First thing (Monday 10 February) we got up, organised ourselves, and drove off to return the car to the hire company. Mission accomplished we then utilised the courtesy bus to take us to the airport in preparation for our flight to Adelaide. This boarded quickly and we took off…. Again Virgin Australia so nothing offered other than tea, coffee and water complimentary – I’d prepared this time by purchasing cheese and biscuits and some soft drinks…. About an hour before we landed we had a glass of wine and enjoyed the rest of the short flight (3 1/2 hours)….
On arrival we got an uber to our apartment and settled in. Nice place and quite spacious…. I finished the blog whilst Richard popped out for some provisions at the local shops. This serviced apartment’s only disappointment was the balcony – a bit grubby from street dust and not really fit for purpose especially as it housed a large air conditioning unit pumping out some very undesired additional heat! Oh yes and $4 a small bottle of water in the fridge which we thought was a bit swingeing….most places give you complimentary water these days. Anyway, blog published and Richard returned with the goodies. We then got ready to go out and found a local restaurant which served the most amazingly flavoured foods….on sharing plates. Fabulous!
Tuesday morning we headed out into a very hot day – phew! – and visited the Central Market via the tram (which was incredibly reasonably priced at only £1.27 for a full day’s travel). The Market was very interesting with pretty much any type of fresh produce you could possible want to buy and lots of food offerings and certainly didn’t expect such a comprehensive cheese offering. And all in air conditioned comfort….
We then navigated our way to the historic area and visited the Migration Museum and the Library. This area is so familiar it could almost be in the UK. Historic buildings and churches – only unlike the UK this area was very clean and tidy….
The Migration Museum was interesting and followed the story of families from around the world who had decided (and were indeed encouraged) to make Australia their home (not forgetting the £10 Poms) and the ‘Whites Only’ immigration policy which can be traced back to the 1850s with the last vestiges of this discriminatory policy not finally removed until 1973. You also need to know about the shocking adoption of Aboriginal and Torres Strait children who were forcibly removed to be placed with white families. These children are classed as the ‘lost generation’ as they had no opportunity to learn about their own culture. It is estimated that one in three indigenous children were removed between 1910 and the 1970s which is really not that long ago, which makes it even more heinous. But we must acknowledge that child trafficking also went the other way – with 130,000 UK children from “deprived” backgrounds sent to the Colonies for a better life. This was mainly to Australia and Canada with many of them separated from their siblings: the children were often falsely informed that they were orphans (many of them being removed directly after birth from single teenage mothers who were shamed into compliance): and many of whom were subject to physical and/or sexual abuse. What a cruel world we live in!
After this we googled to find a rooftop bar – thinking we could escape from the oppressive heat – so headed off on foot towards the nearest one. We found the entrance – stepping over a few homeless people along the way which is obviously an issue in Adelaide – and made our way up to the rooftop. Well it was a rooftop bar but it was only four flights up LOL! Not exactly what we had in mind….but it had nice cold vapour lines of mist chilling the seating area. We had a couple of drinks before returning to the area where our apartment was located and tried out a few hostelries on the way. We met a local nutter who decided Richard was his best friend as his accent reminded him of Ricky Gervais and I got hugs too but he thought I was Ricky Gervais’ mother! He was off his head so I tried hard not to be too offended LOL.
We did find a local bar we liked but afterwards headed back to relax in our apartment’s air conditioning as the heat of the city had sapped our energies. We then had a chat with Lester and Helen (who we were going to visit shortly after) before heading out for a fantastic dinner at the local Japanese restaurant (strangely named Call Me Curry & Izakaya). Our location in the city was a bit grungy in places but perfectly positioned in terms of eateries and hostelries….
On Wednesday morning we were hit by a heatwave – 43 degrees – phew! The highest daily temperature since 2017 and made Adelaide the hottest capital in the world that day. It felt like walking into a pizza oven, so intense, and very draining, So we headed off to the casino to have a look around – huge place where I managed to spend (lose) $20 on the slots (pokies)…. Oh well never mind – and then down to the riverside to check out where we would be picking up our river boat trip later in the week. It was so hot even the ducks were seeking out the shade!
