Brisbane & Back to Reality…

So I realised that I didn’t ever blog about the start of our Life in Brisbane, so I thought I’d do that now! We arrived in Brisbane on Friday 16th September, got to the Hostel and took the car back to the rental place. I must say, I had a really pleasant experience with JUCY Rentals, I found them reasonably priced and the car was lovely to drive!

We got back to the Hostel, and realised straight away that it was not going to be a comfortable few weeks. We had our own room (Double Bed Bottom, Single Bed Top Bunk Bed) at City Backpackers, Brisbane on Upper Roma St. It was easy to get to, but it was NOT a great hostel to stay in. After a super shitty first nights sleep (paper thin mattresses), we headed off to get groceries – which is a short walk away at a place called the Barracks, which we now still visit – restaurants, Coles, a great Sushi place and a Cinema. After coming back, we attempted to cook. It cost $10 each for a grotty cup, plate and bowl and cutlery that looked like it hadn’t been washed. Then there was the kitchen….filthy. Which was a given when staying at a cheap backpackers…I’ll give you that. But the pans barely had handles, there was no room in the fridges, it cost even more to have shelf space and to be honest I didn’t really want to leave my food there! So, we turned part of the room into a store cupboard and took food with us each time we went up, choosing to eat out a LOT. (Which actually leads nicely to my next Foodie blog coming up…)

A few days in and we had both already applied for jobs in the city. I got myself an interview on the Wednesday, turned up and only went n got the job! She wanted me to start Friday. So that was a super quick turnaround time and dodgy living in a backpackers, but it worked! And it meant we’d have a wage coming in. So, after a week at City Backpackers we had had enough. We found that apartment hunting was a struggle because nobody wanted to give us a 3 month lease and we didn’t know where Rachael was going to be working and wanted a little flexibility. So, we searched and went to loads of places – we found 2 great places, but we were ‘outbid’ on one – as someone offered them a 12 month lease, and the other changed their mind after originally saying 3 months was fine. I wrote a post about apartment hunting that you can read here! But….then we found Terrace, a company who rents out rooms short term (as holiday lets or short-long term rent) so we looked around the room and really liked it. We decided to take it, but couldn’t move in for a week. I was going crazy at the backpackers at this point, so we moved to a much smaller hostel/hotel called The Snooze Inn. Our room was COMFORTABLE! 😀 We had our own ensuite, fridge and a kettle…this was luxury! The only issue is there was a half broken microwave and a toaster in the common room and that was about as far as the cooking facilities went…so there was a lot of salad eating that week!

At this point, Rachael had got herself a short term contract at a school out in Shorncliffe that was running until November and had herself an interview for a full time job in January on the Gold Coast. So, after the week was up at Snooze and our apartment was ready, we hired a car for the drive to the interview and kept it for an extra few days so we could move…a whole 2 roads away! What? our bags were heavy! It also let us get groceries and a few house-y bits to make the place feel a little more like home.

Since then, we’ve been enjoying exploring Brisbane.
It’s full of foodie places, artistic places, museums, fun things to do, fresh markets, street festivals and cool bars. We live in a place called Fortitude Valley, and its a fun place to live! I’ll do the highlights of Brisbane in another post, but so far my faves have been:

• Kelvin Grove Markets
• Fireworks at South Brisbane
• Eat Street
• The Finders Keepers Market
• South Brisbane Parklands

There are so many beaches to explore but we haven’t really been to many yet, so thats next on the agenda. Also, its really hard to make friends when your an adult! Anyone else find that? If your an expat in Brisbane, give me a shout in the comments!

This week we also bought a CAR! I’ll write a blog about that to help anyone moving over with the process, it wasn’t the easiest but it makes such a difference being able to afford one over here! That certainly wasn’t the case in the UK.

So it’s kind of Back to Reality…or some sort of new reality, where I come home from work and go for a swim in the apartment pool, go out for food and drinks much more than I did in the UK and have much more time to enjoy the little things. I love it so far!

What is your favourite thing about Brisbane? Anything you can recommend?