South Australia (Road Trip)

It's been a little quiet on the sewing front, around here... and for very good reason. We've spent a fabulous week road-tripping around South Australia. I'd never been to this southern state before so the Autumn school holidays we're the perfect time to visit.



After a quick weekend pit-stop in Melbourne with my in-laws, we re-packed the car and headed west. Our first night in SA was spent at Mt Gambier (just over the border). After driving for around 7 hours, we arrived late in the afternoon so didn't get much time to explore. We still managed to visit a local attraction - an old sink hole which is now a beautiful garden with huge masses of hydrangeas. Possums come out at night and the locals take fruit and vegetables to feed them (by hand). Amelia wasn't too keen to get close to these furry locals, so we stayed up top and watched from a safe distance.



Next morning, we had a breakfast picnic at Blue Lake - a lake in the crater of a dormant volcano. The cobalt colour of the water is just magnificent and I can just imagine how spectacular this would look in the middle of a hot summers day.


Back on the road again and we headed into wine country. We drove by hundreds of kilometres of vineyards. I knew that wine was a big SA export but wow - the amount of vines that we could see, just from the roadside - was absolutely enormous!

After another 7 hour long day of driving, we finally reached Adelaide. Finally.... 

Over the course of the next few days, we visited the Barossa region and taste tested all sorts of beautiful wines, cheeses and local produce. We visited Maggie Beers farmhouse shop and saw the kitchen where they film her show. Sadly, the lady herself wasn't around, but we enjoyed visiting her beautiful part of the world.






We spent a whole day at Adelaide zoo and got to see FuNi and Wang Wang - Adelaides resident giant pandas. Oh my goodness, they're such amazing creatures. They were snoozing during our first walk-thru, but when we came back around to see them before exiting the zoo, they were sitting and eating bamboo. Just sitting on their bottoms, snacking on bamboo. They felt almost human the way they were sitting and eating. 






We saw the sea lions have lunch, super cute golden tamarins, sleeping tapirs, otters, meer cats, lemurs and a gorgeous flamingo called Chilli, who's lived there since 1948! 

We've been to a lot of zoo's in our time, but I must admit that though Adelaide zoo is small, it was probably my favourite. It has wonderful shady spots, plenty of seating all around the park and its interactive with many volunteers on hand to explain and share tid-bits of information. 

Glenelg - I saw my first sunset over water. We live on the East Coast of Australia, so for us, the sun always sets over mountains. I must admit, it was a little disorienting.



Hahndorf - what a wonderful place! Hahndorf is a German inspired village only 30 minutes from the Adelaide CBD. We parked the car and spent the day wandering along the Main Street. So many little stores to visit and explore. We bought a few mementos from Hahndorf including the requisite fridge magnet. We had lunch at the Hahndorf inn and feasted on a giant platter of German delicacies. Yum! 



The time we spent in Adelaide (and its surrounds) was over too quickly. We only got to see a few attractions of this region and next time, we'll definitely have to stay longer.



8 comments

  1. wow whata wonderful time you all had Anorina,visiting Maggi's place is on my bucket list ,:)

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  2. Sounds like a lovely trip. It's funny hearing of your Autumn weather when we are just going into spring here. The food looks yummy.

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  3. Thanks for sharing your wonderful countryside. Here in Oregon USA we have a National Park Crater Lake. It is quite large (like one drives around it edge which takes over an hour) and very deep, but the blue is amazing like your crater lake.

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  4. Great pôst. Thanks for sharing. Looks like fun.

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  5. wonderful photos! greetings from denmark Ulrike :0)

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  6. You found some of our best bits while you were here it seems! We do have a lot of wine country here in SA. Let me know next time you're back and we'll find you some more things to see such as the giant playground at St Kilda which has just been redone and is a great freebie for kids. I love that the sun sets over the sea here and you might have noticed how calm our ocean is too. Great for safe swimming! Hope you come again one day!

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  7. You found some of our best bits while you were here it seems! We do have a lot of wine country here in SA. Let me know next time you're back and we'll find you some more things to see such as the giant playground at St Kilda which has just been redone and is a great freebie for kids. I love that the sun sets over the sea here and you might have noticed how calm our ocean is too. Great for safe swimming! Hope you come again one day!

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  8. Looks like you're having a lovely time Anorina. I love Handorf. So many lovely shops to visit there!

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