Then we headed on the tram to Glenelg (end of the line) which the locals call affectionally ‘The Bay’ which was very nice and – aided a bit by the sea breeze – we walked the promenade to the local marina, had a lovely seafood lunch, then back to the main drag where we found a hostelry to keep cool in. Later in the afternoon we headed back to the marina, found a tapas bar to have an early supper, and at 7pm we boarded a large commercial catamaran which was taking us on a sunset and dolphin watching cruise. The crew were nice, the other guests were also pleasant, and we were lucky to get seated at the stern of the vessel so in the shade. Most people were in full sun on the bow / transom etc. We enjoyed both the cruise, the dolphin sightings, and the sunset at sea before the boat turned around and we headed back into the marina. We then retraced our steps to the tram and caught one back to the city (about 45 minutes journey). Back in our apartment we had an early night having enjoyed our day out despite the heat.
Thursday morning we had a leisurely start and met Lester & Helen on the street as they picked us up. Thankfully the weather had cooled down a bit – phew! First stop was the South Australian Royal Yacht Club before having a quick glance at the Clipper City of Adelaide, a massive renovation of an 1864 clipper ship which was built in Sunderland to transport passengers and goods between Britain and Australia.
We then went to check out the docks before driving towards the beach and the coast – ending at Semophore where we enjoyed checking out the jetty and making new acquaintance with a couple of Brits who were visiting on holiday but who now reside in Spain. We also checked out a huge pelican who was bothering a fisherman for snacks LOL.
After a nice pub lunch on the seafront we headed inland towards Mount Lofty to admire the city views. En route we came across a koala walking down the road. Lester stopped the car in a hurry – giving me a bit of a fright when I realised that I was teetering just above a sheer cliff drop! The koala spotted us and went into the bush becoming camera shy and would only give us a view of his/her bottom LOL.
At the top of the Mountain we couldn’t see much of the view as it was shrouded in mist…oh well, never mind. On the way back we stopped off at a residential cul-de-sac to see the huge tree growing in the middle of the road…. Why would anyone plant that there?!?
Back at the apartment we said farewell to Lester and Helen and had a quiet night in….
Friday morning we headed down to the River Torrens to pick up our Popeye boat trip down the river.
We enjoyed the ride and the commentary until we eventually ended up at the botanical gardens and the zoo – we had already decided not to visit the zoo. But we wanted to see the Chiculy glass installations in the botanical gardens so walked through hoping to catch a glimpse. Those that we saw were stunning – we had tried and failed to get tickets to see this installation during the evening as they are lit up – and, because of the severe weather the botanical garden had been closed because of fire risk. Anyway we did manage to catch a few – absolutely stunning!
Moving on we walked through Rundle Market enjoying some of the street art and we went into the Opal Store where Richard purchased a lovely opal pendant for me to match my Opal ring – Happy Valentine’s Day! Lovely surprise….
On the way back to the apartment we popped down to our hire car company who, for a change, had a city location. We were picking up our car at 5pm so wanted to check all was OK – and glad we did as the car they had allocated was too way too small – so Richard asked if he could have another Mazda X30 as we had both enjoyed driving that last time. Deal done we returned to the apartment and got on with the laundry as we were leaving the following day. At 4.50 pm we went back out and picked up the newly-allocated car and drove off – we had instructions how to get into the apartment block’s underground car park but the one-way system foiled both us and the sat nav. Pleased to report that this time the car – being a slightly older / lesser specification – had USB ports so we were able to run the google maps onto the dummy screen. Anyway, the one way system and the end of work traffic, caused us a nightmare and it took us almost an hour to get back to where we had started which was only a five minute walk away! To enter the car park was very very tight and I was glad Richard was driving. We managed to find a spot inside but, again, it was all very tight! Almost made you want to hold your breath as we navigated around….
Back in the apartment we got ready for the evening – first stop was to a Japanese noodle restaurant which was busy and looked nice. But the menu was incomprehensible to those not in the know so we left and headed down to the local pub where we listened to some live music, ate pizza, and watched the locals having fun. A very mixed collection of punters but at the ‘rough’ end of the spectrum – think some of them had spent the day watching the LIVGolf tournament and had kept hydrated accordingly LOL.
Having finished our food we moved on and walked to the Sky Tower – where we headed to the nine floor for their rooftop bar and sunset drinks – and met the more up-market type of clientele LOL. After drinks and the sun had gone down we headed down to the ground floor and I played on the slots again in the casino and won $50! Woo hoo!
Afterwards we just turned in for the night and that brings this part of our adventure to an end. Please come back soon for the next instalment. Bye for now.
Jan