Getting acclimatized in Brisbane

With just too much luggage I travelled a day with our kids by car, train, bus, airplane and train to finally arrive in Brisbane on time for dinner. After the coldest Melbourne winter, the temperatures here are very pleasant. We could still walk around in T-shirts, even after the sun went down.

Since Oliver has been flying to Brisbane weekly in the last month and a half, the children (and myself) were very excited to go there, too.

After running through our two bedroom apartment the kids found our hotel the best hotel ever (we have heard the last part of that phrase quite a bit from them, must be the honeymoon phase, not a bad phase at all). Especially the view right from our balcony over the river and the Story Bridge are amazing.

So what do you do with only two days in Brisbane? Other than breathing in the vibe of the city, not too much. The kids were pretty exhausted after the travel day and all the new impressions, so day one was mostly spent in the heated pool of the hotel.

On day two we went to the southern part of Brisbane city centre, on the other side of the river that winds through the city. To get there you can take the CityCat, a boat trip over the river, which is part of the public transport through Brisbane. Or you can take the free CityHopper, also a boat, a bit slower, but very pleasant! We went for the latter option. It took us to the other site of the river to the man-made beach.

After playing in the water we took the train and bus to pick up our mode of transport for the next days:

We have two options:

• going South – the Gold Coast
• going North – Sunshine Coast

Next to the coastline both have a very interesting hinterland with lots of hiking oppertunities. We flew over the Gold Coast getting here and saw a lot of high rise buildings, that seems to have many similarities with the Spanish Costa’s. We prefer to travel more authentic, so we plan to head North.

So this will be our view for the next couple days.