Watching the River Flow

G’day from City Backpackers Hostel in Brisbane! 

We’re watching the Brisbane River slowly rise, as it laps onto walkways and pours into neighborhoods around southern Queensland.  From the hostel’s rooftop pool (nice way to wait out a natural disaster), we can see (and hear) rescue helicopters patrol the region.  We’re seeing debris hurtle through the brown river, and we’ve noticed that traffic is much lighter than previous days.  The TV is a running loop of crying Queenslanders holding wet pets, politicians trying to one up each other at hourly press conferences, and residents paddling around flooded streets on surfboards (trying – successfully – to get on TV).

Since our last e-mail, we’ve continued to drive north through the rain.  Our efforts to hike Mt. Warning and stay at a B&B were thwarted by flooded roads.  We weren’t too surprised to be poured on in the rainforest - if anything, the thick rainforest canopy made our jungle hikes our driest experiences in Australia.  We very willingly abandoned our plans to camp up the coast once we learned that the rains were bringing out more snakes; instead, we’ve made friends with motel operators with accents too strong for our comprehension.  We didn’t even bother to see the beach in Surfer’s Paradise (an actual city name!).  We returned our rental car a few days ago, and we have since spent most of our time reading and watching movies as the storm continued (and as Holly rested after a nasty spider bite on the bottom of her foot).  We didn’t expect the floods to impact Brisbane – Australia’s third largest city – but we should have no problems getting to the airport tonight.  On the bright side, today is our first without rain in the last week!

Despite the rain, we’re still having a great time.  We enjoyed wandering Nimbin, the Hippy capital of the southern hemisphere.  We braved the rain to wander some beautiful UNESCO World Heritage rainforest sites, where we met some 2-foot-long fat lizards (known locally as ‘mullets’).  We discovered a great art museum: Brisbane’s modern art museum, which seems to double as a children’s play area (nearly every piece of art on exhibit was interactive).  We feasted on absolutely amazing Indian food at Sultan's Kitchen.  And our current hostel has a movie room, foosball, pub… and did I mention the rooftop pool?

We’ll be in the tropics of NE Australia soon, supposedly north of the flooding.  Keep in touch and take care!