Tour of Booty: The Paradox of Sweat

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I’m not sure what the go is here in Adelaide in terms of trading hours but everything opens at 11am and last night even the supermarkets closed at 5pm (WTF!) so I’m missing some logic here. Maybe because they expect everyone to go to church on a Sunday morning and there would be enough churches to keep the masses happy (no pun intended). I’ve been checked out for an hour (of the YHA, not rehab!) and its approaching 36 degrees. Still half an hour to go before trading starts…

So within half an hour, I will die of
1. Heat stroke
2. Dehydration (suck shit for drinking 8, sorry 4 beers)
3. Hunger/famine
4. Someone stabbing me to death because of the drenched sweaty shirt I am in.

I think Bec (Dewi) was telling me about the paradox of sweat: something that cools us down, yet something that makes us stink! I think she said that before gassing us with deodorant in Owen’s room. I wish she was here to do it today.

I hate to say it but the most number of drongos, drunks, deros, boganated, stoned, methadoned people I have seen on the streets has to be here in Adelaide. Maybe it’s not their fault but all of them ask for spare change and whatever else they can bludge. Who’d want to be out here anyway? Last night it didn’t even get down under 30 degrees and it’s gotta be close to yesterday’s searing heat. Luckily I race back to the cool YHA and it’s time to catch up on some Z’s. Some girl in the Foxtel lounge room also has the same idea and maybe last night she had a big one too. I resolve myself not to have a big night out and check out the next morning on the next tour. It blows harder than the heat while carrying two bags and a bag just for carrying Baz.

In the late afternoon I make a beeline for the bus to Keswick Railway Terminal (the W is silent in Keswick, making it sound like an Arabic swear word) and slowly the terminal fills up. The building’s air conditioner is just about non-existent as the sweat, the hot breaths, the hot bodies in close proximities turn Keswick Terminal into a nightclub, unfortunately with Channel 9’s Backyard Blitz as the only aural entertainment, and grandmothers are the only ladies doing any kind of shuffling. The news comes on and just about everyone groans when today’s temperature is announced: 42 stifling degrees. There’s no end in sight until next Friday. I suppose that is when Adelaide will cry.

Heat and late trains makes for frustrated people but a lot of people understand because they know that they are in for one train ride they will never forget. The train is like a silver snake and thank God there’s AirCon inside. It may look old inside, but it’s AirCon. There is finally relief from the heat.

K’s: Adelaide-Keswick: 13.2K
Running Total: 4023.7 K

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Photos

A Geographical plaque
If you continued to walk in a straight line due north, you'd end up at the Johnstone Geodectic Station!

The Silver Snake
The Indian Pacific about to leave Adelaide

Loco
This was the engine that would be taking us to the West Coast

The Sunset
spotted just leaving Adelaide