There were many significant milestones over the past week – temperatures, rainfall, food consumption, runs – but none more so than me completing the clean sweep of Australian states and territories. Back in 2000 I first dumped by smelly shoes in NSW, ACT, Queensland, NT and WA. Vic came about in 2006 and Tassie soon after in 2007. The absentee, South Australia, remained neglected for a few more years... no fortuitous work trips, no compelling reason to go there, snipes and sneers from the colonials about it being dullsville (er, like, I live in Canberra mate). I think in hindsight that’s a bit of a shame. For Adelaide and its environs has it all, as discovered in just under four days conveniently timed with the second Ashes test.
It has heat. I know about that. But this was proper summer heat like it should be this time of year everywhere else. The mercury hit 38.2 late in the afternoon on Saturday, a nice proper dry heat coming in from the desert, none of this stupid humid stuff. A good day to hit the beaches, which were really quite surprisingly nice.... wonderful beachside suburbs all laid back and full of happy people living life with a little entertainment thrown in thanks to cafes and bars and random shops. Glenelg is the undoubted queen of beachside suburbia, with its white sand, calm, shallow water, jetty and backdrop of fine eateries and cold beer handily available, linked to the city by the semi-famous tram ride.
The sand continues to the south and onwards to the Fleurieu Peninsula, the suburbs becoming rolling wine country and small unhappening towns and villages. Golden hills reminiscent of California are cut by twisting ribbons of road and silvery white gums, an almost time warp hallucination leading you around the next bend and the rather fine Shiraz producing vines of McLaren Vale.
By now things are hotting up and the best plan is to go for some air conditioned comfort and brief afternoon snoozes with the calming backdrop of English willow on Kookaburra ball on the TV. Still decidedly toasty as the evening emerges, Glenelg itself a hotbed of people and noise and tastes and smells, plenty of walks along the beach and dips in the sun as the sun dips. Saturday night here was far from dull, the full spectrum of life on display from toddlers splashing in the fountains, kids plunging off the pier, teens being like totally lame, young romantics and old charmers, lobster red Scots, ten kid families getting that first slightly bracing touch of the sea on their toes. This is a good place to be at this time on this day.
The Adelaide Oval was a rather good place to be all weekend really, including up until the tea interval on Sunday. Another balmy day for the Australian bowlers to toil, milestones overhauled at regular intervals and, just before tea and a huge thunderclap signalled the end of the day, a double century to salute. The ground itself was rather nice, one of the few remaining in international cricket with a grassy bank for the fans to stand, to roll out picnic blankets
and foldaway chairs, to eat chicken rolls and drink copious amounts of overpriced but underwhelming beer on sale (for some reason the insipid XXXX Gold rather than the more excellent Adelaide brew from the Coopers Alehouse). I suppose you can’t have it all.
The next morning dawned with blue skies returning and the local beachside was again hard to resist for breakfast, the love of England clearly all around in Brighton and Hove, just south of Glenelg. Not really at all like the English Brighton and Hove thankfully... no pebbles, no tacky amusements, no men parading in budgie smugglers. Adelaide is far too respectable for anything like that.
Today was town day, a chance to explore the city centre of Adelaide itself. It’s a fairly modest city, the skyline less distinctive than the Sydneys or Melbournes of this world, the streets dotted with 1800s civic pride in between 1970s beige blocks. One of the more remarkable things about the city is it’s positioning which is effectively as an island in the middle of a sea of parkland. Some of this parkland is rough and ready, others green and refined, like the Botanic Gardens and strip of fountains dotting the Torrens River. Occasional wafts of celebration blowing downwind from the Adelaide Oval.
Again warm, solace was provided in the air conditioning of the Art Gallery but the art of beer and cricket was more on my mind. If you can find them, it seems as though Adelaide has some decent, traditional looking pubs. Alas some ludicrous decision not to be airing the cricket during the afternoon in South Australia meant the much needed cold beer and cricket in the pub scenario was delayed. Instead it was a snooze back in the motel as the commentary drawled its way forever onwards on the radio.
Luckily the last session of the day was on TV, so off to the pub in Glenelg it was. Cold beer ordered, stool beside one of the trillion TV screens, all set. For the heavens to open. Meh. Somehow Glenelg avoided all the storms around, so instead of watching cricket the other amiable option was to sit on the balcony watching the world go by. The cricket did resume, then annoyingly cut to the news while still playing (yeah, they do that as well) so a prized Aussie wicket of the useless vice captain was missed. In Glenelg, the day ended – still grey, still threatening, still quite muggy, but still dry – with fish and chips on the beach.
