19th – 23rd April 2017
Wednesday 19th
Chilled out most of the day. Went for a great bike ride from our campsite along the bike path beside the Torrens River to the city and beyond to the weir, and back again. A very enjoyable ride, which will only get better when Adelaide finally finishes all its road works.
Thursday 20th
Cousin Terry and Greg have invited us to stay at their place a couple of days earlier than we’d planned so we can dog-sit for them tomorrow and Saturday. In the meantime we have much shopping to do – back to Central Markets and another enjoyable shopping experience.
We checked in at Terry and Greg’s and spent a lovely evening chatting.
Friday 21st
Busy day today. We ordered the meat for the next few weeks (to be cryovacced), then went to visit our friend Julie at West Beach. A good catch-up over a cuppa, then back to the tyre people to check the valve on one of the new tyres. Yes it does need replacing, no it can’t be done today – come back Monday! (Not happy).
Back to Terry and Greg’s and the big cook-up started! Because much of the next 3+ weeks travel will be fairly remote I’m preparing about half the meals and freezing them, the remainder will be either from the refrigerated cryovacced meats or ‘pantry’ meals (eg tinned tuna base, etc). Exhausted by the time Terry and Greg got home from work!
Saturday 22nd
A good, fun day today. Greg’s away on a work trip today so Terry, Steve and I went out for brunch at Semaphore. From their home we walked along the beach to the pier and to a delightful cafe where we enjoyed our meals. Terry filled us in on the sites and history as we went.
Interesting sculpture, which looks much more interesting and not creepy at all in person, and the Semaphore Tower in the background. The ball, which you’ll see at the base of the pole on top of the tower, used to to raised to the top and dropped at 1pm every day which could be seen by the ships in the harbour.
Back home Terry took us for a drive out to the Port (via Costco for a bit of shopping). Terry works for Defence who are building three new guided missile destroyers for the Navy. Nuship Hobart (it can’t be called HMAS Hobart yet because it hasn’t been commissioned) is nearly finished having already done a few trials and will be delivered in 6 weeks. Nuships Brisbane and Sydney are well on the way. They’re pretty impressive ships and look awfully mean – don’t attack Australia, you really don’t want to mess with these ships!
Terry, with her ship Nuship Hobart.
Sunday 23rd
Today we had a fabulous time in the Adelaide Hills with Terry and Greg as guides. First stop was the Stirling Markets. These are huge markets where we wandered aimlessly for a couple of hours and didn’t see more than half the stalls there – interesting stalls too with lots of local-made crafts, and food.
Autumn colours in Stirling in the Adelaide Hills. Terry and Denise
From here we travelled along the range to Mt Lofty Ranges Vineyard, then on to Pike and Joyce, and Andersons to sample their wares.
Doing a little wine tasting at Mt Lofty Ranges vineyard and restaurant.
The drive was beautiful, winding around the range and through the valleys, made all the more stunning by the trees covered in their autumn leaves. Each of these vineyards has panoramic views down across the vineyards where the leaves are yellowing. Lots of cherry, apple and stone fruit orchards up here too. A truly delightful place to visit.
Vineyards at Mount Lofty Ranges. Beautiful autumn colours.
Back at Terry and Greg’s for our last night we return to Largs Pier Hotel for dinner.
For more photos from our stay in Adelaide with Terry and Greg, CLICK HERE.