Revisiting Hahndorf

40 years ago I celebrated my 21st birthday at The Old Mill in Hahndorf, South Australia. Both it and I are still standing unlike so many other buildings from my past. The house I spent the first 14 years of my life has gone, as has the primary and high schools, the hospital I was born in, the house I first lived in here in Perth some 25 years ago, and probably many other buildings of significance in my life.

One of the Adelaide Hills' most famous towns, Hahndorf is Australia's oldest surviving German settlement. It was settled by a Lutheran migrants in 1838 and the German influence is very apparent and is seen physically in the traditional fachwerk architecture of the original surviving buildings. Due to the First World War in Europe, in 1917 the South Australian Government changed many German place names. The name Hahndorf was changed to Ambleside and this remained until the late 1930s, when it reverted to Hahndorf. There are still references to the name Ambleside in and around the town today.

Gaby and I had a nice hour wandering along the main street of this nice village in the Adelaide Hills. We finished off by going to the Hahndorf Arms for a couple of german sausages and beer and were entertained there by observing a Japanese filming crew taking photos of a tasting plate of pork sausage and a pork hock. I wonder how gross they found it. My experience of Japanese cuisine is one of small portions, delicate presentation and tastes...The tasting plate in front of them would have to have been the antithesis of that. Noticed that the camera of choice with the team was Canon EOS 5D and I would have dearly loved to look through the viewfinder as it stood firmly on an awesome tripod. I will dream.