Adelaide and Kangaroo Island

We flew from Sydney to Adelaide, in South Australia, on July 5th. We arrived quite early in the morning as our flight left Sydney at 6 am. Once arriving in the airport, we noticed there was a half hour time change, so it was even earlier than expected. Luckily, once we went to our hotel to have them hold our luggage, they stated our room was ready. We put our stuff away and started exploring the city.

Although not large, Adelaide was quite charming. We went to the Adelaide market, which was probably the best market we've been to. It had tons of fruit, vegetables, meat, cheese, bread, pastries, etc. We then walked to the Royal Botanical Gardens, which are supposed to be the nicest in the country. It was huge. There were lots of eucalyptus trees, flowers, water gardens, desert gardens, etc. Because the market was so good, we walked back across town to eat lunch at the market and to pick up breakfast for the next morning. We walked through the outdoor mall, Rundle Mall, which had very few, if any, souvenir shops that we could find...which was nice. It did have a side street with lots of strip clubs and adult clubs, which Ed really enjoyed (just kidding).

The next morning, we woke up at 5:30 and got ready for our tour to Kangaroo Island, which was 6:15 am to 10:45 pm. We took a bus for two and a half hours to the ferry. No one told us that the ferry was going to be incredibly rocky. People and dogs were getting sick like crazy. The whole boat stunk of puke and there were countless numbers of vomit bags in the garbage when we disembarked. Luckily, we didn't get sick. Once we got off the ferry, we went straight onto another bus for the next half hour. Our first stop was a beach where there were sea lions everywhere. The colony consisted of approximately 600 sea lions. There were lots of pups too and they were very active...running, rolling, and whatnot. We then drove to grab a quick lunch and then saw a "birds of prey" show. There was a barn owl that ate a whole mouse, a spotted owl that ate an even bigger mouse, a wedged tail eagle that ate a huge rabbit leg, and a sea eagle that ate a fish. We drove on the bus for a while more and we saw the Remarkable Rocks. Unfortunately, we don't have time to upload the pictures right now as we are doing everything in internet cafes. We then headed to a lighthouse and an arch and saw a whole bunch of seals. And yes, we saw many kangaroos while driving around, dead and alive. In fact, our bus almost hit one. Unfortunately, due to time constraints, we weren't able to see the koalas, although we saw one get run over the next day. The ferry ride back was a little less rocky, but people still got sick. If we were to go again, or if anyone plans on going there, definitely stay there more than one day. It was too rushed doing everything on the bus in one day, and there was a lot to see.