Weekend Gateway to Brisbane Botanic Gardens, Mount Coot-tha!

View from Inside Tropical Display Dome

Located just seven km to the west from Brisbane CBD, Mount Coot-tha is one of the right options to relax for a moment, escape from daily activities in this metropolitan city. Mount Coot-tha itself is actually a green leisure precinct in the Brisbane area. It is a place where people could enjoy Brisbane's subtropical climate. There are a lot of attractions there, such as walking and mountain biking trails, a lookout, botanic gardens, planetarium, library, cemetery, and visitor information center. However, on this occasion, on this occasion, I would like to share my experience of exploring Brisbane Botanic Gardens Mt Coot-tha with the Free Guided Discovery Tours led by knowledgeable volunteers there.

The tour started at 1 pm that day, it was usually a one-hour long daily tour that visitors could book at Mt Coot-tha Visitor Information Centre. As for information, this guided tour runs two times a day (except on public holidays and mid-December and late-January), at 11 am and 1 pm. We walked around the botanic garden area accompanied by two tour guides at the time. Our tour guide is two nice local elders who are very knowledgable and passionate in botanical areas. They tell us the history of Brisbane Botanic Garden, the story behind several native and exotic plant collections, giving us the opportunity to distinguish various scents from certain plants, etc. From the tour, we explored several areas inside the botanical garden. We went to Arid Region Plants Area, Bonsai House, Fragrant Garden, Japanese Garden, Lagoon and Bamboo Grove Area, Rainforests Plants Area, and maybe some other places I am not really aware of. Because our tour groups were very interested in the information given and our tour guides were very passionate about

their job, we end up spending 2 hours walking at that time, one hour longer than the tour supposed to be. Overall, the tour was a worth and fun experience.

Besides strolling with the free guided tour, I also went to The Tropical Display Dome there. I personally think that it was one of the key attractions if you visited the garden. It is a building with a geodesic structure designed to become a home for tropical plants collection that needed right atmospheric conditions. Inside the dome, visitors could find a circular pathway, wraps around a central pond featuring water lilies and native fish. This pathway makes visitors past through the whole dome's collection.