Storyline: Home to home westward
Adelaide and Darwin: what do these two cities have in common? To begin with these were the last two Australian cities we stayed in. Situated at the polar ends of a huge continent, they are connected by 2979 km of a famous railway: The Ghan. Taking the train from Adelaide to Darwin was the reason we visited both of them.
We didn’t have much time in either city and, if there was a plan at all it was to just explore the surroundings and the food scene.
Adelaide is the capital of the State of South Australia and a centre of world-famous wine regions. It is also the fifth biggest city of Australia with over a million residents. Yet walking through its gridiron-plan CBD streets, one would never think so.
The timing for a train from Melbourne to Adelaide wasn’t good. Although I was looking forward to taking the Overland train, it runs only twice a week, and we had a hard departure from Adelaide on the 19th. We relied on a short flight instead. It actually took longer to get to Melbourne airport from our Airbnb apartment in South Yarra than the flight itself.
Adelaide Airport was really nice, creating the first impression of a calm, clean and charming city. A city bus took us to the town centre and we walked from there to our new Airbnb apartment in the southeast corner of the CBD’s grid.
The apartment was on the ground floor of two-storey townhouse, with a small front yard and a nice patio at the back. Were it a bit warmer, we would have enjoyed that patio a lot. But it was late Fall, with a chill in the air and leaves covering the ground.
During the walk to the apartment we noticed a pub with an intriguing name on Hutt street, just around the corner form our new location. After self-check in we went back to explore it. They had some interesting local beer, however they also had oysters on special. The beer would be for later. And… there – we greeted Adelaide with a dozen of oysters and a glass of wine (each).
The CBD is a square bordered by parks, which makes for an attractive city life. Although they have a free bus, one can walk end to end of this square: Rundle Mall and government buildings to the north and the rail tracks to the west – west of the park that is.
Nice city, yet somewhat uninspiring. Wide boulevards, large squares, cleanish, flat and uniformly low rise (this seems to be changing), clean air, sunny clear sky. In contrast to the drama of Melbourne that made for great photography, there wasn’t much going on here.
Except the market. Our host, Anna, had a note for us stating that the market experience is a must. It closes at 5pm, except Fridays. And since we were in town on Friday, she recommended we have our dinner there. Thank you, Anna, it was a great experience!
We tried sea urchin for the first time, with some fancy oysters and of course paella as a main dish.
We returned the next day to buy some wine and good cheese, which we then could not finish before our departure. Some ended up with us in Darwin. Perhaps because of the dining options, we liked Adelaide’s market more than the market in Melbourne that closed on us at 2PM.
For the lack of a more interesting alternative, Alex took some street art photographs.
And old cars of course.
On Saturday we decided to walk to Adelaide Parklands Terminal and check out our train. It was also an election day. Voting in Australia is mandatory, so we were greeted by streams of people, many asking if we had already voted. “We’ll be voting In October”, was Alex’s reply. That of course triggered the usual conversations – where were we from, the relationships between Canada and US and what did we think about the US president, etc.
We had enjoyable walk, had some breakfast in a cafe near a voting station, walked through parks,
met The Ghan being prepared for our next morning’s departure,
strolled through the Rundle Mall and took some more photos of street art, before the daylight faded into dusk.
As you know from our previous posts, we said goodbye to Adelaide in the morning on Sunday May 19, plunged into the great outback and the red Australian desert, and greeted Darwin two and a half days later in the evening of May 21.
Hot at last! By the time we checked into the hotel it had also got dark. Full of impressions from a wonderful journey, we found something to eat and called it a day.
Darwin is much smaller city than Adelaide, and according to 2018 statistics, even smaller than Cairns. Yet it was bustling with crowds everywhere. Perhaps because of the dry hot season, its proximity to South East Asia, or perhaps because of the numerous tourists, including those descending from the train like us, and the ones departing the next day on the southbound train. Darwin is the capital of the Northern Territory and is at the top of the centre of Australia, just opposite from Adelaide.
Our hotel was one of the best in the city, we were told, and I’d agree if it weren’t for the breakfast disappointment. We had nice, big and clean room with a view of the water in the distance. However at least for me the breakfast was non-existent. Who eats toast with jam in the 21st century? So, I’d walk to a café and have an omelette and a cappuccino after Alex finished his carb-rich, protein-poor meal.
Darwin is a small, walkable city and we covered it all. As in Cairns, you can watch the waters as much as you want but you don’t swim in the ocean full of crocodiles and poisonous jellyfish.
And one pays a lot to wade in the wave pool.
Nice strips of sand though.
And the food scene? As everywhere else in Australia and New Zealand we enjoyed the seafood. Fresh juicy, delicious!
With happy hour drinks and oysters on special we had a dozen each as opposed to the usual dozen to share. It was our last day in Australia and the area. Great seafood is what will stay with us among other things. Given the many places we’d like to visit we probably won’t come so far again. I was sad to say goodbye to that part of the world. But our time to leave after two months touring down under had come. About 4 hours flight away was our next stop – Singapore.
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