Adelaide – City of Green

The downtown design of Adelaide, in my mind, is downright fantastic. The Central Business District (CBD) is laid out in a typical grid-pattern design, but with a notable difference. Surrounding the entire downtown area are significant stretches of parkland. This extends to the ‘Northern’ Adelaide portion of the downtown as well. So no matter where you are in the downtown you are never more than a 10-15 minute walk from serene parkland. It’s brilliant. It was on my first full day in Adelaide that I set out to explore some of this greenery and see what I could find. This was the day AFTER I arrived at 6am by that evil bus, since that day was spent in a hazy stupor trying to maintain any form of coherence and just staying upright.

On my trip to Adelaide, I had visions of finding a city I’d feel comfortable settling in for several months to find some work, recover from travelling and make some money. This was a good first day.

This is part of the main entertainment distict of Adelaide. Known for it’s festivals (moreso in the summertime though), there were numerous theatres, centers and open spaces dotting the riverside, which cut the CBD from the North side. From there I meandered along until I came to the Botanical Gardens.

The Botanical Gardens were a sprawling green (even amongst the sprawling greenspace of Adelaide), and included this peculiarity – The Bicentennial Conservatory. Noted as the largest single span conservatory in the Southern Hemisphere, naturally I had to wander through it. Just because I knew it would impress well…nobody, that I’d been there.

The conservatory housed a large rainforest, lush and green in the cozy confines of the structure.

A bit further along the gardens was a smaller greenhouse, dedicated to massive water lilies.

I hadn’t seen the underside of a lily pad up close before, so I hadn’t realized that the bottom is studded with spikes, in order to keep would-be predators at bay. Neat design.

That was just the start of my exploring of the Adelaide area, there was still much more for me see. But on another day. I was still pretty exhausted feeling from the bus ordeal. NEVER AGAIN!

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