On the 9th we went to the market at Brisbane Square. We bought flowers, macadamia nuts, custard pies, the cutest tomatoes (polished for extra shine) and a big loaf of Turkish bread. It was a big load so we walked it back to the apartment. Then we walked along the north bank all the way to the Felons Brewery under the Story Bridge. It was another perfect weather day, warm in the sun but cool in the shade. This walk took us to new parts of the city that we had only seen from the river. There were new construction projects everywhere. A new pedestrian bridge going up and an older riverside restaurant complex going down. We noticed restaurants where we have upcoming reservations and ones we want to visit in future. One place beckoned us in for some light fare and drinks. It was Opa! We have a soft spot for the Opa Restaurant back in Florida. Some olives, fried eggplant chips and fried cheese later we were walking back in the light of the setting sun. The wind picked up and scooted us along.
The 10th found us packing a picnic lunch over to the South Bank where we finished up our tour of the Art Gallery Museum. This place required two days of exploring and lucky for us we were in no hurry to rush through. One standout was the work by Fiona Hall. She had a series of intricate sculptures of plants emerging from half rolled sardine tins. The intricate details on the plants was sublime and it commanded your attention. Only later would the subversive contents of the sardine cans reveal themselves to be body parts and sexual organs. Each item was labeled with the plant name in the local language, the common English name and the Latin name. We then had our picnic out on the grounds overlooking the river. We decided to hop on the City Cat river ferry and ride it upstream this time. It was a fun ride and we got to see so much more of Brisbane. After six miles of motoring upstream, the river had looped once more so we could see the city center again. We cruised back to Riverside terminal and walked back to the apartment via the Little Red Dumpling restaurant. Wow we will have to go back to this cute place. I had lamb and coriander dumplings that were the best dumplings I have had in Australia. Leslie got a huge wonton soup with a broth that was out of this world and a dozen floating wontons to top it all off.
An entire tent at the market devoted to mushrooms
Inspired
Big architecture
Old mixed with the new
The beerhall at the Felons Brewery
The Story Bridge
A little Opa time
Great view
Its the 10th and we are back at the Gallery. This artist is from the Torres Islands and he paints in watercolors. This painting is of a volcanic island
A great picture of the cranes
"Great Dane With Cyclone Fence" oil on canvas
Made from repurposed aluminum cans. Palm tree with a big "root"
The detail is amazing
A Drooping She Oak and Drooping She Parts below
There were jacaranda flowers on the floor under this painting
More cool watercolors from the 1800's
A dragonfly brooch
Japanese netsuke
Another netsuke of a lotus flower bud
I don't know if these are claws or feathers around the neck area of the masked lapwing
Coconut Lorikeet
A new "life list" bird
One of Australia's big scary spiders
We passed under many bridges
These three were in short order
Our river trip was 6 miles
This cast iron gas stripping tower has seen better days. It was shipped from England in pieces in the 1880s and is the only remaining such tower left in Australia. It was used to separate the impurities from coal gas
These docks were damaged in the last flood
Nice public art
This pedestrian bridge was a mess of wires and support poles
It must have been fun to build
The cathedral
Yes we will have some dumplings
A funky take on Mao's Little Red Book
Nice interior
So goooood!
These lamb dumplings had actual chunks of lamb inside
It has been 157 and 158 days since our Migration
