Now (26.9.) we are already for 3 weeks in Australia, are still sitting in our little tent and travelling by bus…Normally we should have received our car one week after arrival of the ship, that means the 18th of September.
Responsable are the officers of customs and quarantine – they feel overworked and underpaid and therefore went into strike just right now. At least, the papers have been checked and stamped, only the inspection of the car by customs and quarantine has to be done. Hopefully somebody stoops to admire our car soon – if possible without additional cleaning!

In the meantime, we got to know all attractions (all which can be imposed to children…) of Brisbane and surroundings. After the obligatory visits to the beach and Southbank (see the blog at the beginning) with our two mermaids, the “UnderWaterWorld”, playgrounds, parks and forests and hills close to the city we went to the “Australia Zoo”. The main attractions of this zoo are certainly the Australian animals (including shows with parrots, birds of prey, snakes and crocodile), but there are also animals from Asia, Africa and America.

They demonstrated the reaction of a crocodile if someone steps into water: they have vibration sensors wich enable them to feel the movements and they move fast and smart and it is hardly possible to see them from outside the water.
The good side-effect was that we learned some rules concerning the green giants:
– suppose the presence of crocodiles till proven otherwise by locals
– never swim
– do not approach to water more than 5 meters
– do not lean over water (they jump!)
– camping only more than 200m away from water

Another trip lead us to some children attractions in Surfers Paradise (School holidays in Queensland). Now we as parents are updated about the newest hits like “Bananas in pyjamas” and the “Minions”.

On September 26th, we watched the “Riverfire” as closure of they Brisbane Festival (when we read about that date some weeks ago, we were hoping to already be deep in the outback…now we “had” to see it). It was a 30-minute extraordinary firework including the scenery of the city. The skyscrapers threw out the most colorful sparks and the bridges were blazing in a rain of thousands of lights.

The whale-watching tour on the 27.9. at the sunshine coast (Mooloolaba) was a highlight of these first weeks. For our children, it was the first time on a ship on the sea. Especially Nora did not like the rocking on the waves and panicked. Thanks to animations with play dough, a plastic whale and the first steps to the railing, she could also enjoy the trip and look for whales. Fiona tolerated the rocking better and calmed down faster despite the contagious crying of her sister.
Wir saw several water giants even with their “babies” (who already weigh 1-2 tons and drink 600 liters of milk per day). Once a whale jumped out and splashed back into water with a high fountain. The photos are not ours but those of the crew of the ship (www.whaleone.com.au).

We watched the recently released movie “Blinky Bill” with our children (Blinky Bill is an old story about a little Koala, Fiona had so much compassion with him that she started crying during the movie). In the “Curumbin Wildlife Sanctuary” (home of Blinky Bill) we saw again some shows and animal feedings (pelicans, eels, birds).

On the 28th our car was released from the container, inspected by customs and quarantine and considered as too dirty. After recleaning the car was finally released from quarantine on September 30th.
After paying the steep bill for cleaning, storage (we finance the officers’ strike) and lots of charges we can finally pick up the car on October 1st.
We will straight away head  into the desert (planed is the plenty highway towards Alice Springs), there will soon be summer here and then it is getting too hot!