Place of hundreds of islands

Moreton Bay is home to more than three hundred islands. I returned to one of those islands, Russell to walk the land where my father’s banana farm had once been.

A ferry ride into the past

I crossed the sparkling waters of Moreton Bay from Redland Bay Pier to Russell Island. The journey was once a long haul in a slow wooden boat. Now the crossing took no time.

A galah spotting hike

The Whites Hill to Carindale Bikeway started opposite Brisbane’s Carindale Shopping Centre, but I avoided that starting point because of the noise of the traffic along Creek Road.

Brisbane’s Regent

When I entered the Regent Theatre as a child to see a Disney movie and later an Elvis movie as a teenager, I was enthralled as I still am, by the ostentatious design of the building’s interior.

By river bends

I was headed towards the Brisbane River, but on the way spotted The Brolgas by Lindsay Daen, stationed in the middle of the Brisbane Botanic Gardens. It stood before a bamboo grove. The inspiration for the work came from a shipwrecked sailor who once lived with Aborigines for seventeen years.

Another kind of passport?

I hiked to the Melbourne Museum to view one section within this modern building — the Bunjilaka Aboriginal Cultural Centre. At the entrance to this display, wominjekawas printed on the wall, meant welcome. As well, a map visually explained the many language groups that once existed all over the state before the European invasion.

From ugliest to most stunning

After being in Melbourne for a couple of months, I admired many of its buildings, but coming across others I was surprised that such structures were allowed by any council.