29 Nov to 6 Dec 14

Brisbane

A quick one we forgot on the previous Blog. Thurs 27th and Matt, Helen’s nephew, Debs his wife and their 3 young children came to visit. It was great to see them and they enjoyed being on board. Late in the afternoon the sky grew darker as the clouds thickened. Debs received a text from their neighbour (they live a little to the North of Brisbane) with a storm and hail warning. Debs neighbours had kindly covered their cars with matting. On the marina we watched the sky darken, and darken, and then saw lightening, and heard the thunder. The storm passed us in about half an hour. Still during that time the wind increased and we had very heavy rain. Still no problems; boats are designed for the wind and water (rain or salt). The text from Debs’ neighbour though told of hail stones the size of golf balls, and that the matting had saved their cars from damage. Later on TV we saw how three thunderstorms had combined to form one super cell. That had missed us but hit the Western Suburbs and Brisbane Central. There had been very strong winds, heavy rain and heavy hail; the hail stones golf ball to cricket ball size! The damage had been significant (hundreds of millions of dollars) and there had been much disruption as roads and rail lines flooded. So, Brisbane does not get Cyclones, just Supercells!

Well, the week has been a case of getting back to civilized reality.

One goal has been for Paul to get a well-paying full time job, and Helen a part time job. We had been in touch with an employment agency by e-mail and phone. Now we were in Manly the time had come to pay them a visit. The appointment was for 1300 on Mon 1 Dec 14 and as the office is in the centre of Brisbane and so this offered a good opportunity to have a look around the big city. We walked the 1.5 Km to the rail station. Normally this would not be a problem; however, Brisbane is fairly hot and with no wind and a reasonable uphill climb the walk was very warm. Still the trains run regularly, two an hour during the day, so our wait at the station was only short. Even better, the trains are modern with good air-conditioning and communications. We were therefore comfortable and had a running commentary of which station was next to accompany the suburban scenery slipping past.
We got off the train at Brisbane Central and walked through the CBD to the South Side, across a bridge, to the Queensland Museum. This was in a large arts complex with theatres, a Sciencentre (where one can experience Science hands-on – and we thought that happened in everyday life!), and art galleries. The Museum itself was a reasonable size, spacious and modern. Most of the museum was free to enter with only the Special Exhibition costing to enter. This latter exhibition was ‘Undressed – 350 years of underwear fashion’; we did not pay the A$21 to enter! The general area was quite good with the usual Pacific Creatures area as well as historical areas for Brisbane, and a thought provoking room centering on 3 VC local WWI winners. After an hour or so, it was back across the bridge into the CBD and a look at the shopping areas. These are pretty extensive with several malls. Of course, as the capital of Queensland, the shops cover most things, with an emphasis on clothes and fashion. Probably best of all, the central streets are pedestranised so the usual scourge of city traffic is removed.
The city also has the City Hall that houses the Brisbane Museum. Just before lunch we had a call from the employment agency asking if we could put the appointment back to 1430. No problem, we could visit City Hall, and so we did.
The Museum is at the top of the building. The temporary exhibit was of Hollywood costumes primarily from one collector (some would say fanatic). There were literally hundreds from the 1920s to 1960s all well presented with placards showing who wore them and in which film. For Paul it was moderately interesting, for the first dozen or so, Helen lasted several dozen. However, it would take a real enthusiast to be interested in them all! Still, the rest of the museum was an art collection of semi-modern art (not really our cup of tea) and an excellent presentation on the history of Brisbane focused on the river. This last one was fascinating with many old paintings and photos, supported by informative text. For those who were not too sure … the Western influence on Brisbane (as opposed to the ancient aboriginal) is fairly recent, starting with its discovery and charting by Matthew Flinders in 1799. It was further surveyed in 1823 to become a penal colony; the old adage of Kiwis choosing to come to NZ, whilst Aussies received a sentence could hold true! However, the river made the land that good that it was declared a free settlement in 1838, and so the city was born.
The interview was pretty simple, including watching a Health and Safety video on office safety (!). Unfortunately we were form filling so had to complete the Health and Safety questionnaire using native cunning; it seemed to suffice! We will see if this leads to a job!
Manly has pretty good public transport and originally we had planned to save money and not buy a car. That idea lasted about a week! Used cars in Australia seem quite expensive with the dealers typically having nothing below about A$8,000. However, we spread tentacles and learned of a chap who lived on a boat on the marina who dealt in cheaper used cars. We gave him a call and so met Tony Luck (yes, his real name!). Tony was an Eastender who had emigrated to Australia some 30 or so years ago. He is a born wheeler dealer, and with his apparent accent, has earned the nickname ‘Arthur’, or ‘Arfur’ after the TV character Arthur Daley. And he revels in it! Still, he has been living on a boat on the marina selling cars for some 20 years, and has gained an excellent reputation. We outlined out requirements; a cheap car, reliable, economical, and with air conditioning! Sure enough he had a suitable car and so a few hours later after a good look around and test drive we purchased our 1998 very tidy, 151,000 km, maroon Nissan Pulsar LX 1.6i for A$2,700. And it has good air conditioning!
Of course we then had to buy insurance for the car. This is normally simple and is done on-line to get the best price. And so it was for us; nearly! We went on line, completed the relevant forms and compared quotes. We then went with the best quote, and hit send. Declined! Here we were low risk, and declined. OK, as we were looking at another company the phone rang. It was the first insurance company following up on the declined insurance. The agent politely went through the questions again, and was surprised when the insurance was declined. Still, at least she could say why; our address was high risk as we lived on a boat! Ah well, onto the next company; and also declined. Their agent called, went through the questions, went back to the underwriter and … same result! Then we had another call from the first insurance company. The Agent was surprised we had been declined and so went and pushed the underwriter hard and … still declined. We had now wasted several hours. A bit of research showed that all these companies had the same underwrite Auto and General Insurance. So went to the insurance company that insured our boat, QBE, and … we were insured in minutes!
And apart from that, we have got to know a few people on the Marina. Friday 5th was an enjoyable get together under the big tree at the Marina entrance, nibbles nibbled, wine drunk and a lot of talk with interesting people.
And the repairs continue. We finally got the brushes for our Watermaker. We had ordered these in American Samoa but they had not arrived. Katadyn resent them to us at no charge; nice! These were quickly fitted, and the motor ran OK. However, the watermaker did not make water! We had inhibited it with biocide for long term storage as per instructions. Those same instructions now said that the creatures killed by the biocide could decay and block the membrane, check for a rotten eggs smell. A quick check and it was there, really there! So we now needed to get some alkaline cleaner to clean it out. A call to the local chandlery and they got some for us. Of course, being Katadyn it is not cheap, but we had it.

The photo is The Wheels, of course!