AusTour 2: Brizzie Day 1

In the Australians ever present penchant for shortening names, they have affectionately renamed Brisbane to Brizzie. It was the first stop on our Aus Tour 08, as I’ve decided to call it, and we flew in Saturday night 2 weeks ago now. A quick note on leaving (and one Barry was considerably distressed about) was that the airport we left from (Avalon) didn’t require a single bit of ID to retrieve a ticket, check baggage, go through security or even board the plane. The plane itself from an airbus a320, which I think is the first time I’ve been on an airbus and distressed me because I was in seat 15D (15 and D is the 4 letter in the alphabet…Lost anyone?...Sawyers seat). Anyway, when we got into BNE I was past the seat I had spent about 4 hours in the last time I was in Brisbane, I was glad I wasn’t staying this long this time. In fact we were out of the plane and out of the airport in 20 minutes on a bus on route to a destination I didn’t exactly know where was. So it was partly my fault that we ended up at Roma street station, a 40 minute walk to our hostel (Google maps said it was closer), but it wasn’t my fault the next bit went wrong. We decided to take a train to Brunswick station, after figuring out a transit system neither of us had seen or taken before we found a train going the right way leaving in four minutes. We were on the platform for at least 30 minutes. 4 trains should have come and gone in that time…great first impression Brisbane! Needless to say we made it eventually to Bunk Backpackers Brisbane (a hostel in the same vein as Gilligans, large 8 person rooms with ensuite bathrooms and showers). One thing that was particularly disturbing (or artistic genius) was the bizarre decoration around the lobby including chandeliers made up of headless Barbies, a giant coastal map complete with decorations and out in the bar bird cages with Barbies inside. Bizarre. Due to the incredible delays by Brisbane city transport, it wasn’t long before some of Barry’s friends from Swinburne showed up on the later flight (16 of them in total). We had planned to meet them in Brisbane, and they definitively made Brisbane a 10 times more exciting city.

Transportation the Second

Transportation part two goes a little something like this:

a) “Trams can’t swerve”.
b) Cars don’t stop for you.
c) Roundabouts in Melbourne are just about the scariest and most wild experiences ever.

a) One of the first things we learnt when we arrived in cairns for our orientation experience was that “trams can’t swerve”. The simple solution to this problem is: don’t jump out in front of them because they won’t stop, and the cant move around you. An aussy footy player was actually hit by one not to long ago.

b) I lied. The first thing we learned in cairns is that pedestrians do NOT have the right of way. Cars will not stop for you carelessly stepping out into the street, and you’ll have to wait your turn before its your turn to cross. The only exception to this rule is when there are zebra crossings, at which point I take my time laughing to myself that I finally have the right of way—and flinching when cars stop all of 2 inches from your knees. This all leads to:

c) Outside the Village, between the village and Uni, is one giant mother of all roundabouts. Amoung its amenities are pedestrians, cars and bikes (like any other roundabout), but then the city of Melbourne decided it would be fun to run 4 trams tracks right through the center. For all parties involved this has to be one of the scariest and most spontaneous intersections ever. For example, to get from village to Uni I have to run across three sets of road (one zebra-ed and two not) and two sets of tram tracks. If you’re not awake when you leave, you sure as hell will be once you’ve successfully navigated this Melbourne deathtrap. To Melbourne’s credit I’ve never seen any accidents there, though.

Transportation

A post I’ve been meaning to get to for a while now, but like the rest of this blog suffers from extreme lethargy.I’ve talked a number of times about either the transportation system of Melbourne in general or actually using it; in sum the system is made up of trams, trains and (to a lesser extent) busses. The trams run above ground, all over Melbourne—from the outer suburbs into the city centre. They are definitively not the fastest way to get around, as they follow the roads for the most part (even though they run on rails) and therefore have to obey the traffic lights and make lots of stops. They are however incredibly useful for hop-on-hop-off errands or getting to a specific place. The trains on the other hand run underground in the city and then over ground out into the suburbs. They’re much faster than the trams (not having traffic helps), fit more people and stop less often. They’re an incredibly efficient way to get into or out of the city to anywhere. It all runs on one ticket—met cards—which come in different amounts: 2 hours, daily’s, weeks, months etc. When you combine trains and trams in any combination, it is an easy way to get around all of Melbourne for a cheap price.