The Beachcomber

Time is about to be called on Big Trip 2015. We're at our final destination and have just a few days left of our travels to enjoy. We spent the Easter Bank Holiday weekend in Adelaide. It felt a little strange being back in a city, with traffic and people and shopping centres, but we managed to escape to see the sea on Good Friday - the sun shone on the first of the bank holidays as we joined an exodus from the city on the tram down to Glenelg. Blue skies, clear water, sunshine and ice creams followed by fish and chips back in the city with friends of friends... Just what bank holidays were made for!

We also had time to explore a couple of museums and galleries - the South Australian Museum had an interesting exhibit with Antarctic connections which Jon got lost in for a while and I enjoyed the exhibits on indigenous arts and crafts as well. We found a Bradman exhibit at the State Library as well as a display of WW1 photos. I found an odd but definitely fascinating exhibition on knitting - yarn bombing as graffiti for women seemed to be the general theme. The Wine Experience was an interesting diversion too... I managed to create (virtually at least) a silver medal winning Riesling! Adelaide also has quite a few Victorian markets and shopping arcades which I enjoyed exploring - not much shopping done though, although Jon did pick up a very cheap England Cricket World Cup souvenir!

We enjoyed walking and parkrunning along the Torrens River and exploring Adelaide's many parks and gardens - there was time amongst the showers on Easter Saturday to visit the Botanic Gardens and find just one more rose garden.

Instead of Easter Eggs on Easter Sunday, we joined over 46,000 people at the Adelaide Oval for the "footie" - the opening weekend of the Australian Rules Football season. Home team, the Adelaide Crows with their motto of "we rise as one" thrashed North Melbourne and I was generally confused! It was an entertaining spectacle and we enjoyed being allowed to walk on the pitch at the end of the match - dodging impromptu games of footie to grab a selfie!

Like many a bank holiday in the UK, Easter Monday was a wash out... probably the first day of our trip where the weather really did go against us! There were gale force winds and rain most of the day. We dodged the showers as best we could and even jumped in a few puddles! The photo shows a famous Adelaide landmark - the mirror spheres sculpture on Rundle Mall. Generally, you get lots of people trying to take pictures of themselves, but I thought it looked pretty good in the rain too, with the reflections in the puddles instead.

So rain almost stopped play but not quite and the autumnal feel to the weather followed us to our final destination, at least for the first couple of days we were here. We decided to spend our last week in Victor Harbor, on the southern coast of Australia, just a couple of hours from Adelaide and in an area called Encounter Bay. We like being by the sea - a reminder for both of us of childhood holidays - and it's definitely not something we get to enjoy all that often when we're at home. Walking on the beach has to be one of my favourite holiday pastimes. The beach is just a minute from our little studio apartment and we can catch a glimpse of the Southern Ocean from the front door. We might even spot a dolphin or two, although we are a bit too early for the Southern Right Whales who swim through here from May to August.

We did arrive in time to join the locals for a celebration of the "encounter" between explorers Matthew Flinders and Nicholas Baudin in 1802 - flags were raised, anthems were played, speeches were made and the town crier got involved too. The ceremony was quite entertaining, despite an ill-timed rain shower, and it was interesting to learn a little bit of local history.

We've also been able to catch up with our old friends, the Little Blue Penguins, as there is another colony here, out on Granite Island (bottom right picture in the collage above). We visited the rescue centre and watched the 9 current residents catching fish for their tea. In a strange coincidence, one of the centre volunteers is actually from Chorley, which is my mum's home town. We worked out she was  a Lancashire exile by her pronunciation of "burrows"! I really do never get tired of watching these cute little creatures.

In between walks on the beach, we've been sampling the local produce and the Two Bees cafe in Victor Harbor wins the "best cakes" award from our trip. The combination of Australian, Belgian, Ukrainian and French cake making experience of the cafe owners make for some very impressive patisserie. Jon had the cherry ripe delight (on the right) and I had the white chocolate cookies and cream. We aiming for at least one more visit before we come home!

There has also been time and opportunity to conclude our mini golf challenge. The ocean-themed course in Victor Harbor, which fortunately for me didn't have too many water features to lose my ball in, provided a tense final round, close all the way and only two shots in it going up the final hole. Jon putted out first with a 2, meaning I had 3 shots for the win and 4 for the draw. My nerve held and I holed out in 2 for a round of 48! I think Jon accepted defeat graciously. After some negotiations, Jon has declared himself indoor champion (one victory out of one in Queenstown), the NZ's Outdoor Championship title has been shared (three wins each) and I'm the Australian champion. I think the battle may continue once we are home.

In our remaining few days, we've got one more opportunity for parkrun tourism - the start of Victor Harbor parkrun is a 10 minute walk from our apartment and is an out and back course by the sea. The post run cafe also does an all day breakfast, so Jon is particularly happy about that. Apart from that, I'm looking forward to another visit to the Two Bees cafe and we might venture a little bit further afield on Monday, taking a train over to Goolwa and the mouth of the Murray River. 

We're nearly done. But not quite yet.

Happy travels

Liz T