Brisbane Urban Village Tour: I - South Bank

It's been a while since my last update but life in Brisbane is treating me well. In the times I'm not working, sleeping, or traveling up and down to Burrum Heads, I'm getting well adjusted to city life.

My job is nice and the colleagues are great. I've been working 40 hours a week and so am making some money. With that money I am now able to do some nice outings on a day off, and that is what I decided to do.

The city of Brisbane consists of a lot of smaller villages and suburbs. The inner suburbs are what they call Urban Villages, and I've decided to visit them all on days off. Today I went to South Bank, what is supposed to be the seductress of Brisbane and now I have to say I agree with that.

South Bank is in the middle of the city, has a great view on the Central Business District and the skyline on the Brisbane River, but it's really green and peacefull. I took the train from Cannon Hill, where I live, (and where they are going to build a different kind of Urban Village) and got off at South Bank station. Straight away you walk into beautiful parklands, mixed with playgrounds, swimming pools, beaches, bbq-places, picnic areas and cafe's and restaurants spread out over the place. In the middle of it all are the lifestyle markets, on for 3 days a week.
Walking on you go past more eating and drinking-places, past the wheel of Brisbane, and dive straight in the art-world. Right after each other and connected by bridges and tunnels are the Queensland Performing Arts Center, The Queensland Museum, Science Centers, Art Centers, and more galleries. I decided to go to the big surrealist exhibition. With almost the entire surrealism collection of the Centre Pompidou, it was a great exhibition and well worth going to see again.

View from the bridge between museum and art gallery

After a couple of hours of wandering and taking photos, I decided to have a nice dinner at one of the dozens of restaurants. After burning my mouth on one of the best Peri-Peri chicken dishes I ever had (I went Portuguese), I decided to take the long way home.
Walking over the Goodwill Bridge from South Bank to the botanical gardens in the CBD is an absolutely amazing thing to do, it gives you a great view over the riverbanks and the bridge is a pedestrian-only bridge.
Now I'm home and tired, but I had a great day. On my next day off I'm going to visit one of the other Urban Villages around, but first things first.
Next weekend I'll be up in Burrum Heads again and the weekend after that Kat will be here, for we have been invited to the birthday party of a colleague of mine and we're going to Dracula's, Australias most famous dinner-theatre and Cabaret Restaurant. Well be entertained with B-Grade horror theater, good food and dresscode "Gothic or Casual Smart," so it will probably be amazing.

But more about that another time