Beach day!

December 29, 2016

We decided that we had pretty well seen Brisbane so we wanted to get in another beach day. We'd already returned our rental car so we had to get a daily rental (only $50!) and headed North.

It turns out everyone else in Brisbane had to same idea so traffic was kind of awful. I don't understand Australia. They have so much land and they have some 89% of their population living on 10% of the land. Make like jelly and spread out, Aussies! Anyway, we were headed to one "secluded" beach that ended up being packed so we kept driving and found one that was pretty quiet and really lovely.

Out of the car!

Jackson headed right for the water

It was a big beach!

They keep the beaches very authentic here so this
is what you walk through to get to them

We hung at the beach for quite some time as it was a gorgeous day. Jackson played in the waves with the jellyfish because they "weren't lethal at this beach" and I sat on the sand with a chick-lit book by an Australian author. I felt my reading choice was quite appropriate. :)

We eventually headed for Noosa Beach (the town) for lunch. It was hilarious and by far the most foreign Australia has felt for us thus far. Jackson ordered a chocolate milkshake for us to split. When it came to the table it was lukewarm, shaken chocolate milk. He drank both of ours as I just could not begin to get that down. Yuck! I guess that is a very literal chocolate milkshake!!

Shaken, lukewarm milk when we ordered a milkshake.
Bummer.

Then, our food orders arrived. Mine was a steak sandwich and exactly what I expected. Jackson ordered a "bacon and egg burger" which came out as a bacon and egg sandwich. There was no burger. It turns out a "burger" here is a "sandwich" to us. I laughed so hard at his anguish that I could hardly eat my lunch. I'm still chuckling as I type this. Hilarious.

A sandwich mixup

After lunch it was back to the beach we went! We hit Sunshine Beach this time around which lived up to its moniker.

My view while reading some books on my Kindle

There was almost too much sunshine. I ended up hiding from the sun under my swimsuit coverup and our blankets because my sunscreen couldn't battle the blazing hot Australian sun. We called it a day around 3 and headed back for Brisbane to return to car.

Hiding from the sun by the end of the day

The traffic back into the city was not nearly as bad, thankfully. We made it back to the Meriton to clean up before heading back into the CBD (central business district/ downtown) for dinner. We ended up going easy and just getting the Chipotle-style place again. We don't love spending money on food, obviously!

Jackson nice and tanned!

He got "nacho chips" which were just loaded
french fries- he loved it!

All of that sun and surf took it out of us so we headed back for bed not long after finishing dinner. It was a really fun day and I'm so glad we grabbed a car and got out of the city!

Brisbane from the river

We jumped on a CityCat and took a little tour of the city from the Brisbane River. It was a lovely evening!!

Exploring Brisbane

December 28th

Frozen coke and an "Arnie"

We got up fairly early and headed into the CBD (Central Business District or "downtown" for us Americans) to grab lunch. Jackson had read about a burger place that he wanted to try. It was not my style so I just hung out while he ate. HA!

Spicy burger

Then we found a Chipotle-style place and I had lunch there. Teamwork!

Burrito bowl 

Loving life at the Meriton

We stayed at a place called a "serviced apartment" which was seemingly just a nicer-than-average hotel room. We really enjoyed it. It was also super easy to find our way home because the building was one of the tallest buildings in town!

Brisbane

We had heard that the city was best seen from the river so we headed down to catch the "City Cat" and see the sights.

Brisbane from the river

Moody sky

Lovely cityscape 

Petefish.

We loved seeing some parts of town we'd not seen before and there were some beautiful homes to gawk at while we were being whisked down the river!

Nando's (AGAIN)

We're not fans of spending big money on food so we ended up going to our favorite spot, Nando's, again for dinner. It was amazing. As always.

Gelato!! YUM!

You guys, they have a gelato flavor here called "malten madness" which is just a dream come true. It tastes like a Myer's malt all the way here in Brisbane! Lovely!

Brisbane

We left the Gold Coast after we made a quick breakfast. I took my post as the driver again since Jackson still doesn't like it. Too funny.

Left-side driving

As long as I chant to myself, "In Australia we drive on the left" (they have signs like that around) all is well.

Their crosswalk signs are so fancy

We stopped at the Daisy Hill Koala Centre on our way to Brisbane. They rescue injured koalas and give them a good home. It was heavenly! 

KOALA!

Sleepy.

Comfy

We opted not to hold them as they smell pretty badly and are known to have lice! EEK! We got to our new place in Brisbane, unloaded our stuff and then returned our rental car to the airport early. We just decided that we did not need it since we've not loved driving as we thought we may. We took an Uber back to our place (which is lovely) and were relieved to be car-free again. Now it was time to explore so we laced up our shoes and hit the town.

Brisbane is famous for its riverfront so we headed that way immediately. It is really, really nice. They have pedestrian walkways along it on both sides and numerous bridges. They also have a whole lagoon area for their public pool and a rainforest walk. It is amazing. The Australians love a good public park and pool!

