Adelaide

Well, I've been in Adelaide for the last 48 hours and it's been a dream. I'm staying on the southeastern coast of the Great Australian Bite with Ian, Bonnie, and Angie Young - they're old friends of my parents and their house sits right on the beach. The community actually faces westward over the Indian Ocean so the sunsets are pretty spectacular. It's been a real treat so far. They're very generous people and have been excellent hosts showing me around the city. Ian is an avid swimmer and has won several prestigious competitions around here. He's even swam the notoriously turbulent channel separating San Francisco and Alcatraz! He's doing a swim competition on Sunday so he trains everyday.

Adelaide itself is a unique city with English charm. It's full of pubs and churches and surrounded by rolling hills and vineyards. Apparently some of Australia's most renowned wines are produced here. The temperature hung around 20 degrees all of yesterday, high 20's today. It's so odd being this far south of the equator to the point where the conditions start reflecting those of my northernish home. However, snow is the stuff of storybooks here. Most people have never seen it. Ian is going to take me on a tour of the coastline tomorrow, so I'm looking forward to that. (Just to let people know, there's now a 15.5 hour difference between the Eastern time zone and Adelaide.) Earlier today, Angie and her friend Lauren took me to a small town called Victor Harbour. The funniest thing happened - Lauren went to buy a hotdog and before she even took one bite a rogue seagull swooped over her shoulder and plucked it right out of her hand with its beak! Just moments later, an entire horde of these bastards came careening over the rooftop into a fullblown attack on the hotdog, ripping it to shreds right in front of us. I was warned of sharks, crocs and pythons but I have never seen such an aggressive squawkfest in my entire life. We fled the scene thinking we had somehow become extras in a remake of that old Hitchcock film, Birds. hahaha!

Anyways, Adelaide has been great and the Aussies here are much more like the people I expected to meet when I first arrived. Perth is a beautiful place too and I think I was a bit harsh in the last post. It's just what I observed that day and how I was feeling at the time. But I'm glad to be here now. Lance Armstrong is coming here next week to compete in the "Aussie Tour Down Under" but I'll be gone by then. A bit of a shame not to get over to eastern Aus and NZ but I had to make a choice between Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam vs. Australia and New Zealand and in the end I think SE Asia is better when you're young, and much cheaper too. I didn't really factor Australia into this trip aside from a visit with Matt in Perth because I'm on a budget, so every day here is a bonus. Both adventures would be amazing, no doubt about it, but my dollar goes much further in Asia than it would here.

Well, I'd love to ramble some more but I should get to bed. Hope everything is going well back home. Cheers from Adelaide!