Our WA Trip - Part Ten - Back in Adelaide

When we were actually IN Adelaide at the end of January I wrote a bit in the blog about our adventures. I mean really, it was more of a rant than anything. But I've finally reached the point in recounting our WA adventures where we've made it back to Adelaide, and I can wrap up the story. And about time, too! I'm getting a wee bit sick of sitting at the computer.

So... I'd last left off with Jen and I going to sleep on the train on the Monday night, secure in the knowledge that we'd be arriving in Adelaide early Tuesday morning. Well, Tuesday sure started bright and early - 6am in fact - with the train staff switching on the lights in the carriages and playing this really annoying, overly cheerful music. Yuck. So we grumpily got up, packed all our stuff, ate our breakfast (including the rest of our fruit, since we couldn't take it cross the border, i.e., off the train), and settled in to watch the last of the scenery flow by. This train ride really was much easier and somehow smoother than our outbound trip, but we were still looking forward to getting off.

Unfortunately, as we were passing through the outskirts of Adelaide, our train struck and killed someone who was crossing the tracks illegally. We didn't feel anything - the train just came to a rather abrupt halt on the tracks, blocking a road (which I thought was strange). Then when the announcement came over the PA that there had been an "unfortunate incident" and that the train had to hold where it was until the "police and ambulance arrived", Jen turned to me and said "They shouldn't lie. They're not waiting for an ambulance, they're waiting for the coroner." Jen worked the VIA trains for a year before going to teachers' college, so she had a pretty good idea what was likely happening. In the end the train was delayed for two hours and we didn't pull into the station until almost 10am. Which wasn't so bad for us, since we were getting off, but all the folks who were going through to Sydney lost their ability to tour Adelaide, as the train was now well behind schedule. Yikes.

And after all that, when we finally made it to the hostel, it was still a little too early for us to be able to check in and put our gear in our room. So we left it in the lobby like we did last time and headed off to the central markets to check them out. (We have a bit of a thing for markets.) The markets in Adelaide are small compared to some of the others we've visited, but they kept us entertained for a couple of hours. The markets back on to Adelaide's Chinatown, and we ended up in a teeny little hole-in-the wall Chinese restaurant for lunch. So like Toronto! It was great. Then it was back to the hostel with a load of groceries.

The train trip had tired us out (again), so we took turns napping and taking showers, and headed out to do some more exploring in the late afternoon. We wandered back to the downtown to visit the Art Gallery of South Australia, yet another excellent - and free - institution. We loved this gallery! Many of the paintings had informative blurbs beside them to explain something about the artist's past, or why the painting was historically significant. The security guard at the gallery was really funny (well, either that or really bored)... he kept coming up to us and telling us that he'd painted the piece we were currently looking at. Or he'd offer his opinion on the art, which wasn't all that flattering. We laughed at his description of some of the post-modern stuff, you know, the kind of art that Jen and I both "don't get"... well, the security guy shared our opinion too - and loudly!

The art gallery closed at 5 and we ran out of time to see it all - again. But we didn't want to head back to the hostel quite yet so we decided to try and follow the walking tour of downtown Adelaide as described in Lonely Planet. Well, we got a little bit lost. (I'd blame jet lag from our traveling but I don't think it works that way when you're on a train.) Anyhow, we ended up wandering through the downtown core, along the river, and through a portion of the Botanical Gardens before we got so turned around we decided to strike out for a main road and find our way back to the hostel. As we wandered down Rundle Street, we noticed a few oddities. First off, there was all this money embedded in the sidewalk, all down the street. Strange. And then we passed the Scout Shop. I saw the sign first, and figured it'd be like our Scout and Guide shops at home, where they sell uniforms, some basic camping gear, etc. NOT SO MUCH! This Scout Shop would've given MEC a run for its money - and all the proceeds from the store go to support Scouting in South Australia. What a fabulous idea! Why aren't we doing this in Canada??

The rest of the evening was spent at the hostel. Since we'd eaten out for lunch, we cooked our dinner at the hostel and ate in the common room. A whole bunch of folks were watching a fairly violent movie on the TV, in which there was a lot of swearing and blood and everyone died. Fun. And then we basically crawled off to bed!

The next morning, we'd promised ourselves we were going to spend the morning at Glenelg, where the beach is. And that was the Day Of No Waves. But I've already ranted about that whole experience earlier in the blog, so I'm not going to repeat it here. We basically spent the entire day in Glenelg, although we did head back to the hostel for lunch and a shower so we wouldn't be all crusty after our swim in the un-wavy water.

The afternoon's activities were pretty cool. We visited the Rodney Fox Shark Experience and learned more about shark attacks in Australia than I think was strictly necessary. Rodney Fox got into the Australian history books after surviving a great white attack back in the 1970's. The photos of his injuries are pretty horrific. After he'd recovered, Rodney became fascinated by sharks and spent the rest of his life researching them and advocating for them. I didn't learn much new information, but the exhibits were great.

We also visited the Bay Discovery Centre, which has displays all about the local history. We were there right before closing so we didn't get to go through it all. However the tour guide/host really stole all our attention... he was creepy! He seemed friendly enough at first, but then quickly went off into this big long rant about how important it was to know our history, and what the significance of Confederation was, and on and on and on. When he discovered that we were Canadian, his remark was "Oh. I had some of your type in here earlier. They couldn't speak English either." Now he might have been just trying to "take the piss out of us" (as the local saying goes), but still. I thought he was quite rude. Jen's also convinced he was trying to make advances on me, although I was completely oblivious to this at the time. (And I'm glad - the man was well into his 70's! EEEEW!)

Jen and I were supposed to meet a local Guider and some of her girls that evening, but unfortunately she had to cancel at the last moment due to a family emergency. So instead we enjoyed a leisurely dinner at a gourmet burger bar, where we ate far too much. We took the tram back into the city and got off several stops further than was strictly necessary, so we could walk off some of our dinner before heading back to the hostel. And that was our second day in Adelaide!

Thursday the 24th was the last full 'touring' day of our trip. We started it off in grand style by sleeping in, until all the other girls sharing our dorm room had headed out for the day. Jen and I both still had some souvenir shopping we wanted to get done, so we headed back downtown to finish that off before heading to the local Aboriginal Cultural Centre around 11:30. What a wonderful place. We watched a 45-minute film on the 5 seasons that the Aborigines of North Queensland recognize, and enjoyed a digeridoo performance as well. The artist who played the digeridoo for us was great. He used the instrument to make the sounds of a variety of animals, like kangaroos and dingoes. But he also made up a song about hitch-hiking and did a great impersonation of an Indy 500 car racing down the track! Ha ha! And yes, I finally broke down and bought a horribly stereotypical Aussie souvenir - a boomerang! But it's a real returning boomerang. AND it's left-handed! How could I resist?

The rest of the day really was pretty lazy. Neither Jen nor I wanted to spend more money, or go back to the beach (it wasn't quite warm enough), so we ended up wandering back through the Botanical Gardens, across the river to North Adelaide, past the cricket grounds (the big test match between India and Australia was going on, so the cricket grounds were PACKED), and back through the far side of downtown. We enjoyed a delicious dinner at a teeny little sushi restaurant. We found yet another internet cafe and spent some time catching up with the world, and then it was time to head back to the hostel.

The funniest part of the day was when we got back to our room! One of our other room-mates was already there, reading a book on her bed. We chatted with her for a while and discovered that she was from Sydney and traveling around the country. Jen and I still had cricket on the brain, since we'd passed the cricket oval, so we asked Sally (our room-mate) to explain cricket for us. It's such a complicated game! At first, I don't think she thought we were serious. But as it became more and more apparent how little we understood of the game, she rose to the challenge. Turns out that she too is a teacher, and it showed - she ended up drawing a diagram on the floor of our room, using a pillow for the mound and two thongs (flip flops, not underwear) to represent the batters. It was great! And Jen and I came away understanding at least SOME things about this mysterious game! We're going to have to kidnap one of our Aussie friends and drag them off to a game and get them to explain what's going on blow-by-blow, I think.

And that brings us to the end of our WA adventures! We caught the train back to Melbourne early the next morning. The Overland was a pleasure to ride after all the days on the Indian Pacific, and somehow the 10-hour ride passed quickly. It felt SO GOOD to be home - to know the transit system, to know where the good pizza was, and above all, to sleep in our own beds!

Ever since we returned, I've been basically chained to my computer, typing up these ridiculously long blogs, catching up on a ton of email and reading, and trying to figure out what the heck I'm gonna do this summer. It'll be nice to take a break from all that tomorrow and go out and get some fresh air!