Adventureworld

This Saturday, Tamasin and I had a total brainwave for our first EaRN girls' day out of 2014: What better way to (a) put work stress to the back of our minds and (b) combat the extreme heat than with a trip to the water park? I hadn't seen Tamasin for a whole month, as she'd finished her Honours and spent December working at the hospital and Christmas and New Year in Melbourne, so a catch up was well overdue. She's just found out she's been given a presentation slot at ANS (the Annual Neuroscience Symposium) at the end of January, which is a huge deal; 10,000 experts (academics and doctors) gather in Adelaide for five days of talks, presentations and posters on the newest breakthroughs in Neuroscience research. It's unfortunate that placement students can't apply for a free trip because the entire lab appears to be attending but, on the bright side, the office will be deserted and I doubt my services will be needed too much during that week. Anyway, her freak-out was making my literature review situation look calm and collected, so I suggested that we take a day out from preparing to use the discounted tickets I'd purchased on Groupon last month. Whenever I saw their advert on TV, I got the impression that Adventureworld wasn't exactly Alton Towers and more aimed at young kids, but figured it could still be fun.

Adventureworld is 15km (a 20-minute drive) from my place in Peppermint Grove

On Saturday morning, I woke up sweating. Even with two fans aimed at my bed, that's how hot it was. Tamasin picked me up in a car laden with parasols, cold drinks and ice packs and we headed south to Bibra Lake. The temperature gauge in the car said 41; English people are not built to deal with this business! Stepping out of the car into the stifling heat, we made quick work of getting through the gates and finding a spot in the shade, where we set up our little camp. Yes, there were hoards of annoying children on their school holidays terrorising the place, but we had a ball testing out the rides. There was one huge rollercoaster called Abyss, but all the rest were of a carnival size, although still great fun. My favourite moment was probably us sitting opposite two girls around the age of 13 on one of those twisty, roley poley jobs; one of them was absolutely terrified and screamed the entire time, much to our delight.

The saviour of the day was most definitely the water. As the temperature climbed to a stonking 44, being able to hop into a pool of cool water was heavenly. Water rides are some of my favourites and they had the best ones where you go down rapids in big rubber rings. The fact that we were parked up adjacent to a shallow pool in the shade also made for fantastic Slushie breaks.

We dined on a lovely spread of chips, dips, cheese, crackers and mint M&Ms, before reapplying the suncream and heading back out into the heat. A ride on the super-slow chair lift (just like being in Val Thorens) to the top of the park, where we stood in line for the generic tower ride that launches you into the sky at a ridiculous speed. It was so hot that removing your flip flops had to be done when you were already in your seat because the ground actually blistered your feet. We were again blessed with a very scared man sitting adjacent to us, who provided great entertainment during the countdown to the launch, which the attendant paid absolutely no attention to and just pressed the button when we weren’t expecting it.

Waiting for the dreaded countdown...

By 5pm, we were all sunned-out and ready to go home. We stopped at IGA on the way home for Magnums and I bid Tamasin goodbye with promises of motivational texts during our work-filled Sundays. It must have been only a matter of minutes post-shower before I was conked out on my bed with a slight case of sunburn, very sore feet and memories of a great day.