Australia - hello again... Brisbane

Day 63 - 11/11/23 - Australia - hello again

After a flight of about 4 hours, we returned to Australia around 8 p.m. local time, this time in Brisbane, a city with 2.7 million inhabitants on the west coast of Australia.

House / House The journey from Christchurch to our hotel took 10 hours. The airline “Quantas” informed us when we checked in that the flight had been postponed by 2 hours and during this waiting time another hour was added.

We were not amused to discover that one of our suitcases had a wheel broken off at the baggage claim carousel. There was no sign of the Quantas baggage service staff anywhere.

So we took photos and submitted them to Quantas - let's see what comes of it.

Our Australian immigration check was super nice, we had had different experiences in Melbourne. Apparently we had lost Volker's immigration card and the officer quickly took a new form and started filling it out. Before I had made the final checks (no, I do NOT intend to commit a crime in Australia), the original had been found folded in the passport.

We were a bit surprised about the time difference to Germany. We expected it to be 10 hours now because we had Sydney time in mind. However, it is “only” 9 hours. Brisbane is in the same time zone as Sydney, but does not take part in the “summer time change” - unlike Sydney!!!???

However, with a nightcap of Sapporo beer and Guinness, things seem to be even more relaxed than before.

Day 64 - 11/12/23 - Brisbane - nice to have you

Not only do we have to reset the time, but also the temperatures. Today it will be 28 degrees, it feels like 32 degrees - so there will be high humidity and the UV exposure will be around 8. Over 30 degrees are expected for the next two days.

Directly opposite our hotel room is the Botanical Garden and, like every weekend, there is an artists' market there, where we also bought Karin's new hat. Whatever the case, the saleswoman identified us as German. How people manage to do this remains a mystery to me...

So we immediately became acquainted with the snack stand owner opposite who, in addition to Kangoroo burgers, also sells German bratwurst and... is German. Andy (Andreas) has lived here for 15 years, comes from Bielefeld and is not only an Arminia fan, but also worked as a physio there. He still follows the German football leagues. We didn't hide our relationship with Darmstadt from him, but he really didn't let the pain show...

Brisbane has grown from 1 million people to around 2.7 million in the last 15 years and will continue to grow strongly because the Olympics will be held here in 11 years and are now being built like crazy.

Today we have taken Brisbane to our hearts as our favorite Australian city. Brisbane is not only beautifully located, but also super chill. Of course, we hope that Brisbane, with the Olympics and its rapid growth, doesn't get ahead of itself and bring more problems to the city than desired.