Brisbane Botanic Gardens

Tuesday, July 25, 2017
Toowong, Queensland, Australia
We set off for our first full day trip out and headed to the Brisbane Botanic Gardens. They are just on the outskirts of Brisbane, but I had to drive through town itself at one point. I am definitely getting better with my lane positioning and signaling. I haven’t turned on the windshield wipers in a while now! Shankar, Anoop, Rhys and I set out for a self-guided loop while we waited for the rest of the party to arrive. There wasn’t much in bloom as it is winter here (highs have been between 21-25 ⁰C…), however, there was still tons to see. We wound our way through the paths, stopping occasionally to read about a tree. Rhys did quite well in the stroller until we passed a small waterfall and creek… Mini meltdown ensued to the cries of “wawa, jump” as he loves jumping in the water at the beach or pool. Any water we go by now seems to elicit wails if it is not the appropriate venue! We visited a lovely Japanese garden although we had to see it in shifts as Rhys was having a tantrum over not being able to swim in the pond.
We met up with the rest of Anoop’s family and then visited the fern gardens before stopping for lunch. We had a picnic in the cactus garden where we saw birds drinking the nectar from some of the flowers in bloom. We stopped off at the tropical dome which reminded us of Indonesia with both the plant varieties and the humidity!
We then got back in the car to drive to the Australian plants section of the garden. This loop wasn’t made up of several smaller gardens, but rather was one large loop through the various types of vegetation you would see in Australia. They have been working on this section of the garden for quite some time, but it is mostly plants from Queensland that are found there at the moment. We wandered through eucalyptus and palm groves as well as other treed areas. There was a smaller garden near where we parked displaying plants you would find in local gardens. Here we found a few flowering plants and I had fun taking a few pictures while Anoop continued wandering a snoozing Rhys around. After finishing at the gardens, we drove over to a nearby viewpoint which offered up views of Brisbane itself. While one of us enjoyed the view, the other chased Rhys around. He had seen a bus on the way up and kept trying to make his way back to it so that he could “sit, bus, drive”. We then headed home, a tad slower than on the way in as we hit rush hour leaving Brisbane. It didn’t add much to our trip and was certainly not like the slow moving traffic we have at home. 
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Comments

james
2017-07-30

Great pics: thanks!

wendy
2017-08-03

There were some unique and interesting looking plants! Great pics all around!

2025-05-22

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