Exploring South Australia's Capital, the city of Adelaide

I've quite enjoyed my time in Adelaide! It's been nice to spend some time in a proper city again, and it's very similar to Sydney, without, of course, the Opera House, and it's a bit more quiet. Here's what I've been up to!
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Thursday 10th - Christina and the Chocolate Factory

I got up about 11am on Thursday to compensate for my late night, and had noodles for breakfast as it was the only food we had left. Who says I won't fit right in at uni?! I went on the internet for a bit and then we set off (late) for our 2pm free tour of Haigh's Chocolate Factory! I wanted to get the bus because it was a 25 min walk away and we didn't really know where it was, but the others (Claire, Jenny, Becky and Paula) insisted that we should walk so we could take in the sights of Adelaide along the way, which was fair enough. It turned out to be further than we anticipated so we ended up power-walking the whole way, and made it just in time as the tour before us was running late. The guide told us all about the Haigh family (all 4 generations of them with a fifth in training) and how they make their chocolate. It's quite an unheard-of brand as they only have 11 outlets - 6 in Adelaide, 5 in Melbourne, and are opening a twelfth in Sydney in May. And they only have the one factory.

During our tour the guide gave us some crushed cocoa beans to taste, to show what chocolate starts out tasting like. It tasted like solid coffee - not too appealing really! Then she took us to the viewing area where I expected to see an array of Uumpa-Lumpas decorating and wrapping and mixing, but unfortunately they were just your ordinary factory workers, and they were cleaning up for the end of their shift as our tour was running late. We still got to see a couple of ladies decorating some bars that were going along a conveyor belt and some chocolate being turned about in a giant cement-mixer type of contraption, which apparently was polishing it.

Then we got some free samples - a mandarin cream and four apricot chocolates, and we browsed round the gift shop. I bought a postcard and a couple of chocolate frogs as did Claire, and Becky bought an Easter Bilby. See, in Australia, they have a weird hatred of rabbits, as some early settler brought them over from Europe and released them into the wild for hunting purposes. Next thing he knew they'd multiplied profusely, creating competition for native creatures' food sources and subsequently causing many native species to become extinct or endangered, including the bilby (which is a small rodent with rabbitesque ears). Now the country is absolutely ridden with rabbits. So for Easter they decided to shun the well-loved Easter Bunny and promote the 'Easter Bilby' instead. Bizaare.

We walked back through the park and through Central Market to do some food shopping, and then came back to update my blog on the goings on in the past week (which I'm sure you'll all have read!). In the evening we walked down to the main shopping streets to find somewhere to eat, and ended up settling at the first pizzeria we could find since we were so hungry! The chef looked a bit dodgy, but the pizza me and Claire shared was delicious, the first bit of proper food we've had in ages! After that it was early to bed as I was so tired from the night before.
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Friday 11th - Catching the Tram to Glenelg

We spent most of this morning on hold to Oz Experience, trying to book our buses from here to Sydney (we organised the rest of our time last night, fitting in quality time on the Great Ocean Road, Melbourne and the Snowy Mountains, with about 4 full days left in Sydney before we leave, and we worked out that including today we only have 24 days left in Australia! Sob!). Eventually we asked the tour desk at the hostel to ring them, who was saying that the sooner Adventure Tours take over Oz Experience the better. Personally, I don't agree. But whatever.

At around dinnertime we made a packed lunch and caught the tram through the southern suburbs of Adelaide to the seaside village of Glenelg. Rolling down the main street, it reminded me a lot of Byron Bay, but once at the end of the line, which was on the front, it looked more like a British seaside town, much like what you would find in South Wales or Devon and Cornwall. I loved it. We walked to the end of the pier where a couple of people were fishing, and spotted a stingray and a giant crab. Then we ate our sandwiches under the shade of a large pine tree (I have never before seen a beach lined with oversized Christmas Trees!) and hit the beach straight after. The sea was gorgeous! There was absolutely no surf, so we were wondering whether we'd been jipped and it was actually a lake, and the water was crystal-clear, just like in a swimming pool. You would have to taste it to know it was sea-water. Despite it being quite cold I had a bit of a relax and a swim, then lay on the sand for a while to dry off and read my book (Dan Brown's Deception Point - becoming hooked on the Dan Brown now!).

