Adelaide

Flying to Adelaide for a 30th Birthday

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We said goodbye to our HelpX family and drove to Brisbane airport to catch a flight to Adelaide. We were going to see Nick, our Aussie friend, to celebrate his 30th birthday with him.

Car Trouble

We’d just left Little Pocket and got on the motorway when we felt a bump every second or so on the right side of our van. ‘Is that the road?’ Chris asked. No, the road was pretty new and smooth looking. We pulled over on the busy motorway to see a massive bulge on the side of our right rear tyre.

I felt pretty confident though! Thankfully the guy who sold our van included all the tools needed to change a tyre. Plus our spare tyre was a full sized one. So we got to work, putting the wrench under the van and hoisting it up (even though you’re meant to loosen the tyre nuts first) and then tried to get the nuts off.

But they wouldn’t budge… I started googling tips and realised the van shouldn’t be lifted up at this stage, so we tried to get it lowered again, even that took a while to work out. Finally we got it lowered and tried again to turn the nuts with the cross bar spanner we had. We tried everything! Chris was putting all his body weight into turning the spanner until he was red in the face, when that didn’t work, I jumped up and down on the end of the spanner while Chris held it in place, but the nuts wouldn’t budge. And yes, we were definitely turning them the right way!

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Playing With Marsupials

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If there’s one thing I love about Australia it’s the wildlife. The animals are just so weird, random, and interesting, like nothing I’ve ever seen before! There’s colourful parrots, mobs of kangaroos, koalas in the trees and emus everywhere. And when I saw these animals in the wild for the first time the feeling of excitement I got made me feel like a big kid.

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Adelaide Couchsurfing

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Due to lack of planning and last minute decisions Chris and I ended up in Adelaide with nowhere to stay and a few days to kill before going to Sydney for New Years. So we booked into the cheapest hostel we could find and handed over $28 each for an 8-bed dorm.

It wasn’t the worst hostel ever. There was free internet, a decent TV room, and a balcony terrace area. But the rooms were cramped, the air con didn’t work, and the hostel was home to a cliquey group of backpackers who were staying long term and working in Adelaide. They spent the night playing drinking games and dares out on the terrace.

At 1am I was awoken by voices outside my room. They were whispering loudly and giggling. Next thing the door burst open and a guy came running in with another guy behind him filming on his phone. They turned on the light and started shouting, jumping on the people sleeping in the bottom bunks, then ran out again, laughing.

As far as I was concerned that was enough, I couldn’t be bothered with idiots like that, it’s hard enough getting a good nights sleep in a hostel as it is! So I made use of the free internet and started frantically sending out couchsurfing requests. Continue reading →