The last day, of Adelaide and the test match, started with a dilemma – pay and go the test with the risk of an early finish and / or rain, or go for a jaunt in the Adelaide Hills and eat lots of food. Sometimes you just wish you could be in two places at once! As it was, the prospect of bushland, lookouts, vineyards and, yes, food won out. And there was even enough sunlight around for the cricket to finish and the bushwalk to be had.
The Hills commence pretty much to the east of the city and rise up into suburban crescents and lanes until national park and reserve takes over. Over the other side, the bush dissipates into farmland and wine growing terroir. And a German theme park. Okay, so Hahndorf isn’t quite a theme park but there are plenty of oompah loompahs and sausages leading it that way. It’s actually a rather pretty little spot, a place built and cultivated by a close knit German community in the 1800s and now
evolved into beer halls and sweet shops and hiding places for former dictators (possibly). If you stayed here a week you would, without question, leave with an extra twenty kilos and clogged arteries. While the German platter of sausages, pork, mash, pretzels and goodness knows what else was a sight to behold, I was rather pleased with my salted pork belly, creamy mash and onion relish, washed down with a fine wheat beer.
The only dampener was the oompah loompah music incessantly playing so that it was stuck in your head for the rest of the day. The other dampener, by now, was the weather, which was busy giving Adelaide its wettest day of the year and more than its average December rainfall in a few hours. Thank goodness we mopped up that Aussie tail pretty quickly! There were, in between lightning bolts, a few breaks in the rain, time enough to fill a couple of hours back on the coast near the airport. 
Here again were more rather fine beaches and a laid back, unhurried vibe, strips of low rise suburbia punctuated by a surf club or cafe or ice cream shop once in a while, and the Adelaide love for jetties continued. On most days of the year it is probably rather sedate and lovely. Today its skies as least were was a little more dramatic.
Since that bumpy ride through the clouds took me back to Canberra and mercifully a return to solid ground, the rains have been almost unprecedented. South Australia, Victoria and large parts of New South Wales were, at times, underwater. Travelling into work on Thursday morning was slightly dodgy, a usually dry trickle of a creek swollen and up to the road. Further down the road, the town of Queanbeyan was turning into a murky lagoon, washing its trees and dirt and rocks down river and into Lake Burley Griffin. Now we seem to be drying out, the sun is back and the garden is even more like a jungle. No doubt we’re into the customary settled spell of weather which will break just before the Christmas holidays. Until then, let the mangoes and BBQs reign!
It has heat. I know about that. But this was proper summer heat like it should be this time of year everywhere else. The mercury hit 38.2 late in the afternoon on Saturday, a nice proper dry heat coming in from the desert, none of this stupid humid stuff. A good day to hit the beaches, which were really quite surprisingly nice.... wonderful beachside suburbs all laid back and full of happy people living life with a little entertainment thrown in thanks to cafes and bars and random shops. Glenelg is the undoubted queen of beachside suburbia, with its white sand, calm, shallow water, jetty and backdrop of fine eateries and cold beer handily available, linked to the city by the semi-famous tram ride.The sand continues to the south and onwards to the Fleurieu Peninsula, the suburbs becoming rolling wine country and small unhappening towns and villages. Golden hills reminiscent of California are cut by twisting ribbons of road and silvery white gums, an almost time warp hallucination leading you around the next bend and the rather fine Shiraz producing vines of McLaren Vale.
By now things are hotting up and the best plan is to go for some air conditioned comfort and brief afternoon snoozes with the calming backdrop of English willow on Kookaburra ball on the TV. Still decidedly toasty as the evening emerges, Glenelg itself a hotbed of people and noise and tastes and smells, plenty of walks along the beach and dips in the sun as the sun dips. Saturday night here was far from dull, the full spectrum of life on display from toddlers splashing in the fountains, kids plunging off the pier, teens being like totally lame, young romantics and old charmers, lobster red Scots, ten kid families getting that first slightly bracing touch of the sea on their toes. This is a good place to be at this time on this day.
The Adelaide Oval was a rather good place to be all weekend really, including up until the tea interval on Sunday. Another balmy day for the Australian bowlers to toil, milestones overhauled at regular intervals and, just before tea and a huge thunderclap signalled the end of the day, a double century to salute. The ground itself was rather nice, one of the few remaining in international cricket with a grassy bank for the fans to stand, to roll out picnic blankets
and foldaway chairs, to eat chicken rolls and drink copious amounts of overpriced but underwhelming beer on sale (for some reason the insipid XXXX Gold rather than the more excellent Adelaide brew from the Coopers Alehouse). I suppose you can’t have it all.
