After our visit to the laundromat in Beenleigh we went back to our overnight spot because it was a pleasant place to be whilst having our lunch. Stephen booked us a campsite at Brisbane Holiday Village and we once again braved the M1 to get there. It was easy enough to get an unpowered site and it’s really nice, next to a park, with surrounding palms and other foliage. The only downside is that we are not getting much solar.

Day 1, which was Monday, we spent time getting our bus passes (we had to walk to a shopping centre to find a newsagent, which took time). Then we took the first bus leaving. The destination was the city, but by a roundabout route through suburbs. It wasn’t very interesting and took twice as long as the straight through bus, as we found subsequently.

Today is Day 3 and we have mastered the transport system to and from the caravan park. Stephen has a couple of museums to visit on this, our last day in Brisbane. I thought it was time to catch up with the blog.

On Monday we wanted to have lunch when we arrived and spent time trying to find a cafe with open air tables. One was close by, but this city is full of construction sites and it was hidden behind a boarded off area. We went over to the art gallery afterwards, then home just after sunset. It felt like we actually achieved very little, but orienting in a strange city does require a day of confusion.

Yesterday, we built on that. Our aim was to catch a ferry. The Brisbane River is very winding and they have an excellent ferry service, even for the longer trip that we took. They run every 15 minutes and in some places is a good way to commute to the other side of the river. Unfortunately, we kept finding that ferry stops had closed. We had coffee and a snack at a university, had a look at the park and a gallery, then walked over a footbridge and although the first ferry stop was closed we eventually found one where we were able to catch a ferry and do the long trip to the last stop before the sea. We got off, found there was nowhere we could get lunch, hopped back on, and took advice on a suitable ferry stop, and eventually had lunch at a kebab place at about 2.30 p.m.

We followed that up with an icecream, then caught the ferry back to the Southbank ferry stop where we started. Getting to the bus station was fairly easy from there. Distanced walked was over eight kilometres for the day, a little more than the first day.

Below are some photos and video taken on our ferry ride yesterday afternoon.

With Perth and Adelaide you can feel that the inner city needs more people, but it isn’t a problem here in Brisbane. It is busy, with lots of construction and older buildings that sort of struggle to be seen in the modern, highrise city. There are a lot of new buildings going up, which doesn’t contribute anything positive to the beauty of the city. Really, only the parks are beautiful. The river is dominated by freeways and the motorway in this inner city area.

The bus transport system is interesting. Buses going our way have their own two way road and tunnels, not just buslanes on main roads as we have in Perth. This makes for a good experience for commuting, but adds to the ‘function over form’ feel of the city. Along with the excellent ferry system actually getting around by public transport seems to work well. Not getting around walking, of course, as you may struggle to get to the point you are wanting. The museum Stephen went to this morning has moved and Google maps and his city map were both wrong about the location. Fortunately it was fairly close by.