TUESDAY 25th FEBRUARY
Having had a gentle 10K warm-up on Sunday, I decided to go for another cycle - this time along the Seaford promenade up to Port Noarlunga. As I approached it from the clifftops, I got some lovely views of the Onkaparinga river snaking its way out to sea:
Just beyond the pier, there's a rocky reef, as advertised here:
WEDNESDAY 26th FEBRUARY
Kelly's routine day off and we had promised to go and watch one of Miller's class's daily swimming lessons. As usual, we were mightily impressed by the facilities. Australia takes swimming very seriously:
Back at the ranch, Asher enjoyed playing with his stickers and my sunglasses:
THURSDAY 27th FEBRUARY
Jo and I decided to take a walk so we headed to the sea front and did a bit of the route in to Port Noarlunga that I had cycled on Tuesday. It was a little cooler and cloudier - just low 20's:
By now, we were getting in to the daily routine of taking Asher to and from day care, Kelly to and from the train station and Miller to school and from his after school club. The first two are done by car, but Miller's primary school is just a few hundred yards away and the walk alongside the Onkaparinga river is idyllic - like something Hollywood might have created.
FRIDAY 28th FEBRUARY
Chris' regular day off, so, after taking Miller to school, he and Jo took Asher to his swimming lesson and then drove over to Noarlunga to watch Miller's class have their final swimming lesson of the week. I was initially undecided as to what I might do, but eventually, I chose to jump on the bike again and this time head for the Coast to Vines trail - down to McLaren Vale to start with, then along the Shiraz trail to Willunga, where, after a fairly unhelpful enquiry at the local tourist office, I eventually managed to find the Shifty Lizard brewpub, where I had some lunch, washed down with a sampler paddle, before heading back to McLaren Vale again:
Jo and I met Kelly as she came off the train after work and the three of us drove over to another winery - Down the Rabbit Hole. It's another lovely setting although we did discuss how it was very right-on correct - woke to use the current vernacular. Expensive too. We sat on chairs on the lawn under the shade of some tall trees, which we would have been very grateful for earlier in the day or at the height of summer, but, approaching autumn after 7 pm, as the sun starts to go down, is another matter. We needed another layer - plus the use of one of the winery's blankets.
SATURDAY 29th FEBRUARY
It's the start of Adelaide's Writers' Week - one of many festivals held annually - and we all had to be in the city for a 9 am talk by Miller's favourite writer, Andy Griffiths (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andy_Griffiths_(author)) so it was an early start, catching the 7:30 am train in to the city. He kept the kids in the large crowd well entertained for 45 minutes and even managed to amuse the parents too.
Afterwards, we strolled round the parkland setting before joining the queue at the Face Painting stand:
Asher awaits |
Miller's Batman was first finished |
Asher chose blue as the colour of his tiger |
Next stop was the Museum of Discovery (MoD) where there was an interactive exhibition on - https://mod.org.au/exhibitions/seven-siblings-from-the-future/. It was a little weird - and again, very politically correct. One of the rooms featured a futuristic barber shop where different hairstyles were electronically added to your screen image:
In the evening, Kelly and Chris had booked us all in at Russell's Pizza in Willunga (https://www.russellspizza.com/) - a very atmospheric setting in some old buildings. The Shabby Chic look is very popular in this part of the world. The photo I took was meant to include the boys, but they both hid under the table when I asked them to pose: