At the end of last year Cold Chisel announced that they were finally touring again and I pounced on the Melbourne tickets – I signed up to every ticket pre-sale site you could imagine – and managed to get tickets to one of the two Melbourne shows… Only thing was, I conveniently booked a trip to Queensland on that same weekend only a week later! Thankfully, as the Melbourne show was a sellout I found someone straight away who wanted my ticket and I did the next best thing, used the concert as an excuse to go to Adelaide again, so off I went, got my Cold Chisel tickets, plane tickets booked and away I went.
As Luke had to work the Friday and then Saturday morning, I flew up by myself early Friday to catch up with a girlfriend of mine from uni. We spent the day out shopping, having lunch, and watch some cricket before heading back to my hotel room to relax before dinner (where we sat and caught up and continued to watch the cricket – we are cricket mad!)
Dinner was at the Adelaide Casino and I was hanging for a classic ‘pub meal’ so had a chicken parma which was spot on what I needed. Then it was time to hit the pokies while at the cas and then we said our farewells.
The next day, as Luke wasn’t anticipated to land until around 2pm, I had a lot of time to kill, so I called an Uber and visited Rundle Mall for the first time. It was a lot bigger than I expected and again, did a spot of shopping – but not too much as only had carry on luggage – and then walked just over a kilometre to Torrens River to pop on a river cruise I saw online. Popeye River Cruises had a special for a 30 minute cruise it was $15, so thought to kill some time I’d pop on that. On the way to the pick up point, I stumbled across Jamie’s Italian and it was an absolute bucketlist item I eat at a Jamie Oliver restaurant and they had a deal; $20 pastas! Once I had found a spot on the boat, I logged on to their website and quickly booked a table for one at 1pm.
The river cruise was a good and insightful trip – which ended up being almost 45 minutes in the end – and gave you a lot of history about Adelaide. They had some drinks and snacks you could purchase on the boat such as slices of cake, tea and coffee and staff were extremely friendly. If you have some time while in Adelaide and have already hit up key things such as the wineries, this is a nice little addition to the mix.
Once I got off the boat, it was a very short walk to Jamie’s Italian – and now the hard part – choosing which pasta to have! I nearly ordered two for the sake of it but the waiter recommended the black truffle tagliatelle so I decided to trust him and have that with a lemon and lime bitters… WOW! This pasta was by far the greatest thing I have ever eaten. I was so full by the end of it but it was too amazing to stop eating. If you are ever anywhere near Jamie’s Italian, you have to try it. I thought the pasta in Venice would be hard to top, but this one was next level.
For dessert, there was a special on a lemon and meringue tart with a berry sorbet so I thought I would give that a go. The lemon meringue was delicious, but I am not a fan of things with seeds in it – I’ve hated them since I was a kid – so the berry sorbet wasn’t for me. All-in-all, very happy with my lunch!
I was so full from all the food that I called another Uber and headed back to my hotel room to have a nap to wait for Luke as his flight kept getting delayed. It got to 4pm and Luke had finally arrived two hours after he was meant to and he had a quick shower so we could go and grab some dinner before going to see Cold Chisel (another bucket list item!).
We headed to Glenelg Beach and decided this time to try BurgA’nomix burger bar, which were pretty awesome burgers. Then we headed into the venue, just in time to listen to Paul Kelly belt out some tunes and then it was time for Chisel to pop on stage.
It was one of the best nights of my life, listening to all the classics played live, among others who love Chisel as much as I do. What made it even better was the atmosphere and the view, concerts played on Glenelg Beach as the sun set, people walking around barefoot and not a care in the world. Everyone was happy, and having fun. There were no incidents (that we saw or heard of at least), it was just a good all-round night. When the boys played Khe Sanh, literal shivers as the crowd sang along and was quickly followed up by my next favourite, Bow River. I was so glad that I had made the trip to witness such an event. And if they ever tour again, I will be the first in line to go.
Towards the end of the concert we left to catch an Uber back to the room as we were flying out pretty early the next day. Have to say that the Ubers in Adelaide were a lot more cheaper than anywhere else we had been and all drivers were friendly and talkative. Our accommodation was perfect. Nothing flash, but had a large and comfortable bed, clean bathroom, TV, mini fridge and plenty of storage space. Breakfree Directors Studios in Adelaide, I would highly recommend staying at, we ended up paying $97.47 for two nights (As I had $40 in Expedia credits from our Europe trip) but even if I didn’t have those credits, it is worth the $136 for two nights for when we stayed.
Have you visited Adelaide before? What are some of your favourite things to see and do? Comment below as I would love some more ideas for next time I am in town (once these borders open up at least!)
The Karissa Diaries 