After enjoying the views, and spotting a superb fairywren,
we descended from the top of Yuridla (Mount Lofty) following the same route we’d used in our ascent but once we reached the plain we’d proceed to the center of Adelaide for a day so filled with activities that, combined with the particularly early start, at least half our group wouldn’t last through them all.
My Midnight Confession
I realized years ago that trying to write, even in draft form, the content that comprises these journals concurrent with my actual travels is not only exhausting but limits my ability to remain present throughout. I’ve also found that after a typical three to four week trip, I need a few weeks to process my experiences so they can coalesce into something resembling a cohesive narrative.
I’ve never taken a trip of this intensity for this length of time so I’ve had to process more experiences and information than I typically do. Usually, the combination of my nightly notes and photos is sufficient to prompt my memories. Thus, writing this blog even more than a month after a trip’s end isn’t overly challenging. It’s 16 January 2025 as I sit writing the first draft of this particular post. I was in Adelaide on 5 November 2024 or more than 10 weeks ago. Although I stayed with S until the end of her walking tour, the notes I wrote about the day before bed that night are sketchy. I think they reflect my personal exhaustion. I offer this confession as a mea culpa for the chronicle that follows. If you become confused as your read it, consider that I am confused as I write it.
Which museum are we in?
Usually, my contemporaneous notes join with my photos and memories to sufficiently recreate the day I want to write about but, as I noted above, my notes are insufficient and, frankly, so are my pictures. Of my memories, I’ll say nothing. The album for our “busy first day in Adelaide” has 24 pictures. Sixteen of them are outdoors, two are in the State Library of South Australia,
three are inside South Australia’s Parliament House (including this one of some of my fellow RS travelers listening to an explanation of how this particular legislative body functions.
That leaves a mere three photos from inside one of a pair of museums – the South Australian Museum (SMA) and the Art Gallery of South Australia (AGSA) – our itinerary says we visited. I know we visited the AGSA because I took this photo
of the painting “Fish Catch and Dawes Point, Sydney Harbour” by John William Lewin and a close up of the information placard. I also remember one or two shockingly hideous works in AGSA which could be one reason I have so few photos. (And yes, I fully understand that art appreciation is, like beauty, in the eye of the beholder but there was one sculpture in particular that I wish my eyes had avoided.) I believe it was S, our site coordinator who led us through AGSA.
I know we visited the SMA because we had an informative and enthusiastic young Aboriginal woman as our guide. I’m reasonably certain that the third museum photo of bush tucker is from the SMA because I also have a recollection of our guide telling us about how the seeds and plants therein were identified, used, and traditionally harvested. But this could be a smashed and mashed memory.
Politics and prose(?)
(World I want to leave you better.)
S took us for a quick stop at the State Library of Australia since we’d finished lunch a few minutes early and it was on the way to our next tour at the Parliament House. Its collection is focused on the history of South Australia as a state and not of great interest to anyone in the RS group but, as you can tell from the photo above, it’s easy to understand why S so likes the building.
And now we’re off to Parliament House. As I prepared to write this section a few thoughts drifted into my brain and hence they will soon be out my fingers. The first was remembering our tour was led by a current member of the House of Assembly – the state’s lower house or the equivalent to Maryland’s House of Delegates who was engaging, informative, and seemed devoted to his public service. The second was wondering why RS deemed this activity important enough to cram into an otherwise tiring day. I’ll admit that the building has some interesting spots such as the Speaker’s Hall
and some quirkiness like this sign
but the system the assemblyman described is essentially the Westminster parliamentary system adapted to suit local needs – a system I suspect is at least somewhat familiar to most RS travelers.
Although the assembly only meets about six days per month, it’s generally considered a full-time job. I vaguely recall that the member who led our tour had initially tried to maintain his farm but after a term or two the job’s demands forced him to give that up.
Generally, this is how it functions: The House of Assembly has 47 members who represent local districts and the Legislative Council (or Upper House) has 22 members who are elected on a statewide basis. The full Assembly stands for reelection every four years as does half of the 22 member Council. A term in the Legislative Council is eight years. Members of the Assembly are elected using a full preferential method (a method that’s gaining some traction in the United States under the term ranked choice voting). The governing party (if they have won an outright majority of seats) or coalition (if no party has a majority) in the House of Assembly elects the state’s premier.
Legislation is introduced in the Assembly and moves to the Council if the lower house passes it. Once passed by the Council it’s sent to the Governor – whose position is largely ceremonial but – who represents the King as the ceremonial head of state and signs the bill into law. So, as I noted, nothing particularly special about the structure or the process.
After our tour of Parliament, S led us back to the hotel where, after a bit of a rest, we’d join those of the group who’d decided they needed a longer rest break for a meeting that would prepare us for our zero dark thirty wake-up call for an early breakfast and bus ride to the ferry that would take us to Kangaroo Island.
After the meeting, we were back on a bus for a ride along King William Road to the suburb of Hyde Park where we had dinner at a restaurant called Parisi’s. I’d like to tell you that I remember what I had but, as was the case for most of the trip, we’d ordered from a limited selection of main courses days before. I can tell you that my note says this was the best included meal of the trip to that date.
Here’s where you can see the day’s 18 or so pictures that aren’t in this or the previous post.