Sanctuary of the Veils - Night 24

As a thank you to us volunteers, the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary here in Brisbane gave us free passes to their exhibit. We decided today would be as good of a day as any to use them, since Aaron, Jana, and Matt would be leaving the house after this weekend.

While we were waiting for the bus downtown,

A Koala and I

one of Dan’s old roommates from the hostel, Callum (22, Scotland) happened to be headed in the same direction with two girls from the hostel, Anna (21, from N. Ireland) and Sabine (19, Denmark). Our group of five became eight and we boarded the bus for the nearly hour ride to the Sanctuary. The place turned out to be more of a zoo, than an actually sanctuary, although many of the animals they kept were previously injured. The koalas were broken up by age and gender into separate living arrangement. The furry little beasts sleep 18 to 20 hours a day, so Koala watching isn’t exactly an adventure sport. Feeding only on eucalyptus leaves, they cling to trees for pretty much their entire lives. A strange little piece of evolution.

Drinking on the Boat

On a more exciting note, the Sanctuary also had various birds, reptiles, a few wombats and a pair of dingoes. Sadly, the Tasmanian Devil was out on loan to another zoo. There was also a Kangaroo petting area, where one could get up close and personal with some pet kangaroos and some angry emus, who seemed to like pecking at shiny objects such as cameras and jewelry. At 1:00 there was a demonstration of sheep dog herding techniques. The sheep dogs run these strange circles all the time, just like Tipper does at home, confirming our suspicion that she had herded in a previous life.

Rather than take the bus home, we jumped

New Friends on the Boat

on the cruise ship that comes by daily for a ride back to the city. Sitting in the sun and drinking beer, the hour and half ride was much better than taking the bus. Toohey’s Dry might be my new favorite Australian Beer. I happened to be sitting by a guy from Sydney who was a major jet boat fan and he had been going to Seattle for years to watch the annoying speed boats during SeaFair each August.

Drunk on the Train

Later in the evening we met Callum and Daniel’s other old roommate, Chris at Birdee, the bar at The Bunk hostel. Part open air, it was immediately next to the swimming pool and offered $8 pitchers of beer. A grand place in my opinion. The girls had other plans for the evening but made vague promises to try to meet us out later on. They never showed. After countless pitchers at Birdee, we headed down the street to see a concert at a bar called the Zoo. Quite a bit classier than the Seattle establishment of the same name, cover was a bit expensive because a band, The Veils, were playing that night. We paid it anyways and went in to enjoy the show. Beer was reasonable, by Australian standards and we quickly grabbed a pool table. Once the music started everyone migrated to the stage to listen to The Veils, whose music is your basic new rock sort of stuff. Not bad, but not overly good either. After a late night meal on Brunswick Street we returned to the house around 1am, I think.

What I Learned Today: I am sucker for an Irish accent

Sanctuary of the Veils - Night 24

Brisbane, Australia