This month I travelled out of Canberra to Queensland a state in northern Australia. I travelled to Brisbane, the capital of Queensland for three days and then flew further north onto Yeppoon which is a town on the coast of Queensland. The reason for my visit was to see friends and have time away from the cold of Canberra so I hopped on a plane and an hour and a half later landed in Brisbane but to make the trip more comfortable, I used my Qantas Frequent Flyer points and travelled in Business Class!
A couple of my friends had recently moved to Brisbane from Canberra so once I was picked up from the airport I went to their home where Vanessa and I enjoyed a glass of champagne overlooking the Brisbane River; the river unfortunately being very brown from the recent torrential rain, but still a stunning view.
On one of my days, my friends and I went to a rather new hotel in Brisbane called The Emporium located on the South Bank river and parklands precinct. Our lunch was at the rooftop bar and restaurant and as the rain had stopped we had lovely blue skies and great views of the city skyline.
Sharon chose our beverage and we started off with a very tasty champagne (feeling there is a theme to this visit) and then we all enjoyed a leisurely lunch. My four friends shared two seafood platters and I ordered spring rolls and a tomato salad. It was a lovely way to catch up with great friends I had not seen for some time. And at the same time enjoying those outside views and also the interior of the bar which is very modern and quite glamorous.
Whilst I was in Brisbane it was National Volunteers Week being Australia’s largest celebration of volunteering. One evening my friend Sandy and I walked home from dinner over The Storey Bridge a steel cantilever bridge that spans the Brisbane River, which was lit red to support National Volunteers Week to commemorate the work carried out by volunteers. And wow…it was so beautiful! And whilst the bridge is very lovely during the day, when it was lit red it was spectacular.
After three days it was time to leave Brisbane for Yeppoon. I had to take a plane to Rockhampton which is about a trip of just over an hour then my friend of 45 years came to collect me. I hadn’t been up to Rockhampton nor Yeppoon before and I hadn’t seen Tracey for quite some years so it was going to be a lovely few days visiting in her new home.
Our first day we went for a leisurely walk with her two beautiful dogs along one of the dog friendly beaches. We had woken early and the sun was just rising with a forecast for the day of mid twenties (degrees) so lovely weather to walk early.
That day we also took advantage of the blue skies and weather and walked along the promenade in town. So glad we did as the next two days the rain has not stopped and it’s become torrential.
Today, we did drive down to the beach with the dogs to see if the rain would stop as yesterday we were fortunate to be able to walk for half an hour; today not so. So we took a long drive for me to see some of Yeppoon; what a pretty place with lovely countryside and beautiful beaches. Beaches look so different without sun and blue skies; but still lovely.
One sight Tracey showed me was of a luxury boat (said to be worth $2m AUD) that had smashed into rocks after wild seas at Statue Bay, taken on water and eventually ripped its anchor resulting in it landing at Lammermoore Beach. I was told the owner of the boat does not have insurance!!! (big mistake) and it was his friend who was bringing the boat to Yeppoon on his behalf. There is a moral to this story and it’s something about if you have multi million dollar luxury boat – buy insurance!!
And locals are said to be angry about the environmental issues (plastics and foam being consumed by turtles/fish), the time the owner is taking to remove the boat and about the amount of rubbish from the boat that is in the water and on the beach – don’t blame them!
So this has been my lovely trip away, one more day to go then back to Canberra where it’s temperature is in the low teens; chilly!
Canberra is pretty cold in the winter so it’s always nice to travel interstate mainly north to Queensland for a few days of warmth. That is what I decided to do last month and took my brother and nephew along too. I booked an Airbnb home at a suburb called Biggera Waters which is about an hour’s drive from Gold Coast (Coolangatta) Airport.
It was too cool to swim in the pool so we spent many an hour on the patio reading and just watching the swans and ducks swim by. The swans would arrive at 8.30am every morning; you really could set your clock by them.
I had made plans to catch up with friends who have a holiday home at Sanctuary Cove and my friend Steve kindly offered to come and pick us up in their boat so we could sail along the river to their home. How lucky were we!! So Steve and his son Ryan arrived on our private mooring and off we went…
Until we reached the open waters the boat is legally only able to travel at six knots (no wake allowed) so this afforded me to time to check out houses and gardens that back onto the river…wow some people have gorgeous homes! Once away from residences we could go a little faster which was really nice with the wake behind us.
Also nice to see the Gold Coast skyline behind us as well as views along the shore.
After a glass of wine at my friend’s home we took their golf carts and drove to Sanctuary Cove restaurant area where we had a wonderful lunch at a local Italian restaurant which had a lovely wine bar and to enter you walk through a huge wine barrel. Definitely my sort of place. 
Along the way we drove through the golf course and were fortunate enough to see a mob of kangaroos and one mum with her baby!
