Both of us being country folk, we were surprised in ourselves at just how much we enjoyed ourselves in the “big” cities. We arrived in Brisbane, Brissy for short (everything in Aussie land has an abbreviation, and usually on that ends with a “y” or “ie”.), and somehow ended up driving out of the airport in a rental car. This had not been the original plan but it was $40 for a day and public transport to get to and from the airport would have been $100 so the choice seemed obvious. We hit the road with windshield wipers blazing (if you have every driven on the wrong side of the road you will know what we are talking about) and found our way to our friend Angela's house. Her parents had just put us up on the Sunshine coast, and she had been volunteered for duty as well.
After parking the car, this was a manual car with everything in reverse for us so we were more than happy to be rid of it, we made our way into the city. When we finally made it there people were getting out of work and school; it was commuter rushhour. All kids in Australia have to wear uniforms, some more unfortunate than others. We saw these poor kids in the most unflattering outfits that looked like they were meant for either a nun or an 80 year old man going to his lawnbowling club. What a humiliation. We almost took a picture but felt too bad. Those leaving work were running or biking home through the park and over the river on one of the many bridges connecting the city. After dinner of burgers "with the works" (which means egg, pineapple, beetroot, and bacon) we were shown around the waterfront, or what was left after their floods only a few weeks before, and found free ping pong tables, and a movie being set-up to be shown later that night. What a great place! We got the best view of the town from above far up on a hill overlooking the city. Not too bad.
After our whirlwind tour of Brissy we moved onto our next city, Melbourne. Melboure is a foodies Mecca. There are so many immigrants of various nationalities that the food options are vast and very authentic. From Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese, to Italian, Greek, Lebanese, French, and much more. It was so hard to choose, so why chose. Let's just have them all!
To walk off our food coma, we found our way through the city streets filled with beautiful old stone buildings to the river where low and behold, rowers were out and about. Could this city be any more perfect? We watched the rowers fly by with envy, their coaches on bikes yelling at them with megaphones, and wished we were out there with them. Instead, we walked through the enormous Royal Botanic Gardens full of flowers, lush green grass, people picnicking, weddings, gardens, ponds, and lots of people. On such a beautiful sunny day, the whole city seemed to be out in full force. We just don't have parks like this back home and it was free!
Melbourne had lots of cute neighborhoods to explore, and more parks than any other city we have been to. We read that the cumulative acerage of the parks in Melboure is that of Central Park in NY, and Melbourne is a much smaller city. Some of the parks made it feel like you weren't even in a city; the skyline dissapeared, there were no manicured lawns or landscapes, just grass and trees and open space.
As we said, we were completely take with the cities and surprised to have enjoyed them so. If Melbourne was just a bit closer to home, we might just consider moving there.
T&V
