The idea for this may or may not have originally been a joke, but when we saw how terribly annoying it was to some, there was really no choice but to forge ahead. As originally conceived, the idea was to have a Daytrip to Queensland, for all the fun of Wet ‘n’ Wild. Mr Burridge and Mr Vine were both on board, but we were saying that we were going to go for six months or so before I finally set the random date of “the Saturday closest to the 10th of January” with the idea that I could stay on for a day and see some friends.

Well that theory went out the window when it came to about a week before actually leaving, as my associates decided that they’d go super-early Saturday and come home Sunday, staying at Miss Laura’s so I reworked my booking for maximum fun. We also talked Miss Grace into joining us based on the highly persuasive arguement of “But Grace, weeeeeeeee looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooove you”

So Friday night comes and I manfully powered through the night. (Not actually too impressive as I was on summer time which usually makes for the 3am sleeping anyway and we were heading to the airport at 4) My associates were awoken gracefully by a) the shower, or b) the sultry sounds of Robin Williams’ monolouge from Good Morning Vietnam. We showed up to the highly legitimate Tiger Airways terminal at Tullamarine with plenty of time to spare and spent some time watching the airport wake up for the day. No action on the flippy-board front though, unfortunately.

Got up into the air and in about 2 minutes BAM! out like a light until we started those cool banky maneouvers to get down to Coolangatta. Once we got down we met up with Burridge’s mum, then waited for Laura who was kind enough to put us up for the weekend. We spent the day, exploring Mt Tamborine, which is a super-cool place, by the way. You all should go.

GOSH I LIKE WATERFALLS

Aside from water there were also cool trees with funny looking trunks. We also visited the Mt Tamborine Botanical Gardens, much to the bemusement of our host. Other exciting events on the mountain included walking around and then on the way home almost loosing her car rego sticker out the window.

After returning to sunny Beenleigh, we went to the scummiest Coles I have ever had the displeasure of going into. Seriously, remember what they were like when we were in primary school? That’s exactly the layout, equipment, horrible floor tiles and hillarious freezer that we got to see. The rest of the centre wasn’t exactly great either, featuring a chemist, two churches, a religious bookshop annnnnnnnd that’s about it.

White Trash, not included. No one’s really included actually, they may want to look into that… The only people we saw there were staff and they didn’t look all that impressed at being there in my opinion.

Other activities for Saturday featured picking up Miss Grace from Brisbane Airport, and driving around aimlessly for a few hours, taking in the delights of Woolloongabba, Fortitude Valley and countless others. We even sulked around near the Brisbane Cricket Ground for a while, getting lost in some kind of factory district. Also included was shopping for Wet ‘n’ Wild tomorrow, including, of course, Mr Vine’s customary bulk order of Delta Creams. We made it back and promptly crashed.

Sunday came and I decided that I’d go see all those people who I said I would (a poor decision that left me without too much to do monday, but that’s not the point) So I went on an adventure by myself, starting with Kat, which meant training it up and off to Windsor Station, a very cool station just outside the city.

With Kat and Shaun, my adventure led me to Westfield Chermside, which was, just like most Westfield monstrosities, slightly confusingly laid out. The important thing is that they had Bucking Broncos in the food court, home to the single greatest chips in the history of the entire infinite multiverse. From there we headed off to Redcliffe, because Redcliffe Lagoon is cool and I always like to go there when I’m in town. Turns out that they think it’s cool too and hadn’t actually been there before, a pretty big mistake if you ask me. They were kind enough to drop me off at Strathpine Station, were 1) the mirror fell off their car and 2) I was able to catch up with Joel for a little bit while his car was also being fixed.

I headed back into Brisbane due to a miscommunication after that, went for an explore, lots of cool old buildings still standing up there, unlike here. Finally found out that I had previously been three stations from where I needed to be and headed back there, had dinner and found out that the girl who I had been planning to see was instead going to hospital to see her grandad who was busy recovering from a heart attack. So I headed back to Beenleigh, at more or less the complete other end of the suburban train network.

From there I walked to Laura’s which was nice and relaxing, though after her tales of riots and such made me kinda wish for my practice fire twirling stick (a nice long piece of metal) but there was a nice view out over the Pacific Motorway. Also, no one apparently drives around on Sunday nights up there as I saw about four cars that weren’t on the freeway. When I got to the four way traffic lights just by the estate thing she lives at I could have just stood there and taken pictures of the empty road in all directions just to prove that I could and I’m kinda annoyed now that I didn’t do that.

I don’t really remember what happened Monday, aside from seeing Becca, riding the train all the way to the Gold Coast, having to get off the train to laugh at the girl sitting across the carriage from me who had apparently spent the morning at a deportment school based on the booklet that they had given her to read. Also featured on Monday were the Grace & Laura’s not being able to find the train station, which is when I called you, if I called you. Bus Stop benches aren’t all that comfortable, by the way.

So after getting to Coolangatta again, I found that my plane had been running late all day and it would be two hours before I was even heading southbound, let alone being there. I was sitting/lying under a very comfortable tree though. After all that though, I eventually made it back to Tullamarine. Then on the way back to Chateau du Pie, a kangaroo jumped out in front of the car. Fair enough I hear you say, this was Warrandyte after all, WRONG! This was the Western Ring Road.

Anywhoo, much fun was had, etc, etc, etc. Be on the lookout for Epic Mantrip in Queensland 2: THE REVENGE.