We’ve been on the road for a month! We are pretty much one-third of the way through this amazing adventure, and it’s crazy to realise there are still so many more incredible things to come – all of the NT, Central Qld, Great Barrier Reef…
The day started over at Morialta Conservation Park to the west of Adelaide. I’ve noticed when I’ve been looking on maps that there’s quite a few of these huge conservation parks on the west side of Adelaide, just at the foot of the Adelaide Hills. Adelaide definitely looks after their green spaces well (go have a look on Google Maps at the green parklands that create a ring around the CBD!). There were a few things that drew us to visit Morialta – but a big reason that it is host to what is apparently the biggest playground in Adelaide. And it definitely was spectacular.
When we arrived though, we started off with a walk along one of the creeks down to Morialta Falls. It was a good 2km to get there, but on a really wide track, and really flat the whole way. The rain obviously hasn’t been huge in a lot of the cities and on the coast in the last few months, so the waterfall wasn’t flowing at a great rate, but it was still amazing to look up at and admire. As we walked back, we took a detour up to the Eagles Nest Lookout, and then onto the lookout at the top of the falls – both were only apparently a few hundred metres… but of course, that was a few hundred metres of a seriously huge climb. Surprisingly without too much complaining, the kids did well, and the views from the top were worth it.
We kept heading back towards the main part of the park, but did one last detour up to a place called Giants Cave – again up a bunch of steps! Amazing cave, and we were all left wondering how much of the cave was naturally created, and how much was man-made.
Back at the park, the kids were beyond excited to run around in the huge playground – named Mukanthi, which means play, celebrate in the Kaurna language (Adelaide is the lands of the Kaurna people). Throughout the playground, not only is there big play spaces, each space quite separate and distinct, and almost all built from wood – the playground has each section named after something in the Kaurna language too. It was a brilliant way to not only create an amazingly fun space for the kids, but to help them understand and be exposed to some of the Kaurna language in a place where kids are having the most fun.
Once we had lunch at one of the picnic tables there, it was back in the car and off to our fun afternoon activities. First stop was in a little town called Verdun, just down the road from Hahndorf. We wanted to try and find some sort of tasting experience for the kids to enjoy with us – and so we thought we’d give some cheese tasting a try! Udder Delights, a really well known Adelaide Hills cheese maker, have moved into a great little Craft Brewery / restaurant hub in Verdun called Grünthal Brew. So not only do you have Udder Delights’ cheese there, but you have a microbrewery with beers made on site, and a place to also taste gins they make (distilled offsite, but made by the same people), and then a casual restaurant with pizzas and a bunch of other delicious food.
The cheese tasting plates offered 4 different cheeses for us all to try with crackers. The people there were super keen to ensure the kids were going to enjoy it, and so they offered to swap out the blue cheese that would normally go on the tasting plate if the kids didn’t like it. Daniel was the only one who wanted to swap it out – I was really impressed that Eliza and Alexander wanted to try everything! We all had a great time trying the cheeses together – we had a goats cheese, a brie (some of us got an ash brie, some of us got a smoked brie), a 12 month cheddar, and then a cheddar blue. The kids tried everything, which I loved. At one point, Alexander was loving the brie so much that he was just done with the biscuits and was just going to town on the cheese alone! There wasn’t a lot of love for the goats cheese or the blue, but I was happy to help with that. I also got enjoy another fun gin tasting to go with my cheeses. The kids loved the experience, and we’re so glad we were able to include them in a tasting experience!
From there we headed down the road to Hahndorf. We wandered around the shops for a little while – because wandering through Hahndorf is just beautiful! But knowing that probably isn’t the kids favourite thing to do (understatement), we eventually made our way to what was planned: Hahndorf Mini Golf! It’s a cute little outdoor mini golf set up, and surprisingly during the week it’s just self serve, with an honesty system. So you arrive, put your cash in the box (and get a few coins change if needed), and then grab a putter and ball. It was quite refreshing for it to be so open – but it felt so incredibly strange in this day and age that something would rely so much on honesty! We had a great time working through the course together – plenty of laughs, and some great shots. Plenty of awful shots from all of us too! There was a few hole in ones that we all widely celebrated. It was a great way to finish off the day.
This evening, we caught up with a couple of wonderful friends – Micky and Dan. Micky moved across to Adelaide from Sydney about 4 years ago, and we really haven’t had a chance to catch up with her since then. So it was so great to spend the evening with her and Dan tonight over pizza, and meet their beautiful dogs as well!
Adelaide city adventure time tomorrow!
