Adelaide

The Red Ochre restaurant in Adelaide serves modern and native Australian food to a very high standard. I've been there several occasions, including dad's 60th birthday party and most recently to celebrate Wan's 30th birthday.

The restaurant is located on the northern side of the Torrens river, with a great view of North Terrace including the Convention Centre, Casino and high rise buildings. There is not much immediately surrounding it (golf course, park lands) so it is best to get a taxi there. A taxi will cost about $10 to $15 from most places in the city. Note that the Red Ochre restaurant is upstairs - there is a cafe/cheaper restaurant downstairs operated by the same people.

The main attraction of the Red Ochre for many is the unique food: it serves Modern Australian food made with many native Australian ingredients, especially herbs, spices, fruit and vegetables, combined with Australian meat and game: beef, lamb, kangaroo, emu, crocodile, pigeon and more. On all occasions I've been there, the food has been delicious. This time, with both of us being small eaters, we ordered some bread for starters and then went straight to the mains. I had the kangaroo fillet and tail, while Wan choose the duck with riberry sauce. As with most Australian restaurants and pubs, the servings were quite large and we were both full and satisfied at the end. We didn't order extra salad or vegetables (knowing that the mains would be big enough) but in hindsight we should have just to mix things up.

Being a Thursday night in Adelaide, the restaurant was not full but there were still quite a few people in there. We had a corner table by the window overlooking the city lights. The atmosphere is hard to beat.

You can find a couple of photos of our food, as well as other food we ate in Australia, in the Photo Gallery.

Such good food and service is of course not cheap. It set us back $160, however that included two bottles of wine: a big Cab Sav and a refreshing Moscato after dinner. For a special occasion, it was worth it.

Wan and I stayed at the Country Comfort Adelaide motel at 208 South Terrace when we arrived in Adelaide. This was one of the cheapest motels I found on the Internet within Adelaide CBD and Mum and Dad had said it was ok in the past. Before flying out home we spent another two nights here. Although there is nothing special about the rooms and service, we found it a great spot for what we wanted to do in Adelaide.

First, don't get confused with the many Country Comforts around Adelaide and suburbs. This is the Country Comfort on South Terrace. It is owned and operated by the same people running the adjacent Grand Chifley Hotel and the Chifley on South Terrace. That is, there are three different places all next to each other: two hotels and a motel. You actually check-in at the reception of Grand Chifley and can make use of their facilities. We had breakfast included for one night and that was at the Grand Chifley.

On our first stay the room was $100 per night, and the second stay just $80 per night (booked on wotif.com). This is without breakfast. I booked a room with a double and single bed, since there was a possibility a Brenton would stay one night with us (it turned out he stayed 3 nights. There is supposed to be a $30 charge for the extra person, but we didn't say anything about him staying and no-one asked so that was free).

The room was normal size with a table and two chairs, space for suitcases, wardrobe, TV, mini-fridge, iron and standard bathroom (including shower in the bath). It was an old room, but everything worked and was clean. The rooms were on the eastern wing, numbers 1, 2 and 17. Mum and Dad had a room with queen bed one night (on the western wing, number 37?) - this room looked a bit newer with a renovated bathroom (shower, but no bath).

Although not in the heart of the city (around North Terrace), the location was convenient for us. It is only a 5 minute walk to King William Street where you can catch a free tram through the city. Or you can walk for another 10 minutes to get to Victoria Square and Central Market (and another 10 minutes to the shopping and entertainment area - it is only 2km from one side of the city to the other!). There are a few pubs within walking distance (Brecknock, Kings Head, Gilbert Hotel), a small grocer/convenience store on Gilbert Street and a few nearby cafes for breakfast or lunch. Of course it is a motel so there are plenty of car parks. A bonus of the location is that Brenton works on the corner of South Terrace and King William - a 5 minute walk away. We caught up with him on several occasions after work, usually starting with a pint of Guinness or Pale Ale at the Brecknock.

If you are looking for somewhere cheap to stay so you can explore Adelaide, and don't require special service or fancy rooms, then I recommend staying here.

On arrival to Australia, we had four nights in Adelaide, staying in the city at the Country Comfort Motel on South Terrace. Adelaide is a quiet city. Although the population is about 1 million, the centre of the city is small and everyone is quite laid back (to the extent that the city is almost dead on weeknights and Sundays).

