Friday 8th December – Sorting the camper and arrival in Adelaide

Above and right - the Ghan train from Darwin to Adelaide passed us as we neared our destination.  We had looked at the possibility of getting on board for this epic journey but it was beyond our budget - maybe one for the retirees bucket-list?!  The 'Orient Express' of Australia..... very plush inside I am reliably informed.

We moved off at 0930 hrs.  Taking advice from the staff at reception, we stopped at a caravan shop in Port Pirie to buy new cap for water tank (for $40) and fill with propane gas (only $12).  Then it was on to fill up with cheap diesel in Coles and empty the black tank.

We had much debate about the windscreen chip – what was the right thing to do?  We rang a mobile chip repairer in Adelaide who quoted us $95 to fill the chip but even then the damage may still be visible after the work has been done.  I opted to ring Britz and confess.  After all, we had done nothing wrong.  It was a completely unavoidable accident. The guy on the phone was helpful – he suggested that we should just discuss it with the branch when we dropped off the van as they probably knew someone who could fix it more cheaply.  

A teeny tiny chip...?

So, we carried on into Adelaide as planned.  Straight to the Airbnb to drop our bags, then on to a car wash and to top up the fuel.  As ever we left it until the last minute, arriving at Britz at 301pm!!  The camper looked great and the chip now looked even smaller after the windscreen had been cleaned.   

A couple of hundred km over budget.....

We explained the situation and the woman at the counter came out to assess.  She can’t have looked the van over for more than 30 seconds and after seeing the size of the chip said ‘Oh, that won’t be a problem at all’  …and that was it!  Thank goodness we didn’t bother spending 95 bucks getting it fixed!  They probably would’ve been alright with the water cap too….  I am glad that a bit of common sense over something completely out of our control prevailed.  All that worry for nothing!  We were given our $80 refund for fuel and our $1000 bond was refunded onto my credit card and they never noticed the extra KM’s - Result!

I haven’t mentioned a Chilean couple who we have been effectively shadowing recently.  Just like us, they have done a relocation from Darwin to Adelaide but they have been driving an even more flashy Maui RV (the Rolls Royce to our Ford Mondeo!).  We saw them when we picked up the camper in Darwin, we then bumped into them doing a grocery shop that afternoon in the same supermarket and then they were placed in the site right next to us at Ayers Rock!  Well, here we were again, bumping into Sebastian and Natalia as they dropped their Maui off in Adelaide at the same time!  We had a brief conversation about their ongoing plans and it turned out that they were also heading to Melbourne but weren’t sure yet how they were going to travel.  Without even consulting each other, the natural thing to do was offer them a lift!  After all, we had secured a 12-seater minibus (might have forgotten to mention that one) to be relocated from Adelaide airport to Melbourne, so plenty of room and they want to see the same things that we do, so it makes sense for all of us.

Queen Adelaide statue in the Town Hall

There was a very convenient bus stop right outside Britz where we caught a bus into the City.  We wandered around the main shopping area, saw the ‘Rundel Mall Pigs’ (below left) and headed to the VC to pick up some amazing tips.  From there we chanced upon the Town hall, famously visited by The Beatles.

On 12th June 1964 Beatlemania descended on Adelaide with more than 300,000 people lining the streets - the largest gathering the band had attracted anywhere in the world.  They stood on this balcony of the Town Hall to wave at the crowds.  The four gigs they did here were the last four with Jimmie Nicol on drums in place of Ringo Starr who had been hospitalised with tonsillitis.

We took on some advice to head to the indoor market for some serious food sampling! From Dolmades, to tasters of yoghurts, cheeses etc, we then had Chinese pancake and I had paella for dinner!  You name a food, and it was on offer….

Continuing to stroll aimlessly, we went out onto the street and discovered Adelaide Rally cars all lined up along a sealed-off area.  There were crowds looking at the cars and a party atmosphere with a live band. 

A Ferrari - one of the competitors in the rally

We took our time looking at some classic cars and stopping for a beer before walking back through town, buying some croissants for breakfast and heading back to our Airbnb.  It is a very smart apartment, the only drawback to this set-up being the fact that the owners will be staying there as well, but we’ve not even seen them yet (apart from their cat!) so it’s not been an issue thus far.

Having lots more space, a wide variety of TV channels and decent internet for the first time in a long time, we set to blogging and watching the film Platoon...