For one hour. I was worried about my plans for world domination, but it all worked out.

I had a little time to kill before my tour, so I went into Town Hall to stay dry and found theres actually something to see. Some art and some historical junk, some cool architecture too. The Beatles once stood on the balcony, guys, and that was something special.

The walking tour was predictably good. The guide was young and had a good sense of what we wanted to hear about. A nice morning.

After a quick spin around the cricket grounds (not much to see really), I had an ok lunch at a burrito place. Not as good as Chipotle. Should have gone to Burp. That’s another Mexican place.

I spent the rest of the day at the art gallery. It’s all mixed up right now because 3 major exhibitions are resetting. Art is just crammed in wherever some floor space is. In the the middle of European oils there’s a giant sculpture of a dead horse, in the design area there’s what could only be described as xrated 3-d paper folded genitalia. I loved it.

The tour guide gave the most unique bits of random art history and Adelaide history and political views and business tips. This gal really knows the local art scene too. It was a pleasure to hear about the town from somebody who’s loved here all her life.

The Adelaide central market and chinatown food courts are open late tonight. That food court, all Asian, is straight legit. I passed on the kangaroo curry. The bun at the vietnamese place was great. Also I had the freshest pork buns ever at the dim sum place. I watched them be made, and ate them within 5 minutes.

Tomorrow I’ll go to Alice springs, and start my hiking trip on Sunday. Yay!!

Weather wise, anyway. The weatherman has been wrong every day; today it was sunny and 70.

Had a nice morning walk along the pedestrian street and arrived at the botanical gardens on time to have a watch of demolition equipment next door. I felt like a kid, watching the crew knock down an old hospital.

The tour was spectacular. This garden in particular had a lot of native plant species, which is good because it was all new to me. I spent several hours there.

After some lunch, another state library. Nothing like the one in Melbourne, but nice in its own way.

At the South Australia museum, finally a good display of aboriginal history and artifacts. The best in Australia it’s been said. I believe it. The curator had taken a lot of time to make the displays easy to understand.

That’s it really. I found the central post office and mailed a card, and bought and cooked a healthy meal.

Tomorrow a free walking tour and the art gallery.

Night!

The trip to, and through, and from both of today’s airports went great.

However…the hostel I chose is a dump. Oh, man, how hard I want to check out and go someplace else.

I’m not gonna, tho. I’m settled in and what the hell, it’s only for 3 days. There’s tea and coffee and the shower is hot.

Adelaide is a lot like Portland. The downtown area is smaller, and a free bus makes sightseeing effortless. The people are pretty friendly too.

Today I saw a Japanese garden, an aboriginal art gallery, the beach, a church, found a thrift shop, the parliament building, and I took a long walk.

Tomorrow I’ll take it easier.

So, earlier, when I was all excited about free pancakes, I didn’t realize something rather major. Pancakes once in a while are a treat; pancakes every day are awful.

After a lovely breakfast of not pancakes, I just walked around today with no agenda. After a bit of tram riding, I found a nice park with a bunch of Japanese tourists milling around. They must know something, I thought, and followed them to some neat stuff. It continued to be sunny, so I wandered around the park. There was a model village and conservatory, some fountains and such.

I managed to find more free stuff to do as well. A couple of galleries of aboriginal art were within walking distance. You might not believe how much money they were asking for that stuff. A lot, is all I know. The best was the state library. Man, it’s great! Such a neat exhibit of all their most famous and old books. Since the region was the capitol, they got some doozies here. I won’t bore you, but they got stuff as good as the Morgan library in NYC, and that’s saying something. Also Ned Kelly’s armor was there. He’s a famous bank robber and murderer. Very popular for some reason.

I finally got out to the docklands on the tram.

It’s an area for the rich and boring. One apartment building I saw went for 10,000 a month. Nice, tho.

Dinner was Japanese. Pretty good and filling for 10 bucks. That’s a good deal in Melbourne.

On to Adelaide tomorrow. I have no idea what there is to do there.

🤩