Uluru

 We have made it to the red center.

We started out in the middle of the night, leaving our apartment at 4 a.m. to catch a 6 a.m. flight to Sydney (the only place flights originate to Uluru).  

sun coming up -
somewhere over Victoria

the Blue Mountains - west of Sydney

the coast as we approach Sydney

Leaving Sydney, the suburbs quickly gave way to the Blue Mountains.  West of there, the outback begins.  Initially, you could see some signs of life (buildings and roads), but that soon gave way to vast, wide open spaces.  From the air it was like a kaleidoscope of changing colors and patterns.  Here's a sample...  (take a map of Australia and draw a line between Sydney and the southwest corner of the Northern Territories... these were taken somewhere along this line).

trees line the rivers, making them visible from the air

with temps above 90,
assume the white areas are salt deposits

a slice of pizza?

red desert

Uluru from the air

Kata Tjuta (another monolith) that is part of the national park

red road leads towards the red giant

You can catch a glimpse of Ayer's Rock Resort where we are staying, just in front of Uluru.  We are in the Lost Camel Hotel -- thankfully they have a pool, since the high is expected to be 100 degrees.

Adelaide Farewell

Today is our last day in Adelaide.  So while doing laundry, I thought I would add a few odds and ends from our visit.  

on monument at foot of Glenelg jetty

The city of Adelaide got its start here in Glenelg.  Both our wine tour guides pointed out that Adelaide was the first non-convict city in Australia.  That's why it had some planning behind it.  It was laid out in a logical format (east/west, north/south streets), with a park (Victoria Square) in the center and small parks in each corner.  Parklands were established all around the city.  

.

We noticed a unique flag flying at several places downtown.  

Turns out this is the aboriginal flag.  Red for the earth, black for the sky, and at the center, the sun.

Speaking of the sun, we have been enjoying great sunsets.  About 10 minutes after this was taken, there was a bright contrail in the sky.  (I got it on film, but it's hard to pick out so I chose not to show it here.

We were enjoying dinner the other night, and we got a double -- sunset and a boat show.  The Glenelg Surf Life Saving Club had one of their boats out practicing.  Four rowers and a coxswain brought it in right at sunset.

turning towards shore

pull, pull

landed

At Rosenvale Winery, they had an artist in residence so there were paintings all around the tasting room.  Now I have an idea of what to do with the barrel I have under the staircase at home!

Where we are is about 40 degrees south latitude.  Glenelg sits on St. Vincent's Bay, an arm of the Great Australian Bight.  If you look at a map of Australia, the entire southern coast is on the Bight (an old nautical term for a bay).  Below us is the Southern Ocean which surrounds Antarctica.  While it is not quite like going to Prudhoe or Barrow to take a dip in the Arctic Ocean, we figured that this is as close as we could come to dipping our toes in the Southern Ocean.  

No, Scott did not drive it out on the very fine sand... we carried it to the tide line.

our expensive towel rack

Proof we got in:

Neptune, Lord of the Sea

they surf these waves?

We found a few shells, and tracks of a wild animal:

meet Clyde:

Glenelg is a dog-friendly, off leash area.  We have met and enjoyed watching a number of daschsunds.

It is clouding up, and the washer is done.  That's it from Glenelg and Adelaide.

Barossa, Part 2

Too many wines... too long a trip... 

I only managed to get through half a days worth of photos and memories.  So here's the rest of the day.  

After lunch at Peter Lehmann's, we went up the hill to the Barossa Sculpture Garden.  This gave us a panoramic view of the valley.  Vineyards everywhere.

north

east

south

Much of this area was settled by German immigrants who had fled religious persecution, so throughout the region you see evidence. This memorial begins with Joshua 2:9 -- "The Lord has given us this land."

Our next stop was a winery with a unique business plan -- they don't make wine to make money, they make wine to experiment and do more with the grapes.  They are vineyardists.  They sell 90% of their grapes to other wineries and use the remaining 10% for their own wines.  We got the tour from the Rosenvale Winery general manager.  And appropriately, he started us at the edge of the vineyard.  

These are almost ripe, semillion grapes (a French varietal).  He said they would probably be picking in a week-ten days.

We were drinking a sparkling semillion.  While some wineries may use semillion in blending for sparkling wines, it is rare to have it as a stand-alone varietal.  Very nice on a hot day - a crisp, refreshing taste.

We then had a grenache rose... then moved on to a light red grenache.  He then remembered they were bottling some grenache, so he disappeared for a few minutes and returned with a plastic pitcher with wine so fresh it hadn't even made it to the bottles.  That was a first!

2016 Rosenvale Grenache

the winemaker at work

10 Bulls label
recreated by their resident artist

Our final stop was at the Saltram winery.  The entire front of the winery was covered in grape vines.  They make a nice entry area.

By the time we reached here most of the 20 people on the tour 

were reaching the staturation point.

first wines at last winery

As we headed home, we spotted some kangaroos in a nearby field.  (At motorway speed, there was no chance for a pic.)  Scott thought he had seen a koala during the morning ride through the Adelaide Hills.  

We took a difrerent route home, so we got to see a new perspective of Adelaide.  As we came near the port, we saw pelicans flying in formation and there were salt ponds where they were drying sea salt.

salt ponds

The Barossa Valley

 Probably the most famous wine region in South Australia is the Barossa Valley, located north and east of Adelaide.  It is a dry valley, so it is most famous for shiraz, a grape that began in the middle east.  We visited 4 wineries and tasted 6-8 wines per stop.  It was a long day.

The first stop was ChateauYaldara.  

This winery was established after WWII when a former POW, Hermann Thumm, bought some land that had the ruins of an old winery.  Hermann the German, as he was affectionately known, built the Chateau to display some of his fine china and furniture.  The name Yaldara is aboriginal for "sparkling" -- we tasted two of the namesake wines and toured their cellars.

barrels for aging tawny (port)

Second stop was the town of Tanunda (aboriginal for "water hole").  It is a quaint little town in the midst of the Barossa Valley.  Scott liked the name of this one shop.

a store for nothing but socks?

The second winery of the day was Peter Lehmann.  

Peter Lehmann front yard

Lehmann was a fifth-generation Barossan, who was instrumental in keeping the region going during a downturn in the economy.  He worked for other wineries to learn the process, and quit when corporate greed was dropping vineyard contracts.  He put together a group of vineyards and convinced them to let him make wine using their grapes... 

inside their tasting room

first flight of wines

Scott dressed up in his Napa Valley 
"Squeeze Me, Make Me Whine" t-shirt

D'Arenberg Cube

 Between the two tastings, we made a quick stop at one of the regions most unique wineries.  The owner wanted to make a statement, so the building is designed like a rubick's cube.  (Symbolizing that winemaking is a complex puzzle.)

d'Arenberg Cube

The Cube is hosting a Salvador Dali exhibition, including two large sculptures out front.  

"Space Venus" and "Nobility of Time" are both availabe for sale...

if you have a spare $3.5 million (each!)

Even the out buildings at this winery were a bit weird:

they don't understand plumb

And along the driveway were weird art pieces, 

including two hands rising out of the ground: