Yorke Peninsula

Yorke Peninsula
http://www.yorkepeninsula.com.au/


Weekend trip to the Yorke Peninsula last November.

Had several rounds of great oysters that we bought on the side of the road for $5/dozen. Mmm...

Had fun taking cool photography, such as this shot of an on-coming storm. At night we got to watch cool lightning while enjoying a glass of wine from our cabin balcony - yup, it's a tough life...

The photographer's picture, and me taking a picture of the photographer.

We hit a round of golf on the Sunday on this cute country course that had a great water hazard where you had to tee off over the ocean. Craig made it, I didn't -


but I did get a great series of photos from it...

Ready...Set...Go...Bugger...

A couple more nice shots to go...

Shipwreck in Innes National Park


This is actually from a previous trip, but we thought we'd include it here. Camping by the jetty as part of a school trip to visit rural South Australia.



Port Victoria Jetty

Clare Valley & the Riesling Trail

Cycling Clare Valley's Riesling Trail

In April we had a great weekend camping and cycling the 'Riesling Trail' in the Clare Valley wine region with Cathy and Alex.

Two hours or so north of Adelaide, this wine region has lots of yummy wineries and restaurants, and a great cycle trail along an old railway line.

http://www.clarevalley.com.au/home.asp


The Riesling Trail

Unfortunately wineries tend to put themselves in and around hills so it's a lot of work! And the younger of our group did better than some...

Good thing there are some perks...

Note: Although this type of hydration doesn't improve the performance much, it does help with the enthousiasm and seems to dull the leg pains!

The Wineries (or a couple of them anyway)

Sevenhill Cellars - one of the oldest winery in the region it is run by Jesuits who moved to the region in the 1850s (see http://www.sevenhillcellars.com.au/). Very pretty.

The cellars where the fortified wines are aging

Elisabeth trying to get a sneak preview of next years bottle...

Learning the art of the vigneron

Cardinham Family Winery

Enjoying a wine and a lunch platter at Penna Lane winery

It is definitely a rough life over here...

Camping

At the end of the day, relaxing at the campsites.











And there is always the good ol' aussie rural landmark - the windmill used for pumping up bore water. (I know, not particularly related to wineries, but it was by the campground and I liked the pictured.)

Arapiles April 2007

Mount Arapilies, Victoria, Australia

A very large, strange chunk of rock smack bang in the middle of a flat, flat landscape. Do you need any other reason for deep contemplation???

Pam contemplating geological origins...

We went camping to Mt. Arapiles last weekend to enjoy the outdoors and the last of the warm(ish) weather before winter begins in this part of the world.

Mt Arapiles is a 4 1/2 hour drive from Adelaide (see http://www.parkweb.vic.gov.au/1park_display.cfm?park=148), and aside from being geologically interesting (maybe?? Dad??), it's a great spot for climbing - in fact it's a bit of a climbing mecca for Aussie climbers in the area. (check out http://www.chockstone.org/Arapiles/Arapiles.htm)

Craig and I did a bit of climbing then Matt and Pam (Craig's cousin and his girlfriend) joined us for some great hiking and yummy camping-eats.

Check out some of the pictures...

Relaxing at the top!

But it was a little bit of work to get there...


Luckily it wasn't all work; definitely had time to enjoy the view, pose pretty for the cameras, and explore a bit at the top.

Craig rock-surfing...

Sadly, not a lot of waves to catch around there.


And finally a well-deserved lunch at the end!

Our campsite

And seen from the top

Our campsite is called 'The Pines', which should help in picking it out in the picture...

The main wall of Mount Arapiles

Royal Flying Doctors Experience

Royal Flying Doctor Service

As part of the Flinders Rural Health Club I got to take part in a pretty cool extracurricular activity 2 weeks ago - got to go on a ride-along on a couple Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS) flights.

The RFDS is the rural/remote emergency medical service which flies to Australia's many small towns and remote areas with doctors and nurses to provide on-site emergency care, bring patients to hospital and transfer them from small country hospitals to big city specialists, etc. (see http://www.flyingdoctor.net/).

Although there is only a doctor on board 20% of the time now - usually it's just a nurse, the patient(s) and the pilot, it was pretty cool to see how it's all set up, and some of the things you have to watch out for when air transferring sick patients.

This is a patient pick-up in Renmark.

The inside of the plane; looking back at the patient care area,
and looking forward to the cockpit.

Being able to see South Australia from the co-pilot's seat was an added bonus!

Pilot posing by his plane for me at the end of the day!

Introduction

Hi! This is Craig and Elisabeth's DownUnder Blog.

Although we're starting our blog a year late, hopefully you'll forgive us and be satisfied with being kept up to date a little more consistently at least from now on!

First to introduce ourselves with one of my favourite pictures taken in Thailand in 2005 (aren't we cute? :)).

As most of you know, we are currently living in Adelaide, South Australia where I (Elisabeth) am in my second year of medical school at Flinders Uni... (http://www.flinders.edu.au/)

This is the main plaza at Uni and the view of the beach in the distance behind our two-tone brown car. It's a really nice campus with hills, sports fields that I cross every day to get to class, and the main southern Adelaide hospital, FMC.

... and Craig is working at Pfitzners in the Adelaide Hills making beautiful Australian timber furniture
(see company website at http://www.pfitzner.com.au/),

as well he has joined the local volunteer SES unit- the South Australian State Emergency Services. His unit mainly deals with storm damage, fallen trees, car v building (more common then you think!!) and search & rescue.


Just to recap a bit of our first year:
It was great!
I learned a lot of medicine and managed to pass; Craig is enjoying his work with solid-wood furniture, and getting really good at making great brain food (yup, I am totally milking the fact that he is a better cook than I!!); and we have managed to meet some great new people, visit the neighbourhood and go on many adventures throughout the year.

Enjoying lots of backyard BBQs...

and a yummy Canadian Thanksgiving dinner.








Lots of hikes in the neighbourhood, including this one at Onkaparinga Gorge.







Looking good at Medball 2006 - "Dancing in the swinging 20s"!








In case you haven't seen them already, some pictures of our adventures can be found on our old photo site at http://albums.photo.epson.com/j/AlbumList?u=4282105

And in case you need a reminder of where exactly Adelaide is...
(if you can't see it well enough click here)