Barossa Valley

This was our travel day from Cairns to Adelaide in South Australia after covering 2,950 km in Queensland. We had a 9:00 am flight on JetStar, the budget division of Qantas. We got to the airport in good time, returned the rental car and got checked in with a minimum of fuss. It’s a good thing I pre-paid for extra checked bag weight. Both of our duffle bags have grown to over 20kg and one was just under the 25kg limit I had paid extra for.

The fun part was when you get to the gate and they start measuring and weighing each piece of carry on. You are only allowed 7 kg per person. None of those North American “carry on” bags would ever make it past the Australian baggage Nazis. It provided a half hour of entertainment watching people shuffle their belongs between bags, throw out books, cuss out the staff etc.

It was a nice clear day and the flight was about 3 hours. It was hot in Adelaide, 34 C, but dry. This is not the wet tropics. We picked up the rental car and found our way through Adelaide with the help of Google Maps on Chris’s phone. We are staying north of Adelaide in the Barossa Valley, home of Shiraz, about an hour’s drive from the city. Barossa is one of the world’s great wine regions, just 25 km long yet producing 21% of Australia’s wine

We drove to Tanunda and stopped at the Barossa Tourist Information Centre to pick up some information on the area. That’s our current ride parked on the main street. A Hyundai i30, a much nicer car to drive than the last two Nissans.

We had a late lunch at the Red Door Espresso and then walked around the town. 

The towns have a distinct German heritage dating back to 1842. Fleeing religious prosecution in Prussia, settlers (bringing their vine cuttings with them) created a Lutheran heartland where German traditions persist today. There are many restaurants, cafes, boutiques and tourist oriented shops. The architecture has a unique look with stone buildings with cast iron latticework and gothic church steeples. Maybe some of my relatives live here!

On the way to our B&B we stopped at the Mengler Hill Lookout. We were surprised at how flat and dry looking the valley is. 

The monument there explained the German heritage.

The place we are staying at is in the country a few km out of town. 

The owners have the B&B, a vineyard, sheep and llamas.  After a quick trip back into town for happy hour provisions (and discovering a $60 12 pack of Coors Light), we had a nice couple of hours unwinding and watching the sun set over the vineyards and surrounding farms.

We also had fun watching a variety of parrots and other birds flying from tree to tree over our heads.

We were not very hungry so we decided to find a cafe for a light supper and ended up in Angaston for a small pizza. We were back at the B&B by 9:00 for an early bedtime.

Watching the news on the TV, we discovered that Cyclone Nathan has decided it didn’t like the Coral Sea and was going to make another run at Queensland later this week. Glad we are in South Australia now.

A quick synopsis of our trip north through Queensland:

• Brisbane is a terrific city, clean, modern, trendy, easy to get around, lots of young people.
• The Gold Coast; Orlando goes to Ft. Lauderdale. Easy access to the Hinterland for some rainforest experience.
• The Sunshine Coast; fabulous beaches, low rise seashore towns with high end resorts and residences. No stingers.
• Noosa to Townsville drive on the Bruce Highway; Tropical Saskatchewan with sugar cane instead of wheat.
• Airlie Beach; the gateway to the Whitsundays and the reef; full of backpackers and tour operators. The Queenstown NZ of Australia.
• Townsville; nice small city with a beautiful waterfront, too bad about the stingers.
• Tablelands; a nice contrast to driving the coast; big variety of tropical crops, waterfalls and scenery.
• Port Douglas; looks like lots to do with lots of reef tour operators and classy shops on main street. Cyclone Nathan put a damper on our stay there.
• Cairns; nice waterfront. Easy access to beaches north of town and Karunda. Again,rained out for a couple of days and couldn’t do much exploring.