Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2005 23:00:32 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Last day in the land down under... (so far)

G'day,

I lived through January 4th, 2005 twice -- one part in Australia and again in
Honolulu. This email is about Australia...

In the morning I called a friend in Brisbane (Max from the GSChat list fame,
for those of you who know him, and to the you who are him) -- he said he would
show me around town. On the phone he said it would be easy to recognize him
(I'd never seen him before): "I'll be driving a white accord with the license
plate '86MAX'" ... hahaha! Well, I checked out of the motel and stayed in my
car in the parking lot... and within a few minutes there was a white accord
with "86MAX" plates pulling in...

We went to the airport first and dropped off my rental car -- total 8607 km
driven on this trip in both cars. The rest of the day was the "Chief" driving
me around giving me a tour of Brisbane in his car...

It was hot -- and humid, and muggy, and sticky -- more so than usual. First
"touristy" spot was a mountain overlooking the city. I think its Mount Coottha
(not 100% sure, going from memory here).... got a few views of the city from
the top. And a picture of Max's license plate for the get smart archives!

Next stop: Lunch. At an air conditioned
Chinese/Thai/Mongolian/Indonesian/Japanese/Oriental restaurant by the river.
Well, they had practically every kind of East-Asian food there... plus
something made from kangaroo meat and crocodile meat. And air conditioning.
Well, I stuck to the "familiar" chicken, enjoying the views of downtown Brissie
across the river and a semi-cool A/C room (only semi-cool coz they kept the
darn door open in all that heat! grrr)

oh well... the food was good anyway..

Max has been getting all these trip emails I've been sending, and he noticed my
references to eating ice cream... so that's where we went next.

I only had one. Max had two. He outdid me!

Ok, this place is FANTASTIC! Unfortunately I've forgotten the name -- "Cold..."
something. I remember the cold part! The ice cream was also a little new for me
-- 2 scoops (cheesecake & mango), MIXED thoroughly, topped with a TimTam and
mini M&M's, again MIXED thoroughly.... and then served in cup. That was mine.
And yes, "2 scoops" counts as "one" ice cream (at least thats how I counted it
in all the emails about Sydney).

I'm going back there again some time. Provided I can remember the name.

Anyway, that was also air conditioned. When I got out of there, my glasses
fogged up! That's how hot and humid it was outside...

After that we just had a little extra time for driving around the city, not
really stopping at too many places.. well, not any touristy places anyway. Also
drove by the Gabba stadium, which had one whole seating section removed, so we
had a good view of the whole ground inside from the road.. Didn't stop anywhere
nearby though.

3 PM he dropped me off at the airport... and I got an early flight out to
Sydney -- 4PM instead of my scheduled 5:10 PM. That gave me about 3 hours in
Sydney in between connecting flights.

I went to the Qantas "First class" Lounge -- one of the benefits of American
Airlines' executive platinum membership....... Had a coooooooooool shower
there, changed clothes etc, then hung around in the lounge until 9:00 PM.

While coming back to the US, my flight routing was Brisbane--Sydney,
Sydney--Honolulu, 2 days in Honolulu, and then Honolulu--San Francisco. The
Sydney--Honolulu flight did not have any "overbooking" issues, and they allowed
me to take on both carryon bags... so was quite happy about that! No chance of
them losing it this time!

I was exhausted though -- went to sleep right away, woke up to eat dinner and
went to sleep again, was woken up at breakfast time to have some more food,
then went to sleep again! Then woke up at Honolulu airport after landing.

Now I'm in Honolulu............ until tomorrow (Thursday). Then back to work on
Friday..

Max, thanks for the great tour of the city! And thanks for having an A/C in the
car!

one more email coming up just as soon as I've finished replying to some others
that I got while I was typing this one...

Brisbane pictures:

Table of Contents
January 4 : Diamond Head and Southeastern Oahu