The next morning dawned with blue skies returning and the local beachside was again hard to resist for breakfast, the love of England clearly all around in Brighton and Hove, just south of Glenelg. Not really at all like the English Brighton and Hove thankfully... no pebbles, no tacky amusements, no men parading in budgie smugglers. Adelaide is far too respectable for anything like that.
Today was town day, a chance to explore the city centre of Adelaide itself. It’s a fairly modest city, the skyline less distinctive than the Sydneys or Melbournes of this world, the streets dotted with 1800s civic pride in between 1970s beige blocks. One of the more remarkable things about the city is it’s positioning which is effectively as an island in the middle of a sea of parkland. Some of this parkland is rough and ready, others green and refined, like the Botanic Gardens and strip of fountains dotting the Torrens River. Occasional wafts of celebration blowing downwind from the Adelaide Oval.
Again warm, solace was provided in the air conditioning of the Art Gallery but the art of beer and cricket was more on my mind. If you can find them, it seems as though Adelaide has some decent, traditional looking pubs. Alas some ludicrous decision not to be airing the cricket during the afternoon in South Australia meant the much needed cold beer and cricket in the pub scenario was delayed. Instead it was a snooze back in the motel as the commentary drawled its way forever onwards on the radio.
Luckily the last session of the day was on TV, so off to the pub in Glenelg it was. Cold beer ordered, stool beside one of the trillion TV screens, all set. For the heavens to open. Meh. Somehow Glenelg avoided all the storms around, so instead of watching cricket the other amiable option was to sit on the balcony watching the world go by. The cricket did resume, then annoyingly cut to the news while still playing (yeah, they do that as well) so a prized Aussie wicket of the useless vice captain was missed. In Glenelg, the day ended – still grey, still threatening, still quite muggy, but still dry – with fish and chips on the beach.
The last day, of Adelaide and the test match, started with a dilemma – pay and go the test with the risk of an early finish and / or rain, or go for a jaunt in the Adelaide Hills and eat lots of food. Sometimes you just wish you could be in two places at once! As it was, the prospect of bushland, lookouts, vineyards and, yes, food won out. And there was even enough sunlight around for the cricket to finish and the bushwalk to be had.
The Hills commence pretty much to the east of the city and rise up into suburban crescents and lanes until national park and reserve takes over. Over the other side, the bush dissipates into farmland and wine growing terroir. And a German theme park. Okay, so Hahndorf isn’t quite a theme park but there are plenty of oompah loompahs and sausages leading it that way. It’s actually a rather pretty little spot, a place built and cultivated by a close knit German community in the 1800s and now
evolved into beer halls and sweet shops and hiding places for former dictators (possibly). If you stayed here a week you would, without question, leave with an extra twenty kilos and clogged arteries. While the German platter of sausages, pork, mash, pretzels and goodness knows what else was a sight to behold, I was rather pleased with my salted pork belly, creamy mash and onion relish, washed down with a fine wheat beer.
The only dampener was the oompah loompah music incessantly playing so that it was stuck in your head for the rest of the day. The other dampener, by now, was the weather, which was busy giving Adelaide its wettest day of the year and more than its average December rainfall in a few hours. Thank goodness we mopped up that Aussie tail pretty quickly! There were, in between lightning bolts, a few breaks in the rain, time enough to fill a couple of hours back on the coast near the airport. 
Here again were more rather fine beaches and a laid back, unhurried vibe, strips of low rise suburbia punctuated by a surf club or cafe or ice cream shop once in a while, and the Adelaide love for jetties continued. On most days of the year it is probably rather sedate and lovely. Today its skies as least were was a little more dramatic.
Since that bumpy ride through the clouds took me back to Canberra and mercifully a return to solid ground, the rains have been almost unprecedented. South Australia, Victoria and large parts of New South Wales were, at times, underwater. Travelling into work on Thursday morning was slightly dodgy, a usually dry trickle of a creek swollen and up to the road. Further down the road, the town of Queanbeyan was turning into a murky lagoon, washing its trees and dirt and rocks down river and into Lake Burley Griffin. Now we seem to be drying out, the sun is back and the garden is even more like a jungle. No doubt we’re into the customary settled spell of weather which will break just before the Christmas holidays. Until then, let the mangoes and BBQs reign!
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