The Long Overdue Walkabout: Day 9 – Waiting in Adelaide

Wow, umm…so this is a little embarrassing…I don’t think I took any pictures from Day 9. I mean, it makes creating this post a lot easier. Uploading images and getting them in a blog post takes a ton of time. But still, I can’t believe I didn’t snap at least one photo. My camera wasn’t even dead.

This was a travel day though. I barely have that many notes on it, but there are some memorable highlights.

I was really hungover the next morning waiting for the shuttle to get me to the airport. Dehydration from too much alcohol, desert sun, and too little water kind of does that to you.

An uneventful two hour flight gets you into sunny Adelaide and I had successfully flown the length of Australia from the northernmost city to the southernmost. It was kind of a culture shock after having been in Darwin and Alice Springs, two cities that barely pass as frontier towns. Adelaide was a city, with high rises and busy streets and shopping malls. I realized traveler khakis and dust covered shirts were not going to cut it here. The weather was significantly more pleasant and cooler that 110% humidity Darwin and desert-and-rocks Alice Springs.

Oh, the YHA hostel in Adelaide was incredible. It was big and felt like a big dormitory complex that was clean, bug free, and spacious. I remember feeling horribly grateful for just a boring multi-story building with no outdoor courtyard of any sort. I think this is when I realized I’m more of an indoor person.

Today was the day that Adriane was finally joining me. It marked the personal halfway point of my trip and the end of my solo travels, which was an incredible milestone for me personally. Adriane and I being ourselves, the plan on how we would meet up was a little half-baked. I mean, the odds of me making it through the first week alive was low at best, so there wasn’t much effort put into it. “Just check into the hostel when you get here.” I think I attempted to call her from a payphone to limited success. She was probably en route already. All I knew was I still had a few hours. Might as well acclimate myself.

I remember there was a lot of wandering around downtown with not much to do or in the way of things to see. After checking in, it was pretty much early evening. I walked through an outdoor mall area which had some life to it. Some random buskers in between the shops, flashy lights and display screens for the local movie theater, and decent shops. I ended up eating chinese food at their food court and watching some boxing on the tvs. You know, exotic activities you don’t normally get to experience in day-to-day life.

Sufficiently bored and not really finding anything else to do, I went back to the hostel, grabbed a book, and waited for Adriane in the lounge. An hour or so later, there was a tap on my shoulder and excited squeals and hugs. She arrived! Not without some drama at the front desk. I guess there was some miscommunication and the staff thought she was a visitor and not a paying guest. There was a lot of catching up, but I vividly remember that we proceeded to spend the night throwing all sorts of ideas and recommendations we had heard and ended up totally re-arranging the itinerary we had planned for the rest of the trip. We were now going to go up the east side of Tasmania instead of the west, which meant getting brand new reservations for accommodations and such.

That pretty much took up the night and I think we only managed to got accommodations for our first night there. We hit the sack for an extremely early wakeup the next day. It was time for one final organized tour to Kangaroo Island. Lots of good surprises there. Can’t wait until you get to hear about that.