City of the Blue Lake

A massive statue of a lobster for a restaurant at Kingston!

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Friday 10th November 2006 – Yesterday we spent some time looking around Adelaide and, in particular, one of the parks and the war memorial. Elder Park is divided by the River Torrens them and on the North Adelaide side is the Adelaide Oval where the second cricket Ashes test takes place in early December. The gates were open so I slipped in to have a look and took some film and a few photos. You have to take your opportunities don’t you?

The England cricket team are in the country now and it is less than two weeks to the first test. It is clear from the media here that it is much anticipated and the expectation that the Aussies will win is strong. We will see! We have tickets for the Sunday of the first test at Brisbane and hope that the match lasts that long.

Yesterday afternoon we went off to the Adelaide coast and drove along the scenic drive which is fairly short but interesting. We had some difficulty in navigating our way back but managed in a reasonable time using an atlas we had bought that morning – a very worthwhile investment.

One of the beaches at Robe on the way to Mount Gambier

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Today we made one of our longest drives – some 313 miles – from Adelaide to Mount Gambier. We are now only a short distance from the border between South Australia and Victoria. When we enter Victoria the clocks go forward 30 minutes. The drive today was easy, given the distance, as I was able to put the car into cruise control which is wonderful when you have arthritic knees!

Our first stop was just outside Adelaide – the village of Hahndorf, another German settlement which was very attractive despite being heavily geared to tourism. We had coffee and I had a wonderful apple strudel with fresh cream. You do need some stamina to cope with all the lovely food and drink available when you are on holiday!

We stopped at Meningie for lunch, sitting by the lake surrounded by seagulls after any crumbs. Unfortunately for them we ate everything. We refuelled at Kingston where Elizabeth found this restaurant with a giant lobster outside. She could not resist walking back to photograph it. A later stop was at the lovely small fishing village of Robe. In the evening I ate fish that had been caught there – very well cooked and delicious and helped down by a couple glasses of Chardonnay. Elizabeth had the lamb shanks with a glass of Shiraz.