Tuesday, December 4 Glass House Mountain Campground to Brisbane - We see our Kiwi friends!

     We got a good start in the morning and drove over to the park to do a little hiking and mountain watching.

There are 16 volcanic plugs in the region

Even at ten in the morning it was quite hot

They say this mountain looks like an ape's head.  Works for me.

     From the Glass House Mountains we visited a couple museums near Bribie Island.  I dropped Diana at the Abbey Museum, a small but well-curated collection of European art and artifacts spanning the Stone Age to the Renaissance.  I drove to the Warplane Museum, which has six or seven original airplanes that are in flying condition, as well as a bunch of smaller items.  I stayed for a couple hours and enjoyed it; Diana wouldn't have lasted long.

Replica of the Red Barron's Fokker Dr. I tri-plane

    Afterwards, I joined Diana at the Abbey Museum for a couple more hours.  Air conditioned and quiet, it was a pleasant place to spend the afternoon.

      We drove to Brisbane following Lorraine's directions, and met them outside of the apartment building where they live.  How wonderful to see them after all these years!  The rooms are all studio apartments, and they had arranged for us to have our own room, as well as a separate one for Kristy.  We chatted for awhile, then they took us up to our room where we put stuff away and cleaned up.

      For dinner they treated us at a nearby restaurant, where we finally had some excellent Australian meat pies.  We talked for several hours, catching up on each other's lives.  As many of you know, they sold their home and left New Zealand around 22 years ago after raising a family and running a business.  They rode their BMW motorcycles all over the world, having many amazing adventures and meeting incredible people. Now they've settled down in Brisbane, Wayne working as an engineer for an industrial company.  Their minimalist non-materialistic lifestyle is reflected in the tiny but well-organized apartment they call home.  It is amazing talking to them.  The wisdom they've accrued from living in so many countries  (Algeria, Libya, England, Hungary, Bangladesh, Thailand, are a few) and knowing such diverse people is inspirational.  We've only got a few more days to visit with them, which won't be long enough.