Blogs from Barossa Valley, South Australia, Australia, Oceania - page 2

Zum ersten Mal in Australien durchgeschlafen – auch mein Körper ist jetzt komplett angekommen J Nach einem späten Frühstück fuhren wir heute um 10 Uhr zu fünft Richtung Norden, zu Beginn durch leichten Regen. Ziel: Maggie Beer’s Farm im Barossa Valley. Maggie Beer’s ist eine der bekanntesten Köchinnen Australiens und besitzt in knapp 90 Kilometer Entfernung von Adelaide eine kleine Farm, in der sie ein Restaurant betreibt, ihre Produkte verkauft und Kochkurse abhält. Auf ihrer Farm gibt es auch freilaufende Pfaue und ein paar Vogelgehege die Christian, David und ich uns zuerst noch angesehen haben. Yasmin und Sarah sind sofort ins Restaurant und haben zu verkosten begonnen, wir dann kurz später ebenfalls. Maggie bietet kleine Picknickkörbe an, von denen wir uns mehrere nahmen und zusammen mit alkoholfreiem Schaumwein genossen J Zum Abschluss spazierte ich noch eine ... read more

On Tuesday 26th Feb we left Adelaide after spending two lovely days in this beautiful city. We were heading north towards Port Augusta and the Eyre Peninsular. Annie had already been told by people we had met that this meant travelling through the wine regions of the Barossa Valley..... These wineries included Jacobs Creek. We had already passed through the McLaren wine region ... home to Hardys, Penfold etc and we hadn't stopped, but once she heard that Jacobs Creek had a visitors centre on our route then I always knew that we would have to stop at this one! So, an hour out of Adelaide we travelled through the Barrossa Valley and came across the Jacobs Creek Winery..... Annie's spiritual home! And today they had a VIP visitor! Forget travelling around the world to see ... read more

It was a long weekend in Sydney, which for me means time to explore a new destination. So I spun the wheel.....and up popped Adelaide. It's somewhere that I've wanted to visit for some time, based on the rave reviews from friends and family who've visited there. I also fired off an email to find some friends to join me, and so it was a real treat to be joined in Adelaide by Lucy, from Wellington, and Cam, Joey, Kate and Craig who all flew in from Melbourne. In a self-congratulatory pat on the back, I can say my choice of both destination and travel companions was excellent. Adelaide itself is a very pretty city, with lovely parks and gardens, and gracious big wide avenues and it's very easy to find your way around. In fact ... read more

The highway across the top of the Great Australian Bight, including the Nullarbor was first opened in 1941 and was finally sealed in the late 1970’s. From Kalgoorlie to the border is 900km, and then to the agreed end at Ceduna in South Australia a further 500km. From Perth to Adelaide the total is 2700km to give an idea of the distances involved. It’s a very good road all the way with one straight piece of 140km, the longest in Australia. As the main highway there was quite a bit of traffic, mostly large trucks and caravans. Some of the trucks were oversize, and we had to pull over to let them past. We either had no wind or a following wind, so traveled at about 85 to 90kmh. Fuel consumption (diesel) is about 17.5 litres ... read more

After breakfast we were ready for our long drive from Wilpena Pound to the Barossa Valley. One possible route would have been mostly back the way we came almost to Adelaide, but we decided to try the B roads a bit further east, mostly to look at something a bit different and to check out a railroad museum in Peterborough. However, the first part of the trip, past Hawker, was the same as we’d driven a couple days before. As we drove, we kept seeing ruined sandstone buildings along the road. We later found out that they were the abandoned homesteads of farmers and stockmen trying to make a go of it in the Flinders Ranges. For every successful station we saw, there were two or three ruins. In a couple cases, the ruins were next ... read more