Before my parents arrived, I hadn’t given much thought to the fact that the night sky in the southern hemisphere is different from that at home. No North Star! No big dipper! (At least not in some places.)
Dad was intent on seeing the Southern Cross, the general equivalent to our North Star. Of course we knew it was in the south sky, but we didn’t know when it would rise or exactly what to look for. So once we arrived in Brisbane and read the “what to do” guides, we were excited to learn that there was a planetarium there that could point us in the right direction.
We’d arrived in the city the prior evening and got the lay of the land through a short walk to the downtown pedestrian zone. So the next morning we ventured out with a general plan to find breakfast, take a boat ride on the river, potentially see a museum, and then head by city bus the 4 miles or so to the planetarium flanked by the city gardens.
Brisbane reminded me of a city in Florida: hot and tropical, with South-Beach-like condos along the river that led right out to the ocean. After a Mom’s small incident with the electric tea kettle’s overly hot water cracking her coffee cup, we ended up at McDonald’s for breakfast, consisting mostly of confusion over all their weird coffee names (flat white, long black). We just wanted some Folgers, for heaven’s sake. And some that didn’t cost $3/cup at that.
It was hotter than we were used to in New Zealand. No sweaters needed, for sure. We departed McDonald’s on foot, first running into the Salvation Army band giving a Christmas concert. (Very weird to hear holiday music while sweating.)
We continued walking west across the river, where we serendipitously came upon a dock for the CityCat river ferry. Dad and Mr. Farmer were thrilled at the prospect of cruising the river on a boat. I was just glad to have a little air conditioning and a cold bottle of water (from the vending machine on board).
Two hours later, though, I was tired of the CityCat. We’d ridden one complete loop, and the length of our ride was a good hour and a half longer than the length of my patience. From there we stopped for a quick lunch in a food court (Thai beef salad for me, three days running – yum!) next to the stop for the public bus to the planetarium.
The ride was about 45 minutes, and the planetarium was situated up on a hill at the entrance to the city’s extensive botanical gardens. We were hoping to make the 3:00 p.m. show – though it wasn’t clear what that show would be. (We’re a little spoiled by having the second best space museum just 20 minutes from our house, so we didn’t have high expectations.)
It wasn’t a large building – just the domed theater, plus a small gift shop and gallery of photos along the circumference of the theater. The ticket window was just inside the front door, and Dad once again attempted to get the “concession” (aka “senior”) rate, even though the standard disclaimer said it was only for Australian residents. But his efforts were fruitful, and they got to go in for cheap. We walked through the gallery of space photos as we waited for the theater to open for seating.
Unfortunately the show wasn’t our first choice – how astronauts prepare for going into space. But whatever. The real thing we came for was the 15-minute astronomer’s talk after the show, where he pointed out constellations in the projection of the night sky. At long last Dad saw his Southern Cross! Come to find out, it was going to rise around 3 a.m. for the duration of our stay in Australia. So it was completely unlikely that I would see it, and doubtful that anyone else in our group would see it either, unless someone was awake from another’s snoring. After years and years of staring into the sky and not having a clue where any constellation was besides the dippers, I finally figured out how to spot Orion.
We had an hour to kill before the bus came, so we traipsed through the gardens, which had examples of a whole lot of different climate zones and plant species. A whole fern house, a large cactus garden, a bonsai house and a desert scape. It was probably the most impressive collection of plants I’ve ever seen, and it was beautifully arranged.
We were pretty tired by the time we got back into the city, especially after our 15-minute walk back up hill to our hotel. Unfortunately the “closed on Sunday night” rule applied to every restaurant in our neighborhood, so we mustered up enough energy to walk back down the hill for another $.50 McDonald’s ice cream cone.
gallopingnelly
