Mt. Coot-tha (which was previously called One Tree Hill, not to be confused with New Zealand’s One Tree Hill, neither of which still have the one tree remaining) is a large hill overlooking Brisbane from the Southwest. It is, as my guides told me, the highest peak in the Brisbane area.
I do have to apologize to Brisbane. I was so bored with its status as “not Auckland” that I didn’t even bother to get my Canon out. All I have to offer is a phone picture. Australia is definitely on point in the sky department, though. Ignore the lower half of the picture and look at that gradient of blues!
The lookout offers a nice panoramic view. To the left is more Brisbane, to the right is less Brisbane.
The next day we drove out to Kangaroo Point, which is not too far from South Bank. Sadly, there were no actual Kangaroos in attendance.
It’s a nice little park, full of joggers, walkers, picnickers, and even a rock climber (not pictured).
For those who want to get up the cliff but don’t want to climb, there are these cool stairs. They’re popular among athletes training their endurance, and we had to dodge a number of people who were running up and down the stairs. We, needless to say, walked.
(I might not be able to photograph Auckland or Rangatoto from here, but I can still photograph stairs!)
Atop the stairs there is a nice little cafe featuring an overlook. For those of us who are photographically challenged, it’s much easier to get a nice shot of Brissy from the cafe than from Mt. Coot-tha!
We had lunch in the cafe, after which we went back down the stairs, drove back to their house, and then I drove back to Gold Coast and got on an airplane back to Auckland!
So that’s Brisbane! We’re not quite done with the Australia posts yet, though. I’ve got some that are…a little different. Stay tuned!
The Road 
(I’ve been bad about commenting, but I’m still enjoying the posts and photos!)
No worries, and glad you’re enjoying them!
I’ve got three drafts plus at least three posts I haven’t even started on yet. I’m still about three weeks in the past, current-events-wise. By the time we finish with Australia, it will be more like a month…which doesn’t bother me at all, since I’d much rather be busy doing than writing and photo-wrangling about stuff I’ve already done!
But I also enjoy the process of putting my thoughts to words and choosing which of my photos are the least terrible, etc. I will be extra glad I did this in the future when I want to relive the memories of my glory days :)
Derek Baron, aka Wandering Earl, posted an interesting thing last month entitled Why I’m Concerned About Travel Blogging, which basically states that a lot of travel bloggers make their lives sound like constant exciting adventures when the reality is they’re living in poverty, barely able to afford to see or do anything. It made me realize how lucky I am to have a well-paying job that’s reasonably tolerant of my international shenanigans, but part of me also feels like this is a natural consequence of travel blogging in general. Most of the things I post about (Australia being the exception, since I took vacation days) happened on a Monday, my day off. The rest of the week I’m sitting in my apartment working during the day and then reading, writing blog posts, going to church, or hanging out with friends in the evening. But this is boring, so of course I don’t blog about it. Maybe I should write a post here and there about normal life in New Zealand so it doesn’t seem like I’m portraying my life as epic adventures punctuated with sleep, heh.
I’m not sure why I thought your little note warranted a megacomment essay in response, but here you go….
a post about everyday life would be cool! (I am picturing a snapshot that may or may not be exaggerated for effect–a dimly-lit, untidy apartment with a workspace cluttered with empty food containers, and the laptop screen shows the draft of an epic adventure post.)
lol! Now I want to post one just to prove that my apartment is not dimly-lit, untidy, or cluttered with food containers!