Day 3: Arrival down under and city stroll in Brisbane

Our plane landed in Brisbane on time shortly after 6:30 a.m. We had finally arrived down under - after a total travel time of a good 31 hours. The entry procedure went smoothly. After we had shown all the food we had brought with us and carefully declared, we were allowed to enter. Our first stop was the rental car. Unfortunately, we discovered that Australia, unlike all the other countries we had been to so far, did not recognize our good old German driving license. The employee there explained to us that we would only be able to get a rental car with an international driving license. Damn! There we were at the other end of the world - where were we supposed to get an international driving license from on the spur of the moment? But thanks to digitalization, that was no problem in the end either: we were able to have a multilingual copy of our driving license made online via a web portal. After a good 15 minutes, everything was done. We were then given the key to our rental car. The Subaru Forester looked pretty big from the outside, but given the size of the trunk, we were glad that we only had three suitcases with us.

The next challenge was driving on the left, but my husband mastered that well too.

In order to stock up on the necessary supplies (after all, the hotel we had booked didn't serve breakfast), we stopped at Aldi, Aldi Süd of course. The selection there was similar to what we had at home, so we found everything we needed relatively quickly.
Then we went on to the hotel. Unfortunately we couldn't check in yet, but we could leave our suitcases and our car found a place in the hotel's rather cramped parking garage (at a bargain price of $30 per day). We then set off on foot into the city center. We crossed the Victoria Bridge into the South Beach Parkland. There we looked for something to eat for lunch. Then we continued walking through the park to the Goodwill Bridge. In the park there is a lagoon for swimming, where the lifeguards bravely hold out but no one goes swimming in the 20°C in the Australian winter, and a huge water playground, which is currently being renovated. Here we also encountered the ibis, also known as the "garbage bird", for the first time.

On the other side of the Brisbane River we went back to the hotel, past the Old Government House and the Queensland Parliament.

Once back at the hotel, we were able to go to our rooms. Since we were all pretty tired due to jet lag, we took a break. Before we were all in danger of falling asleep, however, we set off again at around 3:30 p.m. This time we took the free CityHopper ferry across the Brisbane River around the inner-city peninsula. Then we walked back to the center. Again and again we passed old buildings that had been integrated into the new, modern high-rise buildings, creating an interesting contrast. This way, you can still get a small impression of old Brisbane today, despite the many modern high-rise buildings with glass facades.

To end the day, we had pizza at Vapiano before we fell into bed pretty exhausted at around 8 p.m. After two sleepless nights, we finally had a real bed again!

For statistics:

Overnight: The Great Southern Hotel Brisbane

Distance travelled: 17 km

Walked: 11 km

Weather: cloudy with sunshine, approx. 20°C