36 hours in Adelaide

Saturday, 18 August 2018

Well, technically it's probably been more like 16 hours in Adelaide, then 20 hours in the Barossa valley, 6 of those on a farm (not a winery, but an actual working farm).

After a hectic day at work trying to get things organised for my absence (on top of a busy time at home getting packed and all the kids while-we-are-away-stuff organised), Jon and mum picked me up from work just after 5 which gave us plenty of time to make the re-instituted  direct flight from Hobart to Adelaide (which was SO good compared to the usual awkward 4 hour wait in Melbourne).  We made it to Hilary & Tony's place by 10pm, where they were all still up warming themselves in front of the fire. This makes a nice change to arriving in Adelaide in midsummer, when it's impossible to imagine anything but hot hot streets and brown hills.  As evidenced by this photo from the run we went in the park the next day, Adelaide is delightfully cool & green at the moment..

After the run and a quick repack, we all headed up to the Barossa valley and to the Tanunda caravan park.  We quickly got ready then were back in the car for the 45 minute drive to the wedding of Jon's nephew Rory to his lovely fiance Emma, which was being held on Emma's parents farm.  It was a cold day but skies were clear for the ceremony which was held in quite a dramatic setting.  We were under strict instructions not to use our mobiles for photos or post any images of the ceremony to social media, but when I saw that Emma's dog was being the ring bearer, I simply couldn't abide by the rules as I had to report this to Zali who was already outraged at missing the wedding, and would have been further outraged to miss immediate news of the ring-bearing dog.  

The rest of the wedding was fun - it was a canape wedding, which can make food scarce for vegetarians but this time we were well catered for, with the waiters honing in on us when they had plates of vegetarian offerings.   This was because we had been instructed to make ourselves known to the chef at the start of the evening, who then had his wait staff take down a physical description of us all which was a bit uncomfortable at the time! I didn't get to see what the list looked like but I bet it was something like this: "Annoying person with red dress - Vegetarian", "Really annoying person with blue tie - Gluten Free", "Unbelievably annoying person in blue skirt - Gluten Free with Nut Allergy".  For me I reckon the description would have been something like "Annoying person in purple dress and boots", as it turned out I was the only female at the whole event wearing boots as opposed to strappy shoes which was surprising given the low temperatures as night fell.  

Anyway - it was great to see most of the rest of the McComb clan especially as we won't be back for Christmas this year.  After talking ourselves all hoarse, and drinking & dancing ourselves into a lather (not me, but others) we made it back to the caravan park by midnight and fell to bed listening to the rain hammering down on our little cabin roof.

The next morning we had to get up pretty early to get to the airport for our flight to Alice Springs but it was all smooth going and we made the flight with plenty of time to spare. Goodbye Adelaide!