110 – Adelaide

Just so we start off on the right foot here, and before I forget, I am adding Kat and Paul to the Shenagsters list. They may not want to be there, but since no one reads this, no one will know.

Since Kristin left early this morning to return to Brisbane, and I had no way to get around, this lovely couple drove into town, picked me up and spent the say showing me the sights.
The first being the wonderful stretch of beaches where there were so many doggos, I could have taken a years worth of daily doggo pictures.

I did not. I tried really hard to not be ‘that crazy dog lover’ because I just met these people and needed them to navigate this city. Also tried to not be a dog stalker, so I turned my camera away from a majority of the activity.

Turns out my dog crazy was shared by Kat and as we sat at a wonderful breakfast place near the beach, we both greeted the many dogs who came wandering by.
The dogs made the beach experience for me as they ran freely in and out of the waves, relaxing my soul and turning on the happy juice in the heart. I can honestly say I don’t remember much else about it, other than it was very long, apparently several beaches strung together. There were a lot of people – and dogs – everywhere, and for the first time I learned about shark watch planes.
Again, please don’t laugh at me, I am not a coastal dweller. I also do not watch Baywatch or any of those beach lifeguard shows.
I am aware sharks are a danger. I know they have lifeguards on beaches, but I did not know they have an air patrol that flies up and down the coast in small planes and helicopters for the express purpose of looking for sharks or other dangers.

Look at me learning all kinds of new obvious stuff. For you costal dwellers laughing at me, come visit Iowa and try cow tipping sometime. I’ll gladly take you out to the fields for the experience. Its a thing. For real.

The other thing I learned and was emphasized throughout the day is that Adelaide is an arts culture town. There are sculptures, murals, architectural interest points everywhere.
Whimsical, serious, head scratching… just everything.

After breakfast, Paul and Kat took me past the sports arena called the Adelaide Oval, where the Port Adelaide AFL team plays.

I had to ask too. AFL is like football, and rugby combined, yet entirely different in a similar way. I will sum up and say it is a sports arena where they play sports. Go sports!

But they have an arena walk, which is like a bridge walk… which are really big here. A bridge walk they put a harness on you and guide you to the top of the bridge so you can overlook the city. Sydney, Brisbane both have one. Here in Adelaide, they walk around the top of their stadium. They have day tours, night tours, event tours where you can watch part of the sport event from the top.

No, I did not do it. Maybe next visit. The next AFL game is tomorrow, so I am going to miss that too, but again… next time.

We were on our way to the Monteflore Hill, where Colonel William Light stood as Surveyor-General of the colony of South Australia and laid out his plan for the city of Adelaide.
Today, the city remains almost exactly as planned, and now his statue stands tall, overlooking the city, and his vision is memorialized in bronze.

As far as I could tell, if you follow the arrows, things are right where they should be. Don’t know if they are all the same buildings, but there were buildings that could be original buildings in those general directions.

It was here that the timing and the view was right to call Lucy and tell her I found Kat and made a new friend. We had a wonderful talk as we absorbed the beautiful view.
I praise Lucy over and over for being a person who relishes in community. In building bonds between people and encouraging travel and experiencing all kinds of cultures. She couldn’t be here to bring us together in person, but without her, I never would have made this stop; I never would have researched Kangaroo Island, and I never would have met Kat and Paul.

I also would probably still be sitting at home in my chair bemoaning my tired life instead of traveling. It was partly because of her determination to go to Greece last fall, and although I wanted to go, I could not because I had just had my hip replaced. But the lesson to me was life is short and you don’t know what the next day will bring. I can’t keep sitting around waiting for others to be ready anymore, because I’m at the age where things like hips stop working and mobility starts to be limited, and who knows what will follow.
This trip I have done a lot of amazing things, but I have also bemoaned the fact I did not do them when I was younger and more able. But I stopped myself with excuses and waited… and waited… and waited for others to have the time.
No more butts. I do not want to put post it notes on a wall next to pictures of animal butts, I want to stop stopping myself. And this trip did that, at least a little.
Lucy is on the Shenagsters list for giving me an unknowing kick in the pants and getting me out of my chair.

Our conversation had to end because her man brought her ice cream, and Kat thought ice cream was a wonderful idea. So we left the hill and moved deeper into town where I was told the best ice cream in the city was found here…

It was very good. I don’t think any of us had chocolate, but it was cold and refreshing.

I learned that Adelaide is the “City of Churches.” Perhaps, if I had not just spend months in SE Asia travelling temple to temple, I would be more enthused about that fact. I was not in a church mood, so we headed toward the shopping district, and along the way found art and architecture.

It is a walking mall, not unlike the Ped mall in Iowa City, but bigger and entirely more complex. I have learned repeatedly on this trip that the facade of a building isn’t for a store front and apartments above, it often is an entrance to an entire ‘arcade’ of stores, like this one.

