About Adders

Oh look how pretty life is from the air.

Especially when you have a polariser on the lens and you get this fun effect as you fly over the first piece of Australia....

Returning to Adelaide is always tough, after spending about 13 of the last 20 years away from the city I grew up in, you come back feeling oddly like a person who knows where everything is but a little lost at the same time. Friends move on, grow upwards, outwards and inwards. They grow families, lose families. Buy houses, businesses and can also lose them too. But the city itself always feels close to me. That said, I now feel like I am not part of it at all. Strange. A lot of time is reflecting, with family and friends if I get the time, although there are always many I miss out on seeing just because of time and logisitcs constraints.

One of the funniest things is that I do end up doing many of the same things as the last visit, the visit before and those that will come in the future as well. Like......

Visiting the central markets, one of my real loves in the world.

Even though I don't eat a lot of meat, eating well hung steaks from Barossa Fine Foods is a good way to make you feel totally Oz, and a little blokey.

We even got a summer storm.

 

Of course I spent plenty of time at Seacliff Beach.

I am loving how the sand dunes are replenishing so well.

And a beer or two at the Seacliff is normally in order. The local with the view.

Seems everyone was flying south....

Port and the Barossa

What is there to do at Port Adelaide other than shop at a dodgy second hand market (which I like doing by the way). Well you can always head to the lighthouse. No, I don't mean the actual nautical steel investment, although of course you could do that. I mean The Lighthouse Hotel. Forgive the rather sad website, as it is a great little place to have a bite to eat, well priced and good food. However the best thing is the beer. They brew their own and there are at least 6 on tap. I had a sampler when there which included:

Front to back: Honey Wheat beer, House Cider, Lighthouse Gingerbeer, Tusker Draft Rootbeer and the Archie dark ale

It was a nice thing to do in the middle of a beautiful sun shining day. So after that we went to the Brickworks markets, a place that when I was a child I enjoyed. Now, however, it is a slowly dying indictment of what has happened to many things that we more community oriented before people flocked to Shopping centres to buy things they really don't need and eat food they really shouldn't. It really is a shame, I hope someone takes control of it and really makes it into something great.

Instead of hanging around, we jumped back into the car to head to Brighton's Jetty Road strip where we grabbed a coffee and cake before a stroll on the jetty.

Some of us had too much fun eating.

And then put our feet up.

While I sipped my coffee

and ate my choc-mint hedgehog

Kerrin had an orange sponge cakey thing

On the jetty we could measure fish..... had anyone caught any of course.

Marty was just squinting instead

Some shared chips by the sea

The shark chopper was on patrol

As were seagulls looking for chips

Little Mali was more busy trying to look cute

Or at least sing a song.

The next day we jumped in with the sister and partner to hit the Barossa Valley. One of the fun places around Adelaide to taste wine.

Here we were surrounded by classic Australia

Even tin sheds to make it more classic, just needs a kelpie

Of course, pubs are classically Australian too.

There are many things to reflect on..... even tiles

I find it Australian that the museum looks like a pub

The Barossa is a great little day trip or even for the bigger drinker, a longer stay. It has around 170 wine companies and over 75 cellar doors that are open mostly 7 days a week. We only visited a few in probably one of the "most famous" brands Penfolds (where I recommend most things red that you can't sample with the exception of the Cellar Reserve Sangiovese), Rockfords (I recommend the Alicante Bouchet or Basket Press), Kellermeister (I recommend the Boots Cider and the 2008 Wicked Witch), and Kies (where I recommend the water and conversation with the lovely lady in the cellar door).

Somewhere I try to get to when in the Barossa is Rockford's Winery

To sample what they have lying about

And if the boss is happy, I can buy some :)

After lunch we moved onto the more serious side of things, Penfolds

Except not everyone seems to think I am serious.....

Robert Louis Stevenson once said "Wine is bottled poetry", which I could agree with as long as people think that poetry shouldn't be left to people in black skivvies sitting in a smoke filled room or drug induced haze telling others that they just "don't get it". Then again many wine snobs are a little like that.

Where as I prefer the words of Aristophanes which probably are most apt at the end of my blog post, where as he said

“Quickly, bring me a beaker of wine, so that I may wet my mind and say something clever.” 

Alas, I have not wet my mind before this. Sorry reader.