xtreme adelaide

who says adelaide's not xciting? not us! today cath took us on a typical saturday out. first we climbed a wall - she stayed at the top and guided us because she's a regular at the local centre and a fully qualified climbing instructor.

next we did some white water rafting (too risky to take camera so no pix) and then jogged home for breakfast. pulled out some of the tallest thistles in town, made summer pudding and headed off to hahndorf in the adelaide hills.



hahndorf was settled by german settlers in 1830s who left germany because of religious persecution - the town was named after the captain of one of the ships which brought some of them to sa. it's a small town with a number of lovely old buildings which have been turned mainly into touristy arty crafty nick nackery shops with a german theme, so lots of beer steins, cuckoo clocks, bratwurst and apple strudel in sight.

hans heysen lived at 'the cedars', a few kms out of town, and we went on a tour of his studio and house and nora heysen's studio. his studio was a simple stone building with high roof, wonderful light from the huge south facing windows and persian carpets on the floor. a took measurements and is ready to build one similar in the backyard when we get home.

on our way back to erindale we tried to visit several wineries but 4.30pm was much too late for that. however hahndorf hill was still open and turned out to be an excellent find as the wines were tres bien, the winemaker gave us a detailed tasting and obviously loved his work, and there was even a vineyard dog called bacchus, with one blue eye and one brown.

another good day in adelaide!
ps got craig two beer mugs from munchen