This is the inside of the Adelaide Arcade. The foundation stone for the building was laid on 6 May 1885 and it took 5 months to build… which is amazing in my opinion. After that it only took 2 months to fill up with shops. After 3 months of getting the shops set up the whole place was completed and opened in December 1885.
In the original plans, the ground floor was retail space, and the first floor was a workroom for the shop below. So each space had a staircase inside in the back of the shop.

Perhaps because we have an elevator at home now, and husband and I went through great debates about how to label the buttons, I am hyper aware of the nuances of naming levels. For example, it is my nature to consider the floor closest to ground level as the ‘first floor,’ because that is where I enter first. The level below would be basement, and the level above would be second.
I am also comfortable referring to the ‘ground level’ floor as G for ground, but to me, the level above is second and the level below is basement. I only mention this because in the case of the arcade, we entered on the ground level (quite normal), but the level above is the first level… which makes perfect sense because it is the first level above the ground level… but it is simply not the way I think. And then we came upon an interesting site.
A staircase that leads (not to the basement) but to the underground level. Which is what a basement is… and none of this matters, I am just getting caught in the nuances in my head as I try to use their terminology to explain their building.

Anyhoo. When the arcade opened in 1885, they had underground tea rooms.

The wrought iron staircase led patrons underground where they would go to ‘take tea’ with cakes and sandwiches. The underground aspect provided an intimate, quiet setting away from the hustle of the Arcade, and there happened to be a natural spring in the basement conveniently providing water for making the tea.
Now the staircase is there, below that thick panel of glass, and a couple times per year they open up the staircase and the basement to have haunted tours and tea. I am unclear as to if the spring is still there or if city plumbing provides the water for tea.

Which brings me to a special piece of art out on the walking path which was a primary reason for coming to this area. You see, Adelaide has balls. Not kidding. A giant pair of balls proudly displayed in the middle of everything.

Not to far from a giant pigeon who is eyeing a garbage can surrounded by pigs… eating from the garbage can.

A rather surreal comment on modern society’s waste becoming a base of survival for other species of the world who can no longer rely on the natural environment to thrive.

Or something. I made that up, but as I pointed out before, there is a lot of art here, and although there is no obvious nor defined relationship between the pieces, they are all independently tied together in this web of Adelaide.
Which again, I never would have seen without Lucy doing her community building thing and putting Kat, Paul and I together.

Another must stop on this tour was to get free samples of the very best chocolate in Australia from the Haigh’s chocolate store.

Haigh’s Chocolates is an Australian family owned bean-to-bar chocolate making company based in Adelaide, South Australia. It was founded in May 1915 by Alfred E. Haigh, and now, like my husbands family business, is in the fourth generation of family ownership. It is also the oldest chocolatier in Australia.
They, as all candy and chocolatiers, were all stocked up for Easter, with bunnies, eggs, baskets and the special treats everyone wants to find as they run through their yards getting grass stains on their Easter best.
In this warehouse of religious chocolate relics, what did I buy?

Frogs. They make chocolate shaped frogs and I have no idea why, but out of the Easter season, they are apparently famous for them. Not sure if they will resemble frogs by the time I get them all the way back to Iowa, but they at the start of their lifespan with me, were indeed frogs.

Now that I am reflecting about the day and I am writing about the frogs, I am deeply curious… why not kangaroos? Or koalas? Or even some exotic fish that lives right off the shore. Perhaps exotic frogs live right off the shore, I have no idea and the internet is of little help, other than to say this shop is famous for making frogs, and the frogs are made from 100% Rainforest Alliance certified cocoa beans. They make more than 4 million frogs every year, and the larger ones are hand wrapped in foil. But that is all I know about the history of the chocolate frog. I am disappointed.

Since I was not interested in churches, and honestly my hip was bothering me so I did not want to do a deep dive into the botanical gardens, Paul and Kat humored me and we went to find one of Adelaide’s microbreweries. The one with the most intriguing name and nearby was The Little Bang Brewery, so off we went. I learned a couple of things here. First, when you go to a brewery and want to buy a six pack to take home, they are called “Take Away Tinnies.”

And as a side note, apparently America is the only place, or the only place in my journeys that calls it ‘carry out.’ That might even be a Midwest thing, I have no idea, but the rest of the world identifies the act of not eating or drinking in an establishment, but instead picking up the food and… taking it away from the establishment… as take away. Which makes perfect sense, perhaps even more sense than ‘carrying out.’

Symantec’s can be a bitch when you let them run around randomly in your head. Just saying.

