We woke at around 8am and spend a good long time playing with Anthony before I noticed a ‘drip drip’ and we found that Kevin’s attempt to bring the dishwasher out of retirement had gone horribly wrong and the upstairs kitchen had flooded… Laura and Kevin spent some time clearing up while I took the easy job of entertaining Anthony for an hour or so.

Crisis over, we drove into town for a spot of lunch on the main shopping street – Laura had a chicken and mango salad and I got to try Moreton Bay Bug in a salad with prawns and avocado. It tasted a lot like a sweet lobster, but looked far more monstrous.

Following lunch we found an internet cafe and finalised our car hire and hostel plans for Perth before trying to find a few gifts for our hosts in the local supermarket.

We ordered a pizza for dinner and then all said our goodbyes as Laura and I had to be up at 2:40am for our revised flight to Uluru, via Sydney.

Woke up at 7am and I gave my Mum a quick ring (Mother’s Day back home – albeit a coincidence). Michelle and Kevin were kind enough to lend us their second car – they mentioned it was a bit of an old banger, but as we have the old Fiesta we thought nothing of it… until I started driving it and wondered whether or not it would make it to Australia Zoo. I soon got the hang of it though, and it was fantastic to have three freedom of a car without the cost – superb!

It was an easy 70km drive to the zoo from Brisbane and we only stopped briefly at McDonalds for a sausage McMuffin and fruit toast.

Australia Zoo made for a great day out – the crocodile show was a bit brash and ‘American’ but the bird display was amazing, with parrots and cormorants trained to fly around the ‘Crocoseum’. The Kangaroo Park was great, with tame animals for feeding and petting – although a cute wallaby responded to being petted by Laura by being a bit sick… The animals weren’t 100% tame though – one parent let her toddler pat and tug on a big grey kangaroo and was surprised when it had had enough and gave the kid a bit of a box! Koalas were also snoozing and taking shifts for petting – very cute.

The asian elephants and tigers also had fantastic modern enclosures and the sea lion and penguin show was also impressive.

For lunch we had some nice wedges and an incredibly lame hotdog – this is probably a place to bring your own picnic lunch.

We left at around 3:30pm and on the way back took the road to the Glasshouse Mountatins lookout. These were named by James Cook for their resemblance to the furnace towers that dotted the landscape of his home county of Yorkshire. after a quick stop we drove on to Brisbane, getting ‘home’ for 5:30pm. Michelle and Kevin came back from work not much later and we walked down to collect a chippie for our tea. I had battered hotdogs (classy) and Laura had the fish – all very nice indeed.

After a few drinks we all headed to bed at around 10:30pm.

We woke to a beautifully sunny day, wondering if we had made the right decision to shift our trip to the west coast. We decided to try breakfast at the Little Larder and decided to walk over to the New Farm area. There was a pretty metal walkway along the riverside, but a long walk through the rather dull suburb of New Farm. When we arrived at the Little Larder it was absolutely packed so we had to wait for a table. When one did become available it was only for 30 minutes, but we thought we were up for the challenge and took a seat.

The food was fantastic – I had French toast with a passion fruit cream and Laura had pesto scrambled eggs and ham (’green eggs and ham’). The drinks were also gorgeous – a banana smoothie, coffee, fresh orange and a fresh strawberry and mint drink. We barely had time to cram it all in – but it was well worth it. Place a reservation though or avoid on a sunny Sunday morning!

We walked over to Fortitude Valley to find an internet cafe and arrange collection by Laura’s friend Michelle from the hostel. We went back to check out and collect bags and waiting for collection – where we were engaged in conversation by some crazy local fellow, who went on a random train of though, punctuated with ‘guess what?’s. We were a bit worried he would go mental at any moment! Thankfully Michelle arrived about 15 minutes into his conversation and ferried us back to their lovely house in the suburbs of Brisbane.

Michelle had been great friends with Laura when they had worked in the same company in Belfast, before Michelle emigrated with her husband, Kevin. This was a chance for Laura to catch up and we spent some time playing with their seemingly always cheerful baby, Anthony.

They then whisked us up to Mount Coot-tha lookout – a restaurant and park overlooking Brisbane. We stopped for coffee and a caramel square before heading back into town and the Chinese market where Laura had a chow mein and I had delicious sizzling pork mice with eggplant and fried noodles. After that we headed back and to bed.

Never stay in the Mercantile Hotel on a Friday night. Great location, but at 4am on a Saturday they begin to set up the Rocks tourist market which mostly consists of a few hours of hammering metal poles into the ground. In spite of this early wake up call we rose and packed at 8am, before a spot of breakfast and out for a wander around the opera house in the now glorious sunshine.

We then headed to the airport and grabbed a McDonalds and Krispy Kreme – which was so lame that we won’t bother again, even though the Harrods bought ones were amazing! It was then a 75 minute flight to Brisbane and a short train ride into town (the stops were announced in the wrong order, but we worked it out). A fairly long and hot walked found us at the Kookaburra Inn where we checked in before heading back into town and having a chemical tasting Slurpee – ick.

We found an internet cafe to get our friend’s details and managed to give her a call to arrange collection tomorrow and then took a walk around the botanic gardens and along the Mangrove Wlak. We took the Goodwill Bridge over to a cluster of restaurants on the south bank where we settled on the Lebanese restaurant recommended by our hostel. The location was lovely, but the food was very average – a mixed meat platter and a disappointing burger.

We followed the pretty south bank along before crossing over to the north side before returning to our hostel and bed.