QLD Day 4 - Brisbane/Mt Coot-tha

Being my last day in Brisbane I decided to get up early and do a few things before checking out of the hostel. After battling with the crappy WiFi in the hostel and having seen an Officeworks store the night before on my wanderings, I thought I'd go down and investigate the prepaid WiFi that I thought they might sell there. The opening time of Officeworks was 8 AM so I timed it to get to the McDonald's next door for breakfast (I don't know why, but I like McDonald's breakfasts) just before then. As it turned out Officeworks didn't have any prepaid WiFi so I walked back empty handed. On the way I stopped at a supermarket to buy a bottle of water and a nectarine, which I consumed on the spot outside.

After packing up and checking out of the hostel I trundled down to Roma Street station and left my luggage in a locker for a few hours. Still on the hunt for prepaid broadband I ended up buying a Telstra prepaid kit from Target in the city. After buying a few more supplies I decided it would be a good idea to fit in a bit of sight seeing before moving on to the Gold Coast.

On the bus to Mt Coot-tha

I had seen a bus heading to Mt coot-Tha earlier and decided to go. I happened across an electronic public transport information booth and obtained a timetable for the route, the only problem was I didn't know exactly where to catch it. I went back to near where I saw the bus the first time and ended up on a free city circle bus (is there a city in Australia which doesn't have one of these?). Keeping my eyes peeled I worked out where I needed to get the Mt Coot-tha bus from and waited.

The view from the summit. Not sure what
the TNT courier truck was doing up there...

It was an interesting ride, as the bus went past the back of the hostel and through a whole area that I had been only a few hundred metres from the night before and that morning. After a windy trip up the hill, and the bus backtracking at least once we reached the summit. On reading the timetable I assumed the bus stayed at the top for a few minutes before heading back down. The plan was to jump off take a few photos and get back on. Upon asking the driver about this I was informed that he was going off duty, and the we had just passed the return bus (I remember seeing it too, but it didn't twig at the time). Looking at the timetable, it would be an hour until the next bus. So to make the most of it I decided to have lunch at the cafe at the top. This is one of the few places I remember visiting in Brisbane when I was 12, so it was a bit nostalgic I guess. I took some of photos of the view, and I reckon that I could almost see the hostel where I stayed. I sat down and had a nice lunch, Malaysian stir fry noodles. It was all very pleasant really.

The view again, this time my hosetel is right at
the centre of the photo

The view inland to the Great Dividing Range
west of Brisbane

Back on the bus down the hill and into the city. I alighted and decided to catch one of the underground buses to Roma Street station. Yes Brisbane has underground busways in the CBD, it's all pretty cool actually. These connect to above ground busways the go out into the suburbs. Something inside me wishes these were at least light rail if not a heavy rail metro system.