An International Game of Hide-And-Seek: Arriving in Adelaide.

Kaitlyn and I have the worst luck with international flights…or at least the ones to and from New Zealand. We once again arrived at the airport two hours early. This time, however, we didn’t have trouble getting our boarding passes or going through customs at the Christchurch airport. It seemed your standard procedure and I let out a breath of relief – We would catch our plane to Melbourne and I would have 3.5 hours to chill in the Melbourne-Tullamarine airport. I relaxed too soon perhaps, as once we had boarded our plane, we were told after about twenty-five minutes that there were some technical difficulties and engineers were assessing and trying to fix the problem. After disembarking the airplane and waiting anxiously in the airport, our plane ended up leaving two whole hours after it was supposed to. The flight was rather long and boring…nothing but ocean below to stare at for 3.5 hours. Thankful to finally be at the Melbourne airport, we made our way to Australian customs (at this point I had an hour before my flight to Adelaide was supposed to board). Turns out, we arrived at the end of line. It took us a good 45 minutes to get to the customs desks and retrieve our luggage. No problem, right? I had 15 minutes to get through quarantine, drop off my luggage, go through security, and find my gate. Well needless to say it was cutting it REALLY close. After a super quick goodbye to my awesome travel buddy, I rushed off to the domestic terminal and caught my flight to Adelaide. I think Kaitlyn and I decided that there’s no more international flights for us until we leave Australia to come back home in July.

I spent the next few days settling into my new home for the next 4.5 months. I met three of my roommates and a fellow Canadian named Manny, who is also an architecture student. My room is pretty standard (very white) but larger than my residence room in first year so I was quite pleased. The air conditioning works great…and boy have I needed it! The weather here has been wonderful, but after a while in the sun, there’s nothing like a cool bedroom. Adelaide is a really nice city, a bit big for my liking (apparently the population is about 1 million people), however since I live right in the center of the city, it doesn’t seem all that big. It’s full of both old and modern architecture that create a great diverse CBD that is a pleasure to walk through. The center of the city is surrounded by a large greenspace that separates it from the large amount of residential areas. It’s quite a unique and interesting layout for the city and defines the different areas with beautiful park space that both sides can enjoy.

During the international student orientation week, I picked up my student card and attended a couple of lectures but I found that they were mostly just a repeat of the information I already knew. Although I don’t think I needed to arrive quite so early to attend these events, I’m glad I did as the campus was a bit crazy this week for the first year Orientation Week. I did sign up for a Dolphin Tour and a Wildlife day trip though!

The campus of University of Adelaide is beautiful – it has some very unique architecture (some buildings come straight from Hogwarts, I swear), a great amount of greenspace (complete with lawn chairs for relaxing), and overall just a great atmosphere. I think it helps that the entire campus is a smoke-free zone! It is also right nearby Rundle Mall – a large shopping mall, both indoor and outdoor - , the Adelaide zoo, the botanic gardens, the State Library, Art Gallery, and South Australian Museum. There is so much in such close vicinity I will never run out of things to do! I do like being able to walk everywhere too…it’s great exercise!

Last Saturday, I decided I’d try and find my way to the beach. After a bus completely passed me by, I tried my luck with the tram that goes directly to Glenelg Beach (one of two popular beaches near the city). Turns out the tram is free within the city but costs a very reasonable fee of $2.40 for a single ticket out of the city for students. I spent a good two and a half hours lying on the beach soaking up the sun and even took a dip in the ocean! There was also a large pier at the beach too where I watched people jump and dive into the wonderful cool water. The sand was smooth and warm and the water was a beautiful blue colour. I know Grand Beach is supposed to have some of the best sand in the world, but there is something about a beach on the ocean that a beach on Lake Winnipeg just doesn’t have a chance to compete with…

The next day, I went to campus for 10am for the university tour to Port Adelaide where we would get to go on a dolphin tour! Port Adelaide is situated on the Port River and has been declared a Dolphin Sanctuary by the South Australian Museum. Apparently the Port Rivver is one of only a few places where dolphins live within a major city and approximately 40 Indo-Pacific Bottlenose Dolphins live in the river.

Manny and I walked to the nearby railway station where we bought multi-trip metro tickets. Instead of always buying the single trip tickets, the multi-trip tickets are a better deal and you can use them ten times before you have to buy more. The best part is that all metro tickets can be used interchangeably to ride the bus, tram, or train. It’s the same ticket for all public transit! I personally love the idea of not having to buy tickets for each different method of travel. We arrived at Port Adelaide too late to go on the earlier dolphin tour so Manny and I had lunch at a nice little café that had really yummy fish and chips. At 2pm, we boarded the river boat for our dolphin cruise. Personally I was a bit disappointed, the scenery was not all that great and I only saw two dolphins. I was expecting more from the trip, but that’s not to say I didn’t enjoy what I did get. Who wouldn’t like to see a large red lighthouse, a bunch of seagulls chilling on a boat, and a couple of cool old ships? Not such a bad day after all…