Another gorgeous morning dawns over Adelaide, and we are going to take full advantage of it. Donning our jackets (it is so lovely and brisk in the morning) we set off on the 20 minute walk to the Botanic Gardens. The 125 acre gardens were opened in 1857 and they have a wealth of different plants, botanical collections and areas to explore. We start off walking down the river to the park, then entering at the Friends’ Gate where we can walk through a forested area and look at all the bats in the trees. Yeah, they weren’t at the river, but they are here in droves.

We spent a lovely few hours wandering the grounds, exploring the huge arboretum with palm trees and wood bridges above the canopy.  But the best was the rose garden which had tons and tons of different roses with explanations and information about the fragrance of roses, how fragrance is an individual sense and the same rose will smell different to different people.  Interesting!

More wandering through some odd gardens, across a pond filled with fish and turtles, then onto a café in the middle of the gardens for a cappuccino.  Refreshment stop complete, we then headed out of the gardens, through a Palm and Bamboo filled forest eventually making it back out to North Terrace where we began our Museum day visits.

First stop was the Art Gallery of South Australia, or AGSA.  Here, there were fascinating exhibits of Aborigine arts and crafts, weapons and shields and helmets, or maybe even headdresses, that looked like faces.  Creepy, but fascinating.

We were done with AGSA fairly quickly, faster than we anticipated, so we struck off through their courtyard out to the Migration Museum, getting a little lost on the way, but eventually succeeding in find the small entrance to the large interior courtyard and main entrance to the museum.  Inside a series of rooms were exhibits on Aboriginal history, migration to South Australia, a war memorial and so much more.  It was an excellent museum but no photos allowed.  We could take photos outside however, and we did so of the Immigrants sculpture as well as the cool skyline reflections in the mirrored windows on the walls of the museum.

Also, in what I’ll call an outbuilding (I think it was part of a prison originally? I can’t recall), there was a fabulous exhibit on Japanese -Australian art, with a poignant story on twin sisters from Japan, but who had Australian roots.  They came to Australia to explore their heritage, starting at their grandmother’s house, and then traveled all over Australia with a temple structure taking photos.  The photos alone were fabulous, but the sad part comes in that one of the sisters was killed in a car accident in January of 2022.  Just when they were starting to get some fame and become known for their work.  Ever so sad.

On that tragic note, we left the museum and headed out to Rundle Mall in search of an afternoon beverage and lunch to cheer us up.  Surprisingly, it was difficult to find some place, but eventually we found the Hotel Richmond – which we chose for the excellent balcony patio on the 2^nd floor just as much as for the name.  We sat here, basking in the sun with our wine and beer and munching on an excellent dish of Fish and Chips.  Perfect to quell our hunger and quench our thirst.

Later in the afternoon, we once again walked the river walk, this time heading in the opposite direction we had taken yesterday.  The walk is lovely, the skyline beautiful and at the end there was a huge park area with gazebos and grills and a horse ranch!  Totally cool – this close to the CBD.  We are falling in love with Adelaide – it’s laid back atmosphere and lovely green spaces.

The plan for dinner tonight was pizza, but unfortunately the pizza place is only open on the weekends, as in Friday and Saturday.  We are right on the outskirts of the entertainment district, which is a hopping place on Friday and Saturday nights (as is evidenced by a lot of noise and music that we can hear from our apartment balcony – that goes on well into the night), so a lot of the restaurants are only open at those times to cater to the partying masses.  Ah well, there are always other choices, and we found a perfect little diner called Dumping 100 – which specialized in, yes, dumplings.  We’re in heaven – like being back in Chiang Mai with our Gyoza, only from a restaurant, not a food stall.  We ordered a large order of pork dumplings, took it back to the apartment and very happily munched away on our lovely balcony overlooking the city.