Downtown Brisbane

Finally the weekend arrives and we can do some exploring in Brisbane!

My colleague and I had arranged to meet up with a few other colleagues for dinner near Brisbane downtown. So we decided to go to the shopping malls in Brisbane in the afternoon.

We wanted to settle lunch first at our favorite Thai restaurant but suay suay, the restaurant was closed for lunch. So bobian we went to next door's Sizzler for the salad bar instead.

Crispy cheese toast@Sizzler

After suppressing my stomach revolution (with soup, salad, pasta, potatoes, ice-cream, etc.), I took the driver seat and embarked on my virgin trip to Brisbane downtown. I missed a couple of turns and after some route re-plan (thanks to my fantastic VC), I reached the destination we were looking for - Myer Center@Elizabeth Street.

Parking is expensive in downtown Brisbane. But some malls, including Meyer Center, offer 10 AUD whole day parking.

We spent some time shopping in Meyer before venturing out to the Queen Street Promenade. Queen Street Promenade is similar to some of the Europe city's pedestrian mall, where there are outdoor eateries in the middle, flanked by shops along both side. It wasn't a big place so we explored the nearby streets.

Brisbane City Hall

Shops close very early in Australia, so by 6 pm we found ourselves loitering along the streets of Brisbane. Faced with the fact that night has fallen (sun set early in winter), we decided to go to our dinner place even though we were still an hour away from the meeting time.

We soon found out that the place - Breakfast Creek Hotel, was less than 10 minutes drive from the city center. The place is not what it is call now, it is no longer a hotel and we didn't come here for breakfast. :-P

The place was already packed with people and we were lucky to find a (free) car park lot.

In Australia, its quite common to have a drink before dinner, which is what we did when we met our colleagues at the bar. We then proceed to our table for dinner. The place we were at is famous for steak, which was what everyone at the table ordered, except me. I was more of a fish person so I went for the Barramundi, and the way it was done wasn't really worth the price tag. After some wine, and more beer, we finally make our way back to the hotel in quiet Ipswich.

To be continued...