Adelaide and Goolwa

One of the residents that Brian was working with (James) offered his family's beach house to us for a weekend, and we jumped at the chance. It's on the coast in Southern Australia, about an hour south of Adelaide. After a late night having dinner at the home of Brian's boss, we caught a very early flight to Adelaide, picked up a rental car and drove to Goolwa, the little town where the beach house is.

The house was great, very relaxing. We had lots of BBQ's, read by the fire and went the beach (just a short climb over the sand dunes in the back yard). We never got up the nerve to try surfing, despite James saying we could use his surfboard if we wanted. Something to do with the warnings about great white sharks in the area... it was a bit too cold for suntanning and so we kept our feet on dry land rather than risk it in the water.

We drove up to the McLaren Vale, which is a fantastic wine region about 30 mins away from Goolwa. On Jarrad's excellent recommendation, we went to d'Arenberg winery. They have a beautiful restaurant overlooking the winery, which served some of the most delicious food we've had on our trip so far (lamb and fish, two Australian specialties). After making your selection from the menu you go to the tasting bar to pick a wine to accompany your meal, very fancy. The region is known for great Shiraz, and we bought a few different bottles at the various wineries we visited.

James' parents are members of a golf course across the street, so we went over to play 9 holes one morning. For the most part we didn't keep score, although I did get a par which was very exciting. By the end of the round Brian had deteriorated and was using his putter as a pool cue, but other than that it was very successful.

We drove back to Adelaide the following morning in a rain storm which all the Australians were thrilled with because of the water shortages here... we weren't quite as excited. We spent the day looking at some of the museums in Adelaide before catching our flight home.