Just a short hop from Perth we arrived in Adelaide which held a special place in my heart as it was where my Dad served while in the RAF back in 1963. He told so many stories of things that he and his pals got up to while serving in Australia with tales of Big bad Bob and Blackie, the dog he won during a game of poker. It was a dream come true for me to see the place on the other side of the world where all these stories stemmed from and just a pity my Dad’s no longer around for me to share my experience of this lovely city with.
Adelaide is a small, but vibrant city. We arrived during the fringe festival and Kelli-Ann gave us a quick tour before dropping us off at the hotel leaving us with some spare time to explore. We got ready and set off to see the city and head to the fringe to see what was going on. However, by this time fatigue was beginning to catch up with Paul so we only managed 500m down the street where the waft of an Indian restaurant was too inviting so that’s where the exploring ended for the night. The meal was lovely then we retired to watch a movie, The Founder, only just managing to see the end before the eyes could stay open no longer.
Feeling refreshed we got up early and I ran a 10km route which was right around the city centre and remarkably all done in green parkland. It was another lovely route and beautiful day and I must have just missed Paul who had gone for a route down by the river where he spotted some lovely black swans.
We were then picked up in plenty of time for the demonstration. Everything in place and all set for a full house, but unfortunately the Adelaide store TV hadn’t arrived in time. The TVs were linked to a camera to show those at the back the more detailed work, but we all thought it wouldn’t be such a problem.
Here’s Paul’s intro the the Adelaide demo. The group were a little quieter to start with than the others so Paul stepped up the humour and excitement, but one lady stormed off claiming that it was a waste of money ($10) as she couldn’t see. Paul handled the situation really well and reorganised the audience making sure that everyone could see and as soon as the lady left the atmosphere lifted and everyone started laughing along and all seemed to thoroughly enjoy the demo.
Here’s Paul with Kelli-Ann getting a quick snap and Paul was then delighted when asked for his autograph, enhancing his cake royalty experience.
We had an early start the following day for the flight to Melbourne. Thankfully we avoided the traffic and were a little early so Kelli-Ann took us down to the beach for a short walk along the front.
There was a beautiful pier jutting out to the beautifully calm sea, one of these zen moments where you just have to pinch yourself. As if that wasn’t enough we had one of our most magical experiences on the tour on our way back to the car where we spotted a pod of dolphins playing just off the shoreline. Now that was going to take some beating!
David x
