It’s all go while one is on holiday, and as we had a tour booked this morning, we had to get up reasonably early again. Being the worrier I am, I was up and showered before the alarm went off. Which meant that Robin was busy in the bathroom when the alarm started beeping. So I pushed this button, and that button, the sleep button, and the mute button on the bedside clock, and still the darn thing wouldn’t switch off. Robin strolled out, squeaky clean to start the day, to hear all the commotion as I related my problem. “That’s not the clock going”, he said, “it’s my phone”. Well, how was I to know that!
And look what happened when we switched the TV on in our room this morning, isn’t that a nice welcome!
The TV knows our names!
After breakfast at a local café we walked along to the pick-up stop for our Adelaide City Highlights tour, and were taken to the bus depot, where tourists were boarding the various buses to take them on one of the many tours on offer. We have done city tours before while on an overseas holiday, and they are a good way to give travellers a quick overview of the city.
That’s our bus for the morning
Adelaide is a beautiful city, full of parks and lovely stone buildings. Built of stone, we were told, because there wasn’t any suitable timber when the settlers arrived. Luckily there was an adequate supply of granite, marble, and sandstone nearby, as well as clay to make bricks. We were taken past government buildings and beautiful old family homes, numerous parks, through the Botanic Gardens, with a running commentary given every step of the way.
One of the lovely old homes
Our first stop on the tour was at St Peter’s Cathedral, built in 1877 of local stone in the French Gothic style. The striking Reredos, carved and coloured panels made of English Oak in 1910, are a magnificent feature as they are viewed down the length of the building.
St Peter’s Cathedral
Next stop on the tour was a visit to Haigh’s Chocolates – quite a well loved Adelaide family business, it seems. We were given a quick guided tour and it was explained how these hand crafted chocolates are made.
The home of Haigh’s Chocolates
With several free samples passed around to whet our appetites, our bus tour group was let loose in the shop, and by the look of it, most were buying up large. We have to admit that yes, we did but several items too. Well, you have to, don’t you?
That’s Robin in the middle paying for our chocolates.
The tour concluded as we went past several new new buildings being constructed down town before being dropped off. I don’t think our driver was terribly impressed with this particular building though. It’s known locally either as “the upside down pineapple” or “the cheese grater”. It’s certainly different!
London’s got their gherkin, and Adelaide’s got a cheese grater
And to finish off our second day in Adelaide, we braved the heavy rain and flashes of lightening and took ourselves off to Jamie’s Italian place for dinner.
Set in an old bank building, the place was humming, the staff attentive, and the food, as we expected, was delicious. What to have – that’s always the question. It was Pork Belly for him, and Prawn Linguine for her.
At Jamie’s Italian
We must go and check out the toilets, we were told. How often do you get that sort of recommendation? They were certainly interesting, set in the old bank vaults.
Conveniences behind bars
It was certainly a great finish to a wonderful day. And we will be on the go again tomorrow.
2 comments:
What a great way to see the city. We tend to do this type of thing overseas, but never here. Maybe we should. We've only visited Adelaide once, briefly, and the weather was feral, so we saw very little.....one day. That weather you had is just arriving here now, wet and blustery.
Wow that is really interesting. Worth a visit to the restaurant just to see the conveniences.
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