The other thing I want to touch on is Adelaide is a lot more than beach and art, although art is coursing through the whole place. They have races. They have festivals including the Fringe festival that finished up just before I arrived.
Beer and BBQ festival; the Fringe Festival; Groovin the Moo autumn music festival;  WOMADelaide; Adelaide Cabaret festival; South Australian living arts festival; the Cellar door festival; and the plain old Adelaide festival which encompasses all kinds of art.
And there is supercar racing, horse racing, street car racing, bike racing… a lot of racing. And don’t forget the sports. Go Sports!
Although this is the smallest capital city in Australia, they have a lot going on here, but I have the impression from others Adelaide is often overlooked or put aside because they are not east coast – just like the states.

Being from Iowa, what is known to most of the country as a ‘fly over’ state because there is nothing to see on the ground, I get offended by the blatant narrowness of the east coast dwellers. My mom used to attend conferences when I was growing up, and one time she came home from Boston with a live lobster, (it was on ice in a box to transport home), for us to enjoy for dinner. She took out of the box and plopped it down on my father’s stomach when she got home because it was late at night, he was sound asleep, and she had to take the shuttle home instead of him giving her a ride.
That was not the story I intended to tell, but it was both terrifying when he started to scream and funny as heck upon reflection. Dad picked her up at the airport after that, and I was reminded of that story when I thought about mom going to conferences.
What I wanted to express is Mom came home from one of her conferences on the east coast, and mind you, they lived on the east coast for a while, so she was familiar with the culture. But at this conference, she was approached by the highly learned doctors from highly important schools of higher learning. Those institutions which are so openly open to all kinds of new ideas to be inclusive and not prejudice.
When they found out she was from Iowa – mind you this was in the late 1970’s, not 1800 – they became very sympathetic to her ‘plight’ of living with the ‘Indians’ and having to ‘fight off the cannibals.’ They wanted to know things like what kind of livestock her husband raised. What were hospitals like in the wilderness? What was it like to drive a horse and buggy?
Mom was presenting at this conference, she was not simply attending, and these highly learned people were attending her presentation. And they were serious with their ‘rural’ questions.
But that event shaped my opinions of cities, and costal dwellers. and even the ‘highly highest learned institutions of the coast.’ And I have spent a lifetime trying to break that down and reform my thinking.

Has not worked, but an effort is being made.

But here I am. Part of me walked into this city listening to the ‘coastal dweller’ opinion of ‘why would you want to visit there? And part of me had my full underdog stubborn on determined to love every minute of the experience to prove the little guys have a lot to offer.

Of course, neither were going to happen entirely and both were forced opinions instead of open minds, which presents me the realization that I have taken a huge detour into what perhaps is the point.
Going new places and talking to the locals, not the ‘foreigners’ about the great parts of their home is where the magic of travel is created. But the key is to realize you, as the traveler, has stepped outside your comfort zone and are probably trying to get back into it. Or at least I see that in myself, and when those feelings creep up. The criticize and compare feelings. That is when I know I am closing my mind and need to open it up and listen again.
Don’t always succeed, but recognizing the issue is the first step, so they tell me. Don’t know if I believe them.

Today, Kat and Paul invited me into their comfort zone and shared their unique, local opinions about the place they live. They love it here, and they expressed a magic about this ‘non east coast, too small big’ city that I did not, and could not, get from anyone else.
I did not know these people but Lucy did. I had a connection. A safety net here. Completely out of my comfort zone; in a city I had never been in and in a country I had only been in a few days, and those few days were spent with a trusted family member guiding me around like a puppy.

And it all worked out. Well, not all. I will not claim my mind was entirely open, but I will claim I was trying all day to get there.
In the spirit of Lucy, I started making connections in my head of others who would love it here because of how Kat and Paul expressed their city to me.
Starting with Lucy’s kids who love artistic expression. Who brew beer, and there is a lot of that here. Her husband who loves cars and racing, and just making connections with people. They all need to come here and visit Kat and Paul.

My list expanded to other people in my head and I started to form the connections… of community. Not because I have a lot of knowledge, but because I made a connection with people who do. I found reasons to return. Reasons to bring people into this experience. Not because it was on my list, because it was not until Lucy, but because of the people I connected with.

So, I guess my take away is when I feel safe, I do better at connecting with people. Duh.

But I also realized that when I get home, I need to look around and find what it is about Iowa that keeps me there. There is no doubt I am comfortable there, but I have been curious about what I would say or do to excite people about coming to Iowa. Comfort and excitement are very different things, even when they cross paths and present as one.

So, another great big shout out to Kat and Paul for sharing their piece of the world with me. For accepting my short notice arrival and for just being wonderful people to put up with me and all my oddities.
And always and forever to Lucy, the inspiration and connection that made today possible.
And to everyone who said to me (and there were several) ‘why would you go to Adelaide?’
Well, I had to go there to answer their question.