Adelaide Natural Environment

Whenever you visit an Australian city it's always worth checking out the local Botanic Gardens - all the cities seem to have them, they usually cover hundreds of acres of land, and the pride that seems to be taken in maintaining an area of beauty away from the city centre probably deserves an award. Adelaide's Botanic Gardens cover 120 acres, are almost next door to Adelaide Zoo, and contain a large lake by which you can sit and soak up the atmosphere even if you're not in the mood to wander. Every Australian city seems to create it's Botanic Gardens with a different purpose in mind, and the ones in Adelaide appear to be very much about relaxation - whereas the gardens in Brisbane, for example, were covered in woodland and animal habitats, Adelaide seems to be more about plants and flowers and wide open grassy spaces covered in horticultural displays. Rather than feeling as though you are actually walking through a woodland and experiencing a real return to nature, you move between conservatories showcasing different plant and flower species or wander through small gardens of carefully arranged flowers. I prefer the less organised and more natural feel of Brisbane where you can wander on a boardwalk along the reed beds by the river, watching things darting about in the water while surrounded by dense woodland. The main attraction of Adelaide's Botanic Gardens is the International Rose Garden - an area surrounding the Bicentennial Conservatory and showcasing nearly five thousand different types of rose. Pathways meander through the Rose Garden, which is divided into sections according to type, purpose and colour - one moment you can find yourself surrounded by sweet smelling red roses, the next you're looking at The Children's Rose or the Sir Cliff Richard Rose, or something equally bizarre. It seems that they have a Rose for every occasion here, and in the adjacent National Rose Trial Garden, the idea is to create a place where new varieties can be tested to see if they can stand the climate of Australia. I don't care how tough you think you are, you really do get swept away by the colour and the smell - at some point, the benches scattered around the garden draw you to them and you have to sit down, open a bottle of water and just surround yourself with colour and smell for half an hour before moving on.

You can read my full travel journals at http://www.offexploring.com/globalwanderer and http://www.offexploring.com/globalwanderer2