Surf's Up

HAPPY NEW YEAR! Here's my hangover cure: a walk on the beach. I walked from home to the beach by the Somerton Surf Lifesaving Club. These volunteer groups are all up and down the coast and provide lifesaving services for swimmers. They also have planes and helicopters that routinely patrol, but the on-the-beach people are volunteers, and mostly high school students by the looks of it. Here's an old rescue boat parked in the Somerton club's back yard.

Water is a bit of an issue in Australia. In order to not arouse the ire of your neighbors by irrigating a big garden with City water, many folks with the $$$ haved drilled their own wells -- they are called "bores" in Australia. So, now irrigate away! However, becuase of a couple dry seasons (and too many people...), the City has banned new bore construction to keep aquifer levels from falling more.

Here's the beach cafe at the club (closed on New Years Day).
Times from home:
12 minute bike ride
20 minute jog
35 minute walk

Here's the real appeal of the club: cheap beer and Friday night dinner. Sunset view. Oh yeah. Sally -- let's check this place out our First Friday. Tables 16, 17, and 18 are 2-ups on the 2nd floor with the sunset view. I'll call 8298 7112 and reserve one!

It turns out the Somerton club is a Coopers Beer establishment. There are two camps in Adelaide beach clubs: 1) Coopers -- the local more or less microbrewery, and 2) West End -- this is the cheap beer you buy when you're in high school. Thankfully, $4 pints of Coopers Pale Ale here! Haleleulia!

Here are the lifesavers hard at work.

This is the pathway down to the beach.

Oh, I hate hangovers -- nice to relax a bit.

Here's the leg-side view.

Doo dee doo dee dooo...So I decided to walk down the beach to Glenelg, where I could take a bus back home (or walk).


Here's a little video of playing in the surf. Yay waterproof camera.

After a while I started seeing these little guys. A fellow playing cricket on the beach with his family told me that they're called "blue bottoms" and are pretty rare 'round here. I suspect they were probably blown in by the super strong southerly winds (just listen to the wwhhhhhooooooshhhhhhh in the video...).

So, I got up a little higher on the beach, walked to Glenelg, and caught the 600U bus that dropped me off about a 2 minute walk from our place in Warradale in about 5 or 10 minutes. Nice.

Here's the Crossroads Church I checked out last weekend -- as seen from the bus. It's about a 5 minute bike ride from home. I can still smell the perfume of the retirees!

OK -- more soon!