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G'day everyone!!
So as you are probably expecting, this is my blog of overall Adelaide!! I absolutely loved the city although I did have my reservations going there!!
I arrived on Wed night and had a easy and quick transfer from the airport! The hostel is very small, which is actually a good thing, and basic but it is the cheapest in Adelaide!! Had a nice early night ready for the next day!
Got up early (I say early but it's probably late by English standards!!) for the free hot pancake breakfast!! After a quick trip to the supermarket for the weeks food, it was off out to explore the city! My hostel was about 10 mins walk to the city centre and the opposite side of the Botanical Gardens! So, I headed through the city, enjoying some window shopping in the amazing malls they have there!! Had to drag myself away from the shoe shops a few times!! Eventually I reached the main road which leads to the Botanical Gardens!! It goes past the museum and art gallery and then the university!! It was nice going past the university but strange to imagine going to a city based uni rather than my little bubble of Loughborough!! I finally reached the Botanical Gardens and it was absolutely beautiful! There were plenty of grass spaces to sunbathe on, benches to sit and read and water features and ponds dotted about to enjoy!! I ended up spending all day there engrossed in my book and I loved it!!
Infact, I loved it so much that I did the same the next day!! To try and make it a bit different, I headed up past the Oval to get there!! I crossed a river, which actually ran through the centre of the city and pretty much separates it into a north and south!! However, this wasn't just your average English river, oh no, it was an Adelaide river!! Full of water features and with grass areas either side to relax, a cycle path running all the way along, rowing boats training on there and peddle boats for hire!! I wandered along the river until I reached the Gardens, which also ran pretty much around the Oval!
As I mentioned before, the weekend was spent at the Oval enjoying the athletic talent :) Had a wicked weekend and would definitely recommend sevens to anyone, even if you don't understand rugby!!
Monday, I enjoyed a chill out day with the joys of doing some laundry!! Oh yes, living the high life over here!!
Tuesday was a lovely relaxing wine tasting day!!! I booked a tour to go and discover the Barossa Valley which is most famous for being the home of Jacobs Creek!! First stop of the day however, was breakfast!! Not very interesting for me to tell you about except that it was at a cafe next door the worlds oldest toy factory, and in honour of this, they built the worlds largest rocking horse outside!! Only downside is that it doesn't actually rock, but seeing as the place is on a hill its probably a good idea!!
We then had another quick stop in an attempt to delay the drinking at a place called the Whispering Wall!! Its basically a dam that was built over 100 years ago but it was built in a curve!! This means that when you get two people standing at opposite ends (about 150m away), and they talk normally you can hear each other as though you are standing next to each other!!
Next stop of the day was the first winery, and the most important-yep Jacobs Creek!! We had a little tour of the building including seeing the ranges of wines they do! The ones in England are the Classic range, but there is also the Three Vines, Regional and Reserve ranges plus another couple!! Amazingly enough, you can actually buy some of the classic range cheaper in England than in the shop there!! We then got to taste 5 wines, 2 white, 2 red and one rose!! The whites were nice and I obviously loved the rose but what surprised me the most was that I actually quite liked the red!! The Barossa Valley is well known for its Shiraz so that might have helped!!
Next stop was a little famiily run winery called Kies! Its infact in its 7th generation of the family, although the 7th person is actually only 2 yrs old at the moment!! Anyway, here we tried a few wines and we got to choose from a list of about 20! Here, I also got to try Tawny! Most of you will know it as port but I learnt that you can actually only call it Port if it comes from Portugal!! So in Oz, its called Tawny, and again I was surprised that I really liked it!! I've had it before but only with a cheap alcopop so you can't really taste it!!
The third stop was called Richmond Groves which also happened to be our lunch stop! Unfortunately we had another tasting session yet!! At this winery, we had a tour and got to see the process of how wine is made!! Then we got to taste another 5 wines!! To be honest, we just wanted lucnh by this point as we had all had our fair share of wine!!
Lunch was a beautiful BBQ outside with sooo much food!! Definitely got us all going for the final winery!! However, before that, we went up to a look out which overlooked the entire Barossa Valley!! As it was such a nice day we had a beautiful view and could see for miles!!
Our final winery was called Seppletsfield and was by far my favourite!! We got to try a sparkling shiraz here, but that definitely didn't go down well!! But then they brought out the drink that this place is famous for- Tawny!! We got to try a 3yr old and a 10yr old, and the 10year old was gorgeous!! However, they also sell at 40 year old and -they are the only place to do this- a 100yr old!! The release a new one every year and are on the 34th year of doing so!! However, it costs bout $900 (that about 1350 quid) for a bottle the size of a can of coke so funnily enough we weren't offered a chance at that one!! However, we did get to try 2 other fortified wines, one called Tokay and one called Muscat!! Tokay was beautiful and tasted like a caramel honey!! The Muscat wasn't as nice however it was made better by chocolate!! But not just any chocolate, oh no, here they have a choloatier on site who has made a chocolate that goes specifically with the Muscat!! He also had a surprise chocolate which you have to guess the flavours!! Most of us gave it a go, and were slightly disappointed that it was salt and pepper!! Not as awful as it sounds but still not as nice as we hoped it would be!!
Overall it was a brilliant day and I was lucky that we had a nice group of people on the tour!! An an added bonus that I remember it all!!
Yesterday was another chill out day spent wandering around the city and enjoying the coffee shops!!
Arrived safely in Melbourne today so will sign out for now!!
Sending lots of wine love
xxxx
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