About a 10 minute drive from our AirBnb was the Brisbane Southbank. We parked in an underground garage and then took the stairs up to a park area that was decorated for the holidays. We had hoped to get a bit to eat from one of the food court establishments, but unfortunately they were all closing up for the night. It was my original plan to eat here the night before, but it was clear that we had made the correct choice the night before.
Our late lunch was managing to tide us over and we decided to take a little stroll down the sidewalk along the river bank. Elizabeth came a live in front of the camera. She began pointing out the beautiful sights a long the river bank like the illuminated buildings and bridges. As we continued walking, we came across the lagoon and playground. We admired how the city created such a beautiful area for kids to run around and imagined how much our kids would enjoy the space.
We also found ourselves standing outside the Nepalese Peace Pagoda, which was donated to the city for the Expo ’88. We took a little bit of time to really check it out and read all of the signs that talked about it.
We finally made it to the Wheel of Brisbane, but neither of us were in the mood to ride in the ferris wheel. We did think that it was fun to take photos in front of the wheel, so we snapped some pics. We could hear someone playing live acoustic covers in the background and thought it would be fun to watch someone playing music, while we had a late dinner. We crossed the street and walked into a James Squire Brewery restaurant called the Charming Squire.
The establishment was an open space with high ceilings and had a very industrial feel. As soon as we walked through the entrance, the acoustic guitar player was playing The Who’s Won’t Get Fooled Again. The acoustic covers lended itself to the mellow atmosphere and the layout of the building allowed the music to carry above the conversations of those enjoying dinner and some drinks. I ordered a sour beer and Elizabeth decided to try a hard cider. Then we decided to split a margarita pizza and hang out for awhile. I thought it would be funny to request something from Australia’s own Little River Band and the musician was happy to comply.
We headed back to the car and we were joking about things that Australians says. We did our horrible accents, while laughing about how they call diapers, “nappies”.
It was nice to take a little walk through the city a little and take it all in. We felt really safe and the city felt really new and clean. The weather was nice and comfortable and Elizabeth mentioned that the city was, “pretty amazing” and “we might have to move here”. It was fun to imagine starting all over in a new country. The previous four days were fun and if you were going to move outside the US, Brisbane felt like the place to make it happen.