pajamas where you could stick your head in to get your picture taken and luckily for all of us I didn't upload those pics yet so I can't share them here right now, lol

March 1 Left the previous night for a 17 hour (!) bus trip to Brisbane. I thought it was "only" 16 hours but I didn't realise there was a time difference, d'uh. Slept through most of it though I did see sun set, sunrise, a giant shrimp (lolwtf I know) on top of a building, Byron Bay and Surfers Paradise before finally ending up in Brisbane. Jaydeyn was already waiting at the bus stop and it is so awesome to finally hang out with her! (though I am afraid I am scaring her with my fandom squee haha).

First day we didn't do a whole lot, just wandered through the city (mostly South Bank) to get a feel for the city and see where everything is (and had ice cream! OMG I am so addicted to New Zealand's rum and raisin one). I fell in love with Brisbane instantly, it's a beautiful city and because of a gorgeous pool with white sandy beach smackdown in the middle of it it looks very different from any other city I've seen so far.

The place I am staying right now (and got through Jaydeyn <3) is awesome too. It's in a suburb of Brisbane and so beautiful! The backyard is awesome as well; I am especially addicted to the passion fruits nom nom nom

Sunrise somewhere between Sydney and Brisbane

Like I said: WTF???

I think this was Surfers Paradise

Rainforest walk on the South Bank

You can feed the pigeons, sea gulls and ducks, but not the ibis!

The gorgeous pool on the South Bank

AWESOME tunnel on South Bank

I am starting to get used to seeing palm trees everywhere, they really keep reminding me in what kind of tropical environment I am now

Nepalese Pagoda (left over from the expo in the eighties)

The Brisbane version of the London Eye

March 2: Spent the day wandering the city again, this time around spending longer on South Bank and visiting the Queensland Museum and Art Gallery. I also took the free loop bus around the city centre. Brisbane is so pretty, I really love this city. When I came home all tired it wasn't from working for once! That's always a good thing ;) Especially when you can sit down with a glass of cold water filled with fresh passion fruit from the back yard. How much better can it get?

In the evening Jaydeyn and I watched the episode of Good News Week I was at the taping of and it was so cool to see it back like that. Totally fangirled over Wes again and I think she likes him now too :D *high fives Jules*

Random pretty lilies

At the Museum I saw a hobbit!

And a kangaroo

And a scene that could've come straight out of Finding Nemo

This is what the Art Gallery looked like. The coloured parts were actually a piece of art from a great artist I'd see more of the next day (his name is Spencer Finch)

A painting I really liked and reminded me of Dali

This is what the Art Gallery looked like from the inside. The patches of water were everywhere and were supposed to represent the Brisbane river (though, as Jaydeyn pointed out, less brown lol)

View on Brisbane from South Bank

This beautiful building was the former Treasury and is now the Casino (cameo by the Master's spheres in the left bottom corner there xD)

War Memorial

Close-up

For the Twilight fans out there. Go to the "blood bank" on Edward street and know it's a one way only (aka you'll never return lol!)

March 3: Today was a pretty lazy day in the sense that I slept in and didn't start doing much stuff until later on the day. First had lunch in the city with Jaydeyn (which consisted of Dutch poffertjes and when I was still hungry all kinds of chocolate from a cool sweet's store close-by) and then we went to the Gallery of Modern Art.

The Gallery was AMAZING! We saw so many pieces we ooh-ed and aah-ed over, it was really quite wonderful. One of the first exhibitions we saw was Spencer Finch's one (remember I he did the coloured windows on the Queensland Art Gallery?) and all the pieces were very divers and awesome in their own way. After that we went to a section with indigenous art and one piece in particular was fantastic. It was a tree with bare branches, covered partly in little pieces of white ceramic (like mosaic). On it were all these beautiful stuffed birds. Surrounding the tree were other animals, like kangaroos. They were made out of blue ceramic (also little pieces like a mosaic) but the claws and ears were furry like from an actual kangaroo.

Unfortunately I wasn't allowed to take pictures in a large part of the gallery so I don't have -too- many shots.