Today’s touristy escapade was a visit to the Castlemaine XXXX brewery. Visit it I did. Only to get there five minutes after the tour had set off, and a 3-hour wait till the next one. I wasn’t really up for sitting there and finishing two novels, so I walked back into town.

On the way back, I spotted an advert for a diving course for only £160 or thereabouts. Investigating, I found there was actually a variety of courses and I’m now seriously looking at getting SSI or PADI certification up north after I’ve been to Melbourne. In fact, I spent so long in the travel agents’ I ended up having to run like heckers into Brisbane so I wasn’t late for a lunch “date”. Whoops.

After lunch, I walked up to the Museum of Queensland (there’s also a Brisbane museum that I’ve not been to yet) which was quite entertaining. I missed the “large mammals” exhibit by two days, but the rest of the place is worth popping in, especially as it’s free. The exhibits cover biodiversity, the history of Queensland, transport, indigenous population and a large research department. In addition, they’re currently displaying the winners of the recent BBC Wildlife “photogapher of the year” competition which was absolutely superb.

 The research area was very impressive, with a stuffed example of just about every native mammal and bird in Queensland. Given that Queensland has the most diverse range of wildlife of any Australian state (and pretty much anywhere in the world), this is a whole lot of stuffing. On the whole, it’s a small but enjoyable museum and worth a visit if you’re in the area. There’s also a kids’ science play-exhibit thingy, but that incurs a cost so I didn’t bother!

The evening was just a pleasant meal with Belinda, who I’m keeping company while her hubby’s away. We watched some pretty atrocious television and then retired earlier than normal. I feel a cold coming on, though I’m putting this down to a lack of sleep. I’m waking before 6am every morning and can’t get back to sleep again.