Brisbane Greeters offer a free tour of the Walter Taylor Bridge - an activity that had been on my radar for at least seven years!Tours run on select days, with only four participants on each - so scheduling a suitable time had been tricky due to Nick's shift-work.
Today's tour was eagerly anticipated!
We caught the train to Indooroopilly and met our tour guide in the park, beside Witton Barracks.
We had a morning tea picnic in the same park, on our previous visit to Indooroopilly.
We'd read some of Witton Barracks history, during our heritage trail walk but on this tour, we entered one of the buildings, now converted to office space - and viewed a former cell. It was a very interesting site.
It was a short walk from Witton Barracks to Walter Taylor Bridge, our primary focus for doing the tour.
The bridge is one of only a few in the world designed for residential living and the only one of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere. The north tower was home to the Green family for more than 75 years.
I'd been keen to see inside the bridge apartment since realising tours were available - but as we listened to our guide, we realised there were lots more interesting facts about the bridge and it's builder, including a link to Sydney Harbour Bridge.
We had plenty of time for a good look through the rooms, photos and records. We even stood on the balcony to view trafffic below!
(Some people remember driving on the bridge and seeing washing hung over the balcony)!
The National Film Archive has a short film from 1954 - titled "Living in the Walter Taylor Bridge".
At the end of the tour, Nick and I walked back to the Jack Pesch (pedestrian and cycle) Bridge, to cross the Brisbane River. We then walked under the four bridges to the Walter Taylor Reserve, where we sat beside the river for our picnic lunch. It was a great shady spot to view the bridges from another angle and we stayed for a while, watching the world go by.
After lunch we walked back to Indooroopilly, on the Walter Taylor Bridge footpath. By that time, out of the shade, the temperature was 34 degrees and we made a snap decision to have a drink in the Indooroopilly Hotel (which had been a point of interest on our previous heritage trail walk). We really appreciated the air conditioning while we waited for our train home!
Total fare cost was $2.00 - 50c each way, for each of us. How good is that?
Our previous Indooroopilly train adventure was 12 days ago. Since then the price of diesel at the same fuel station had risen to $3.21 per litre. Using the same calculation method, today's return trip would have cost just over $16.00 - plus $6.00 for parking, so $22.00 total.
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