Brisbane

I don't think I mentioned that the sun rises a little before 5:00 a.m. here.  It's a combination of being close to the equator and also not being on daylight savings time.  Since the sun woke us up early, we visited a farmers' market for breakfast.  There was lots of variety of produce and prepared foods.  It was very busy even though we got there well before 8:00 a.m.

We packed up for our final destination for the trip, Brisbane.  Lying north of the Gold Coast, Brisbane is built on a very snake like river that allows for lots of waterfront development.  Skyscrapers mixed with restaurants all along the banks.  To get an overall view, we took the ferry (which we could have stayed on for 2 or 3 hours just to make the entire loop).  Since  this used to be an industrial area servicing the port, many of the buildings have been re-purposed as entertainment venues, museums and office buildings.



Brisbane hosted a world exhibition in 1988 and the buildings and parks now serve as family entertainment space.  It was a nice Sunday afternoon, so lots of families were out enjoying the area.




Next we walked back across the river through the former botanic gardens.  They still have some pretty amazing landscaping which we enjoyed on our way back to our hotel.


For our final dinner together, we booked one of the top restaurants in the city, Arc.  Along the way we walked through several lively bars and restaurants.  Our destination was on the quiet end of the entertainment district.  The meal was lovely and the city is beautiful at night.


Our flight the next day was around 11:00 a.m., so we didn't have to get up too early to get to the airport.  I'm happy (or maybe sad) to report that Christmas seems to start early the world over.
With a good tailwind, we were able to make it to LA in a little over 12 hours.  I know this sounds very long but after you have a couple of meals, watch a long movie and binge watch a TV series, you really don't have that much time to sleep.

We've had a wonderful two weeks with our friends.  We didn't try to see everything Australia has to offer because we plan on returning.  There's definitely a lot to enjoy.

Until next time.

Tammie

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