Taking in the view

Our hotel tower from the Brisbane River

Lagoon

The public swimming area near the river

Looking for sunset

Petefish.

A lovely evening

We decided that we did not need dinner, but we did grab some fabulous malted gelato on our way home. The ice cream here is undeniably better than at home! We also enjoyed that it was such a nice night that we wanted ice cream and could still enjoy the Christmas decor. Some people say that they cannot imagine a warm Christmas, but I am at the point where I cannot imagine a cold one!

Gelato and Christmas decor

Brisbane tour

RAIN forest

We took off from the Gold Coast and headed for higher ground. I drove as Jackson just did not love driving on the opposite side. I didn't mind it. I decided it was because I drive from wherever I'm sitting in the car anyway normally. HA! :)

We hit an area called the Natural Bridge in Springbrook National Park and did the quick, easy walk through the area.

A lovely waterfall

The natural bridge

Inside the glowworm cave

Happy little hiker

From there we headed to a lookout that was supposed to be just amazing. Wouldn't you know about 10 minutes before we got there a storm rolled in and all we saw was a cloud. BOO.

The Best of All Lookout...WAH!

Not a sign you'd see at home...

We did make it home in time to FaceTime with our best girl, though, so life was not all bad.

FaceTiming with MacKenzie :)

That evening we went out to the beach to soak in some evening rays. Jackson decided he wanted to swim with the rest of the country's visitors. You could only swim in certain guarded zones due to the waves crashing so close to shore.

Beach evening

Jackson is in that mass of people

Since it was Boxing Day we decided to cook at home (the restaurants here charge a 15% additional fee for dining on a public holiday). Jackson made an excellent pasta bake and I made some sautéed green beans. It was just nice to finally have some vegetables! :)

Christmas Day

I ended up getting a little bug on Christmas Day and slept until the mid-afternoon. It was a gloomy morning anyway so I did not miss much.

We did not end up loving the Gold Coast area. It was really touristy and a bit rundown. 

Tourist.

Mocking tourists with their peace signs
and eating nachos

We ended up deciding to go to the nearby Hard Rock Cafe (we'd already been to get my Mom a guitar pin for her collection) for nachos. It helped the sad feeling of being so far from home at Christmas. We sat on the patio and mocked the tourists. It turned into a good night. :)

Christmas Eve in Surfers Paradise

Final day in Airlie

We slept so much better in a stationary, climate controlled room. We woke up and got to FaceTime with MacKenzie which makes everything a little better.

FaceTiming with MacK (and Susie)

The place we stayed had a free breakfast complete with Vegemite. We decided there was no better time for Jackson to try it.

Fake excitement

I posted the video of the experience. He hated it. He says it was SO salty and didn't taste like anything he'd previously eaten. The best description he had was "burnt, concentrated beef gravy." I don't know about you, but that sounds horrid. They say if you don't like beer then you won't like Vegemite as they're both derived from yeast. I hate beer so I skipped the taste test. :)

The closest we've come to an animal attack- HA!

We got packed up and caught the airport shuttle. It is a good thing we've relaxed into "holiday time" because no one moves with haste in Airlie Beach. The airport had two gates and the easiest security ever. Our flight to Brisbane was on the cleanest airplane we'd ever been on (yay, Virgin Australia) and was not nearly full so we both got our own rows to sleep in. It was a quick 1.5 hour flight into Brisbane where we got our first rental car of the trip and headed south to come to the Gold Coast. Jackson drove and I navigated with our rented TomTom Navigation unit. We never pay for those but the who driving on the opposite side in a foreign land thing trumped our normal frugalness.

Jackson had a bit of a transition issue, but eventually mellowed out and got us here safely. He said that his who perspective was so off that he just could not get comfortable.

The view from our new place

We got to our place around 3 p.m. local time, got all checked in and parked (whoa, harder than it should have been due to their parking garages making ZERO sense). Our serviced apartment here is on the 7th floor and partially faces the beach. The space itself is quite nice, but the finishes could use some upgrading. The bathroom feels especially European! The unit does have laundry, though, so we were happy!

LAUNDRY

Making breakfast dish

(Note: It appears that Jackson is the only one who works on things but in reality he just never takes photos so I did most of the laundry and then made him pose with it. He did actually do the whole breakfast dish prep as I needed to catch up on blogs!)

We walked to two grocery stores near our place and they were insane. It was like people didn't know if the stores would ever reopen after Christmas so they had to buy everything that night. It was like the Wednesday before Thanksgiving plus some madness. The area of Surfers Paradise is pretty cool. It is like Miami Beach but quite a bit bigger. We did some exploring and walking along the beach last night before just calling it a night. We were happy to have a completely private home base for a couple of days where we could just settle in and get comfortable.

It was certainly not what I'd call a traditional Christmas Eve, but I'm not sure we have those anymore. We figured out that we had not been home for Christmas in at least 9 years so we don't even really know what it would be like anymore!