By the numbers
18,712 steps
14.11kms
I did wake up early, but didn’t move for a bit. When I did end up outside two buildings down, another hostel was having issues. Their smoke alarms were going off and some people were waiting outside, but some were walking back in. Two fire trucks turned up and one group were walking in when I crossed the road. I don’t know if someone was cooking or not, but I didn’t see smoke anywhere. I ended up with a coffee and something for breakfast and decided to walk random streets towards the railway station as it was around a 10 min walk. One was Leigh street named after William Leigh, who never came to South Australia. He was just an overseas investor in the 1800s. There was information about some of the surrounding buildings and who owned them. They were all on two light posts on either end of the street. I used the loo in the train station and I could hear snoring coming from the cubicles, I wasn’t going to disturb them.
I wasn’t catching a train this time, but using the bridge behind the station to make my way over the Adelaide Oval. What I was doing was going to visit the Bradman Collection, which was about the life of Sir Donald Bradman.. I managed to arrive 2 minutes before the museum opened, but I was allowed to take pictures of the stadium, but not allowed on the oval. While I was doing that one of the ladies told me it was now open and said sorry she was late as she was chatting. I was not worried in the slightest. There was one rule, I was not allowed to take pictures of the collection. No one said anything about writing notes. Part of the Adelaide oval display was about the history including in 1977 Feetwood Mac were the first major band to play, and in 1949 the first woman’s test match was played. The Bradman collection included quite a bit about his career as a cricketer including the Bodyline tour in the 1930s. Around the same time as Bradman was playing happened to be important events like the Great Depression, which peoples spirits were uplifted due to his playing, and the rise of mass media like wireless radio. Radio meant the cricket could be broadcast ball by ball, which was first done by Adelaide. Then after the ABC was created, they broadcast the Bodyline tour during the 1930s. Bradman was from Bowral and had played cricket as a youngster and later on in Adelaide. It was interesting as he was well liked by people, and liked other sports too. They had bats from the 1930s and about a song he wrote. I was literally the only person there the entire time and it probably came across that I was a cricket tragic.
I found there was a statue outside of him and I found where it was in Adelaide, which happened to be just outside. I visited it before I had to leave for the Discovery tour I was meant to do at 11am. I ended up walking along the river front until I crossed a bridge that took me through Adelaide University, where I was wondering why I was basically going uphill or felt like it. I couldn’t really stop and become distracted as I was going to be late if I had stopped for a look. It wasn’t long before I found the Australian Space Discovery Centre. It was run by the Australian Space Agency, which is pretty cool that we actually have this. I had around 20 mins before I could go inside and I was happy to sit outside in the shade, and I could feel the day starting to get warmer. I had my ticket on my phone ready for when they scanned them and a lady behind me started complaining about the internet crashing because everyone was using their phones. There were plenty of kids around and everyone seemed to end up in the interactive area. One machine showed you the real time location of a satellite like the NBN Skymuster and a few others, A map showed you where the Ground stations tor tracking satellites, launch sites and so on, I had never seen a list of future rocket launches before. While I was looking I listened in on a kid who was upset, telling his dad that another woman, who wasn’t his mother basically push him off one of the machines for her kid to use. On a whim I went for a look to see if it was the grumpy lady from earlier who was complaining and since I didn’t see her, I think she took off if it was her. One computer showed you all the space junk in orbit around the Earth. As an adult even I enjoyed the simulations. There were team stories like how there is a GPS guided cane being made up to make life easier for vision impaired people. There was a short lecture basically about separating fact from fiction like we received some of the moon landing. There was a mission control centre behind some screens, but they couldn’t be lifted as there was apparently sensitive work being done not for public viewing.
I did get myself some souvenirs and they told me that there will be some more being included pretty soon. Somehow I think I would be back to Adelaide sometime just for that. They do even have a careers board too where you can ask questions, although I wasn’t that game to check it out when someone was standing there. My next walking journey was a walk to the Botanic garden, which wasn’t too far away. I wandered through the Botanic Garden and even filled up my nearly empty water bottle. I was heading towards the cafe, but I found the cacti display and they were actually flowering. I was also on the hunt for the corpse flower that had bloomed recently, but there was not just one botanic garden location in Adelaide, there were around 4 and it wasn’t at the one I was at. I made it to the cafe and one guy started talking to me right off the bat. He knew where I had gotten my shirt and he was from Wellington. We had a Lord of the Rings chat and found he had a few friends who were an elf and a Hobbit. I still want the quite on my shirt as a tattoo as it means a lot to me honestly. ‘Not all those who wander are lost’. I ended up with a drink and a pie before wandering off again. I had a quick look in the garden shop next door to the Botany museum, which I didn’t visit. I ended up with the rose garden down one end of the gardens, and I was looking at some of the test gardens and one I liked. The rest outside of the testing area were established and had names. The building the roses were next to were the old tram sheds that had been repurposed.
While I was getting sunburnt, I took a walk towards the National Wine Centre of Australia that apparently had a little discovery centre of its own. It was part of the university of Adelaide. I walked inside and was happy it was nice and cool. The discovery centre was open and I was able to walk up the ramp to the top where there were story boards along the way telling the story of wine growing in Australia, which started in 1788. I looked over the rails and I seen the wine cellar underneath and it was large and full of wine. The top floor, I found how to make two wines, both red and white and the processes that were used to make them. There was a wall of the different variety of grapes used for the many wines we grew in Australia. I stuck around for a little bit and then decided I should wander back to where I was staying.
Once I ended the gardens again as I was going to get through and see the cathedral on my way past. Turns out my phone was overheating, which I knew about the entire time I have been away that its been getting overly warm, and maps went black and white as a message said the phone needed to cool down. Not really something that should be happening, but I do need a new phone this year. As I was wandering, I came across a patch the Gardens were using to save threatened and endangered species of plants. They had a list of the three they were growing and what was going to happen once they had enough. Nearby there was something called a deadhouse on my map and I soon found it. It was an old mortuary from when there was a hospital on the grounds. It was an asylum to begin with and later for diseases.. Wandering o7ut of the Botanic Gardens, I headed to the zoo, no I wasn’t going to visit that as it had been a long enough day. I ended up walking across the little foot bridge I had used earlier between Adelaide university and the Oval side. A monument I thought to be a war memorial was to do with John Howard Angas, who was a pioneer and philanthropist when he died in 1904. He was religious and rand a good business. I had a quick look at the Cathedral before heading back to the train station and the hostel, where I kinda needed to get backed before I left the next day in the early hours.
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