i walked down to darling harbour and was disappointed to find that the wildlife centre was shut. i found an employee and he told me that the breakfast idea had not been popular and they’d stopped offering it. damn! so i headed back down to circular quay and the opera house for another look around.

i went back to the hotel, checked out, and decided to see if i could get a bus to canberra. four hours later i was wandering the streets of our nation’s capital looking for the local yha. i bought a yha membership, which gets me a 10% discount on yha globally, checked in, had a late lunch and spent the afternoon wandering around london circuit (canberra, not england, lol) and checking email.

day 222 – i wanted to make a big day of it today, so that i could try and get more done. i jumped on a bus after breakfast and headed straight for the new parliament house. the federal politicians weren’t there, so i wandered around for a while. parilament house is really nice and it was fun to look around.

i saw ‘blue poles’ by jackson pollock (the biggest and most expensive piece of crap in the world) and looked at all the portraits of former prime ministers. i couldn’t find john howard’s portrait, which is a good thing, cause i might have torn it down and pissed on it … which would have got me into trouble (maybe not, nobody likes john howard).

i walked around the outside of parliament house and down to the lodge (where the prime minister lives). i had a look at the outside but couldn’t go in (obviously). i had also considered going down to the federal mint, but i didn’t know exactly where it was, i didn’t want to spend $20 on a cab fare and it was too far to walk. so i went back to parliament house and had to wait nearly an hour for a bus back towards town.

then it was off to the national library for a spot of lunch and a cruise around the nick cave exhibition. i actually liked the nick cave gallery. there were some great photos and diaries cave used to write his song. on the walls were boxes with ‘open me’ written on them. i opened one and nick cave’s voice bellowed out at me, explaining some aspect of his career. it scared the absolute crap out of me.

the afternoon was getting late and i was starting to think of heading back to sydney. i had spent a lot of money and didn’t want to spend too much more. i wandered around the mall, looking for buses, trains and flights back to brisbane. most were too expensive, so i came up with a plan to wing it and pick up a last minute ticket on the train. i returned to the hotel, had dinner and spent the evening on the internet.

day 223 – i went to bed at 2am, which was probably a very stupid thing to do … considering i had to get up at 5.30am to go to the train station. surprisingly, i woke up at 5.30 (without an alarm), grabbed my gear (quietly so as not to wake the other people in the dorm) and headed to the train station. it was a fast run to the station and i was a little bit panicky, not knowing exactly whether the train was leaving at the right time and not knowing whether i could actually get a ticket.

it turns out that i had 30 minutes to spare and there were plenty of tickets. the train ran through to sydney where i had already bought a connecting train to brisbane. while on the train to sydney i was so hapy i celebrated with a pie and a coffee for breakfast.

the trip to sydney was only a few hours and i had a lot of time to kill before the train to brisbane. i realised that i’d forgotten to take matilda to see the opera house, so i checked my bag and headed back into town again. this time i walked across the harbour bridge to kirabili. i had some fish and chips for lunch and while i was eating it started belting down rain.

i braved the rain and walked to luna park to take some photos. then i jumped on a ferry which took me back to circular quay. the rain had started to ease up and i managed to get back to the train station. i got some coffee and listened to music while i waited for the train.

the trip back to brisbane was fairly unadventurous. i had a conversation with the carriage guards who were interested in my camera and angry at the people who were secretly smoking in the toilets.

since i had the whole seat to myself, i curled up and managed to get some sleep.

day 224 – i arrived in brisbane early and caught the train to craig’s house. i caught up on my sleep and lazed around the house for the day. in the evening, four of us went to the norman hotel where i ate a whopping 600 gram steak. despite the size, i polished off the steak, and the vegetables, and two beers. hehehe … it was a huge meal.

day 225 - after all the recent adventures, i needed a break. i stayed at craig’s house and caught up with web stuff.