Follow the Light

Both Roger and the cat were glad to have me home: the cat complained at length about the substandard brushing he had received while I was away, and Roger was just glad to have someone else to share the load of cat-brushing duties.

"He's sitting in the wrong chair and he only brushed me thrice a day. I insist that you do better."

Cat brushing done for the day, we sat down to plan our remaining time in cat-brush housesit.  "You know," said Roger.  "If we want to go to Illuminate Adelaide, we'll have to go tonight.  It's forecast to rain soon and after that we'll be busy."  Which was a good point, so we ditched the planning and went to Illuminate Adelaide instead.

Illuminate Adelaide, in case you hadn't guessed, was Adelaide's answer to Vivid Sydney, and we wandered along Rundle Street looking at light shows projected onto buildings and not being entirely impressed because it was cold and I was tired.

 

Hmm, OK I suppose.

The lack of impression lasted until we got to the Botanic Gardens where we hemmed and hawed and dithered about spending our money to wander through a light show in the Gardens.  After all, how good could a few lights in the trees be?

Pretty good, as it turns out. Enough to make me forget about being cold and tired, anyway.

We followed a pathway through the gardens, with guides popping out to redirect anyone who got so distracted by the lights that they wandered from the path.

It all started off as expected with trees illuminated by lights, and lots of pretty reflections...

 

As expected...

...and then the lights started dancing all over the lake and we both oohed and aahed along with everyone else and discovered ourselves to be very impressed after all. 

Now that's pretty. 

Dragging ourselves away from the lake we followed the lights to a tree tunnel where, had I been a Lord Of The Rings aficionado I would have been somewhat concerned about the Eye of Sauron.  But I wasn't, and I just followed the light along with everyone else and enjoyed the patterns of foliage and shadow amongst the trees.

But there was more!  We left Sauron's light behind and entered a wonderland of fairy lights where fellow explorers loomed and disappeared on winding pathways through banks of mist.

I expect to see a faerie any minute now.

 

I am impressed, I promise.

 Finally, reluctantly, we left fairyland behind and found ourselves at the tropical greenhouse which didn't look particularly welcoming, being grey and forbidding and filled with 'exotic' tropical plants from faraway places like Queensland.

Roger felt quite blue about the whole thing.

Of course I should have known better, because inside disco balls spattered stars all over the exotic foliage, and I got to stand in a rain of light.

I need alight umbrella.

 

Beam me up.

After nearly two hours we emerged, blinking, from the Botanic Gardens and declared the entry money well spent after all.

A final light wave.

By that time I really was tired, and Roger's back was complaining about standing around in the cold even though his brain was still up for some more light-induced oohing and aahing, so we wandered back to the car past a little bit more of Illuminate Adelaide.

I'd already met this fella in Melbourne.

And of course on the way there was an opportunity for an obligatory Illuminate Adelaide selfie to round out the night.

Goodnight!