Staying on South Terrace, within 5 minutes walk of King William Street is great because there is a free tram running from South Terrace to North Terrace during the day. Most shopping, cultural and entertainment venues are near North Terrace. Some of the things we did while in Adelaide included:

• Shopping (or at least window shopping) in Rundle Mall
• Visited the South Australian Museum (free entry)
• Wandered down North Terrace admiring the statues and old majestic buildings, and through Adelaide University to the River Torrens
• Lunch and shopping in the Central Market, which includes Chinatown and some good Asian grocers
• Tram to Glenelg Beach
• Coopers Pale and Sparkling Ales, as well as red wines at the Austral and Exeter on Rundle Street
• Dinner at the Red Ochre Restaurant (see me separate review), as well as at pubs and restaurants around Adelaide

On Friday we borrowed Brentons Pajero and drove up to Cleland Wildlife Park. Here is a great collection of Australian animals, most of which you can get close to and feed. We saw: kangaroos, koalas, Tasmanian devils, emus, echidnas, bandicoots, wallabies, wombats and all sorts of birds. There is also a snake farm. Well worth a visit if you are in Adelaide.

On Saturday morning Mum and Dad arrived in Adelaide and we all went up to Barossa Valley for some wine tasting. The first stop was Chateau Barossa, a new winery built by the guy who owned Chateau Yaldara. The wines were not special, but the highlight was the large rose garden outside. It was opened by the Queen Elizabeth II on here previous visit to Australia. Lunch was at a snack shop in Tanunda (Wan tried a Hamburger with the lot and was full after 1/3 of it). Then on to Jacob's Creek Winery which had some nice wines.

Back on Adelaide we had dinner at the Gilbert Hotel. It was great food and atmosphere until I noticed the last couple of mouthfuls of my chicken schnitzel was uncooked. Not sure how much of it was uncooked but luckily there were no side effects the next day.

On Sunday we made our way to Mum and Dad's home in Kongorong near Mt Gambier (about 450km south of Adelaide).

The most questions I get from friends in Australia (and elsewhere) are along the lines: How is the weather in Thailand? And from Thai's here, one of the first questions they ask after meeting you is Do you like the weather in Thailand? Whatever I answer, most people do not fully comprehend, especially those:

• Australians and others that are used to seasons (Summer, Autumn/Fall, Winter, Spring), and haven't spent an extended period in South-east Asia
• Thai's that bring out the jackets, long trousers and scarves during "winter" when the minimum temperature drops to 20°C

So maybe some facts and figures will help explain the difference in weather between Thailand (Bangkok) and Australia (Mt Gambier and Adelaide). Adelaide is the capital city of South Australia, and is where I worked and lived for 12 years. Mt Gambier is where I grew up, and most of my family still live. It is about 500 km south of Adelaide, and known to be much cooler and wetter than Adelaide. The state of South Australia is the driest state in the driest (inhabited) continent on Earth.

The following table summarises the average maximum temperature, average minimum temperature, and yearly rainfall for the three locations. On average, Bangkok is about 10°C hotter than the locations in Australia! However, this is the average over the year - Australia has same extremely hot temperatures during summer. In Adelaide there 5 to 10 days per year with the temperature above 40°C. The most recent hottest day I recall was 46°C! In Bangkok, it seldom (if ever) reaches 40°C.

The difference in rainfall is also significant: Bangkok is twice as wet as Mt Gambier, and three times as wet as Adelaide. In short, when it rains in Thailand, it rains a lot!

The follow graphs show some more detail of the temperature and rainfall on a monthly basis. This is good for illustrating the difference between seasons.

In Bangkok, it is warm to hot all year. And the overnight temperature hardly drops below 20°C. The only respite you get is around December. This year (2007), there was about 2 weeks of "winter" when I actually felt cold when getting out of bed in the morning. One night I walked outside at 10pm in shorts and t-shirt and had a slight feeling of coldness. But this "winter" was brief (mid-December) - I am back sleeping with an air-conditioner on.

In Mt Gambier and Adelaide, the seasons are more pronounced: hot in summer, cold in winter. Even in summer you get cooler temperatures overnight. Another comparison: I guess I have slept without air-conditioning in Bangkok for about 20 days per year. In Adelaide, it was about half that many days when I slept with the air-conditioning on.

Although the temperature does not distinguish seasons in Bangkok, the rainfall does. A wet season (May to November) and a dry season.

In summary, although the weather is a lot different to that which I am used to in Australia, I cope well with it in Thailand. I actually like the warm weather, and am dreading going back to Mt Gambier in March 2008 (which may contain some 40+ days) and having to get out the jeans and jumpers.

Source of weather data: Australian Bureau of Meteorology and BBC.