Heading South

Settled in for the train ride down to Gold Coast from Brisbane.  We’ve gotten out of the city and are now express for the foreseeable future, with the landscape transitioning from suburban and light industrial to one a bit more exurban.

Crossing the River on the train to South Brisbane.

I had a fantastic morning around Fortitude Valley, New Farm and Newstead.  Before meeting up with Stuart, I wandered through King George Square, ANZAC Square (where there was a group of bagpipe diggers performing – I stood and watched for a few minutes), and Brisbane Arcade on the way to Queen and Albert.  After we met up at 9:40, we covered a lot of ground in a light drizzle (not so bad – with a brolly we were fine), and I saw Chinatown, some of the older residential suburbs of the city, and the old warehouses and dockhouses on the river, now turned apartments and condos.  We grabbed toasties for lunch before turning around and heading back into the city in the early arvo.  We returned via Harcourt Street, which provided a fantastic view of the Story Bridge at the crest of a hill.  The road terminated at the River just next to the bridge, and we took the subway (in the British/Australian English sense of the word) under it, linking up with the path I ran up yesterday.  We walked along the River for a while, turning into the city and parting ways at Queen Street Mall where we had met in the morning.

I headed to the Southbank via the Victoria Street Bridge to pop into the special collections of the library to get some contact information for the collections administrator for Barry, the band director at Tulane who had led the Expo Band (he wanted to talk to someone about the collection and display they have).  The person who I talked to seemed genuinely interested and excited at the prospect.

From the library I headed to the Kurilpa Bridge and crossed to my hotel, grabbed my bags, and headed to the Roma Street Rail station to catch the 2:24 for the Gold Coast.  It looks like I will transfer to a bus at Nerang to head to Surfers Paradise on the coast.  But for now I will sit back and enjoy the ride.  On to the next adventure.