The tide actually came in surprisingly quickly, so after a half hour or so we met up with Becky and Jenny and had a stroll down the main street to check out the shops. We found one of the six Haigh's Chocolate Shops, excluding the factory gift shop, in which I bought some creams to replace the chocolate frogs I'd already scoffed! We got a Boost too, who are now running a competition where if your straw turns pink you get a free one - Claire won one yesterday so she claimed her free one - and Becky won one now! Surely my time will come! Then we found the best shop I've seen yet - apart from Australia, The Gift. It was called The Lolly Shop, and sold loads of imported British and American products, mostly condiments (including Branston Pickle and Marmite), snacks (eg. Walkers Crisps, Twiglets and Monster Munch) and confectionary (like Rowntrees and Cadburys Double Deckers). I bought some Monster Munch, Fruit Pastilles and an American Peanut Butter chocolate bar (which turned out to be very tasty) just for the shear novelty of it. Becky bought two jars of marmite too, as she can't be doing with Australia's 'imitation' Vegemite. Personally I don't mind either.

We got the tram back to the hostel in time for the Adventure Tours bus to arrive, and the idiot driver didn't have my hiking boots. He said that he couldn't find them, and when I said that I'd spoken to the hostel in Parachilna and they said that they'd found them and were going to hand them over he said "Well they didn't" and just walked off. The nobhead. Turned out he'd bare-faced lied to me cos when I rang the hostel to find out what the hell had gone on, they said they'd handed them over and the driver rang the next day en-route to Adelaide to say he'd forgotten them. Git. So after much debating of my options, ie. whether or not to wait in Adelaide for another 3 days and have them sent down on the next southbound bus, or have them sent by post to wherever we're staying in Melbourne (but I'd need them in between anyway), I just thought "Whatever, I'll buy some more tomorrow and put them on my credit card". Cos quite frankly I can't be bothered with the hassle.

After tea I felt much better about having resolved my problem, even if it did mean that I'd spent $100 on shoes I'd only worn twice! We walked over to Central Market again cos it was open until 9pm, but it was mostly a food market with fish, cheese, fruit, meats etc. So we just came back at 9 and had an early night again! All very boring really!
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Saturday 12th - Boot Hunting and Sight Seeing!

This morning we set out to Adelaide's main shopping streets - Rundle Mall and Rundle Street on the hunt for some new, reasonably-priced hiking boots for me. After sifting through every camping shop and turning our noses up at the extortion we found one pair of boots that were exactly like mine, which was lucky since they were on sale when I first bought them. Unfortunately they were a tad too small, so we abandoned the enterprise for the time being to retire to Adelaide's North Terrace, the 'cultural' street where all the museums, libraries and art galleries dwell. We investigated the South Australian Museum, which had a pretty cool display of animals and exhibition of Pacific Cultures. Then we moved on to the Botanic Gardens, where they seemed to have some sort of live music festival going on, so we sat and ate our packed lunch in the shade of a nice tree with the groove in the background, amused by the pigeon with the mohican that kept pacing in front of us. We got up and left as soon as that grey/yellow pesky species of bird (that we've now nick-named 'The Rat with Wings') turned up.

On the way back we nipped into Trim's, which is a camping and outdoor Army Stores type of shop, and is ironically about 5 mins walk from our hostel. We could've gone there first today instead of trapsing all the way around Adelaide, but hey. They had some boots in there the same style as Claire's, for only $60 (about 25 quid). So I bought them hastily, probably mostly out of relief and shear exasperation! But I am relieved now. It's bugged me that I've had to fork out about 60 quid in total for shoes, but I'll need them for the Grampians and the Snowy Mountains really, cos my trainers are far too flimsy. And I'll be able to use them at home whilst walking the pooches (which Ma and Pa will probably argue as a rare occasion!) instead of getting my trainers caked in mud. And I'll be able to take them to America, and round Europe when we do our European tour. So there you go. So long as I don't leave them anywhere else!
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What next?

So there's my time in Adelaide! Whatever next? Well tomorrow we're back on the good old Adventure Tours bus (snide groan) and we'll be spending tomorrow night in the town of Halls Gap, in the Grampian Mountains. Not sure what we'll be doing regarding walks, hikes and sightseeing, but I'm sure that as Adventure Tours go we won't have much freedom! The brochure says we'll be spending the afternoon hiking at Hollow Mountain and Mackenzie Falls, with sunset at Reeds Lookout. Should be ok really. On Monday we move on to Princetown, where we hike the Pinnacle in the morning then enjoy the views of the Great Ocean Road. We get off at Lorne in between Princetown and Melbourne (cos we're priviledged Oz Exp customers!), to spend some quality time on the Great Ocean Road, and it's a little seaside village too so it should be cool. Then on Friday we head to Melbourne. I'll keep you posted along the way anyway!

That's all for now, take care everyone and I'll try and post as often as I can between here and Melbourne to keep the reading lengths down!

PS. In other news, we saw that silly cow Kitten, from Big Brother 5, whilst walking back from Trim's today. It was either her or her twin sister. Mind you, Australia would be a good place for her to hide out since no one knows who she is! Silly cow.