After lunch we returned to my friend’s home to watch the sunset – I never grow tired of watching either a sunrise or sunset…beautiful anywhere around the world.
And I love it when the sky changes colour whilst the sun is setting…
One other day we took my nephew and godson to MovieWorld on the Gold Coast. Rather expensive and really not what I like to do but I hope my nephew and godson enjoyed themselves. It was my godson’s first time to eat a snow cone; he loved it and enjoyed some rides.
And the sweetest thing about the trip was my godson absolutely loved my nephew (they had met some three years ago) so followed him around all weekend and just wouldn’t let him out of his sight…very lovely and my nephew even though he is seven years older, was incredibly patient and loving!
We also had a meal at a local Chinese restaurant on our last night with another friend (my godson’s mum) and as usual I enjoyed an eggplant dish and some dumplings…delicious. A great long weekend away!
I travelled by plane to Brisbane with a short stop-over in Sydney and took the two hour shuttle to Noosa. Initially my friends and I were going to meet at Brisbane Airport and hire two cars to drive to Noosa. But…my friends were unfortunately stuck in Canberra Airport for seven hours due to an issue with their plane. They didn’t arrive in Noosa until just after midnight so luckily there was a shuttle to drop me off right outside my accomodation!!
I decided to go for a walk to familiarise myself with the area and walked to the main shopping street which took about thirty-minutes. It was lovely how lush and green the vegetation was along the way. When I returned to the resort, my friend Mandy and her partner came over for a glass of wine before I retired to my room for an early night.
Early the next morning I did the same walk down to the beach and then met up with Mandy for breakfast at a cafe overlooking the beach called Bistro C. 
Lots of people out and about swimming or surfing or just relaxing like us enjoying breakfast.
It turned out that this was not the only time I was to eat at Bistro C. One of the girls who had arrived late from Canberra messaged me to say that a birthday lunch had been organised that day for Mandy and it was at Bistro C!!
I decided to take the shuttle bus back to the resort as I was a bit weary after my walks…and a couple of hours later, it was time to return to Bistro C for lunch. One of the girls and I chose the roasted beetroot, feta and legume salad with fig, spiced pumpkin, radish, pomegranate and pea hummus. I opted for no cheese and mayonnaise and it really was absolutely delicious. Coupled with a glass of champagne it was a great way to spend a couple of hours!!
Now I know there are many wonderful restaurants in Noosa but I had seen something else delicious on the menu. The next day I walked back into town and stopped off for lunch at Bistro C...the dish I wanted to try was the fried shiitake mushroom, water chestnut and spinach dumplings with Sichuan eggplant, sesame broccoli, snow peas, green onion and ginger broth. Unfortunately I was very disappointed with this dish. The dumplings tasted like they had been sitting around for a while and there was no Sichuan eggplant or ginger broth on the dish.
At the time of our visit the Noosa Food and Wine Festival was on so we had tickets for a four course dinner at Peppers Resort with a few guest Aussie chefs. Matt Moran whose restaurant is Aria overlooking Sydney Harbour and Matt Preston from Australian Masterchef were two I saw and had photos with. Nice to spend time with the girls but the vegan food was incredibly disappointing; so much I didn’t even stay for dessert!
Warwick is significant in the establishment of the Australian Federal Police as its the location of an assault of the then Prime Minister who was in Warwick giving a speech at the local railway station when an egg was thrown in his direction, knocking off his hat. The Prime Minister asked the local police sergeant to arrest the offender but interestingly, the sergeant refused, saying it was not in his jurisdiction to take action.
We walked in through huge wooden doors with stained glass windows and were taken to our rooms – there are thirteen in total; all very lovely and some with beautiful stained windows similar to those above the front entry doors. 
The manor also has a guest lounge room with open fire for the cold winter evenings and a dining room with gorgeous velvet covered chairs.
Our first official event was to view the re-enactment of the famous egg throwing incident at the train station. Really well put together by the Warwick community. 
As we were representing the AFP, we all wore our uniforms and three of us had a quick photo opportunity outside the main doors of the manor and a larger group photo outside the train station after the re-inactment.
A commemorative plaque was unveiled by our Commissioner and the local Member of Parliament followed by our Commissioner doing some quick media interviews.
Our next official function was a dinner so we went back to the manor and changed into our Mess uniforms and again had some photos taken, but this time on the stairs in the manor. My friend Jane and I had a couple more photos taken along with a few of me and the Commissioner as this was the last time I was to wear my Mess uniform as a member of the AFP; I have since retired – 30 November after thirty-four and a half years!
And finally a photograph of all of us at our dinner function; a great weekend representing the AFP.
Then as if we hadn’t had enough to eat the previous evening, we went for brunch at this lovely little cafe within a rather large shopping centre. The meals matched the size of the shopping centre; huge!!
As were the views at night….
Sue's Fabulous Travels 
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