Adelaide

Before the flu kicked in I had a lovely little holiday in Adelaide - went over on a Sunday afternoon which was my first trip in a plane for nearly three years! Can you believe it. Such a change after spending so much time in airports. I was a bit worried that I wouldn't like the crowds and the public spaces but (a) Canberra airport is not one of the world's busiest hubs and (b) it's like riding a bike, the joys and the horrors just came straight back. More joys than horrors, I am generally happy to stare out the window and have snacks, and it's two one-hour flights, not long-haul.

I went for a long walk Sunday before it got dark to reacquaint myself with the city centre, and then went immediately over the road to the Tasting Australia that was set up in the park opposite; bars, food stalls, fairy lights ... it was rather pleasant. My hotel was nice too, a little apartment in the old Treasury building, so suitably Victorian with high ceilings and creaky floors ... 100% haunted but I still slept well. 

Monday I went to the Art Gallery of South Australia and enjoyed the weirdly random shit of their two rooms of "International Art". I am quite sure it was all very thoughtfully and carefully curated but it means you end up with Van Dyck next to Renoir next to Rosetti next to something made out of plastic straws. It worked, which is why I think someone put a lot of time into it, but not for any logical reason that I could see. 

Loving this red wool stuff. With hands. Each strand is stapled to the walls of the room, and in person it was very eerie. They also had  Free/State which is new Australian art which had some crazy bits. Some of it was absolutely no, that is not art I don't care what word salad you put on the statement on the wall, but a lot of it was kind of cool. Then I went next door to the State Library which had an exhibition on modernist residential architecture in Adelaide in the 1950s and 60s (by way of background Adelaide is considered a very conservative city, old money, looks backward etc) and how it was received. Being so recent there were floor plans and lots of photos and newspaper cuttings and interviews with the people who lived in the houses, and I thought it was fascinating. Love a good floor plan.

After that I took a bus over to North Adelaide (very cute 19th century suburb, not at all like Canberra), had lunch and walked slowly back over the river and past the Oval. It was a beautiful day and a lovely walk. Then I poked around the shops for an hour or two before going back to the hotel ... and starting to think "I feel a bit tired" and "maybe I will just have takeaway for dinner" .... before starting to feel really dreadful, on with the fever, spending the night making ghosts out of the curtains and waking up on Tuesday wondering how on earth I was going to get through the day. 

It wasn't a great day. I ended up slowly checking out, slowly walking to the museum, and spending three hours going from room to room. Slowly. Sitting in a chair looking at an exhibit for half an hour, then moving on. Then to the airport, sitting in the lounge for three hours unable to read just staring, plane (DON'T COUGH), another airport, another plane, and arriving home about 10 pm and cry-telling my husband that I expected to die in the night so perhaps we should say our goodbyes now. Fun times. That was two weeks ago today and I still feel tired and breathless, so a vicious bug. But not covid, unless multiple tests are wrong, which is not impossible.