Yesterday very early morning I left the RSL club at 1 o’clock, as they shut down. I can recommend it, if you need to wait in Casino for a few hours in the night, and have nothing else to do. I watched the tennis game of Roger Federer from the Australian Open, which was almost 4 hours and pretty exciting until the final match ball. Well there was not much else on display 😉. After the RSL Club closed, I slowly walked to the train station. I expected that the waiting room opens at 1:30 o’clock, as it was still closed a few minutes after, I knocked on the door until a staff member appeared. He explained me that these hours are NOT opening hours of the waiting room, but instead staff working hours, and that the waiting room only opens shortly before the train arrives. I explained him, the staff from the railway, that the train will be arriving soon, and that I didn’t make the timetables. He responded that he didn’t make the staff working hours 🤨, but then finally asked me, if I want to come in. Yes, for sure, otherwise this waiting room is never used (probably this is what the staff is intending to achieve). I mean, if there’s only one train per day leaving to Brisbane, departing at 2:19 o’clock, just continue to make the service as inconvenient as possible, so that people are not using it anymore, and then argue due to the low usage, you should close down the service at all. In the end the train was a few minutes late, but this didn’t bother me at all, and as it was dark anyway throughout the train ride I tried to sleep a bit, even as I assume the mountainous landscape was pretty nice.
As I arrived in Brisbane at 4 o’clock local time, it was pretty early. So I decided to take the first train to Cleveland and then the ferry to North Stradbroke Island in order to have a relaxed day at the beach. After checking in at Point Lookout very early, as the rooms were not fully booked I spent the whole day at the beach. I first went to Adder rock and seeked for a bit of shade to relax on the beach, and afterwards have a swim. Then I strolled along the long Home beach and Cylinder beach to the centre of Point Lookout to get some late lunch, before I continued to Deadman’s beach. From there I saw in a bit of a distance a group of dolphins jumping out of the water. The detour along the North Gorge walk was definitely worth. After waiting for a while also a group of dolphins appeared, even it was a bit in a distance, you could clearly distinct them. Followed by two turtles, and a manta Ray which stayed directly at the mouth of North Gorge. I finished my walk at the main beach before I headed back.
