Australia – Day 09
We woke up early and said goodbye to the beach.
Tip: Palm Cove was a great place to spend some time away from the busy city but it is close to various attractions. One thing we didn’t get to do was to visit the town of Kuranda and its koala gardens, butterfly sanctuary, and bird habitat.
Drove back safely to the car rental place and took the shuttle to the airport to go to Brisbane (our final destination for the trip).
This time we took the low fare airline Jetstar and just like Tigerair they will weigh in your carry-on. I believe the additional purchased weight allowed is less on Jetstar.
Once at the Brisbane airport we looked for the pre-booked signed to get our Uber.
For this last hotel, we didn’t spend too much time looking for a good deal and got a more convenient location for the night. The hotel turned out to be a massive tower and our room ended up on the 68th floor. We had a great view of the east side of the city.
The first thing we did was to get the transportation card called Translink Go-Card. It is $10 for a deposit and an additional amount to top-up.
Be aware that to get your $10 deposit you need to surrender your Go-Card. See https://translink.com.au/tickets-and-fares/go-card/refunds for more details
We also learned to not use the back door of the bus to enter. You will be charged a $5 fee as is you had not tapped on boarding the bus. The system assumes you left the bus when you used the wrong door.
Once we realized the mistake we made we were out of cash on our cards and decided to walk back to other sites after lunch.
We walked first to Streets Beach which is a man-made pool with a whole section with white sand. The location has a lot of shops and restaurants as well as lockets, showers, and bathrooms. Also next to the beach there was another pool and an awesome kids playground including large slides, spider rope climbing, and a giant hamster wheel.
As we. Continued our walk north we encountered a forest walk leading to a Nepalese pagoda, The Wheel of Brisbane ( a giant Ferris wheel), the Brisbane sign and a long boardwalk.
Pay attention to the signs of shared bicycles and pedestrian walkways. Some lanes are for bicycles only and they come fast. Avoid getting injured. Also I noticed that Australian walk on the left side of the path.
We continued our way north toward the Queensland Museum and Science Centre. We. Only had one hour to visit but since it is free, it worked out for us.
The museum starts with a preserved young great white shark and a giant squid. Also on this floor, there are dinosaur bones on display.
On the 4th floor, the museum has a large animal section area displaying every type of animal you can think of.
After the museum closed at 5:00 PM we continued to a well-rated steakhouse called Black Hide Steakhouse. Since it was our last night, we decided to splurge on some Australian wagyu beef. We got to the restaurant as they opened and were able to accommodate us. We got a Ribeye, Rump steak and we got their famous short ribs for the little one.
The service and food were excellent.
On the way back to the hotel we did a long walk back to the Brisbane sign to take pictures of the city at night. After this, we called it a night and said goodbye to Brisbane.
