SA Drink Of The Week

Graham Kilsby interview

The Kilsby Sinkhole episode is live now but its show notes will be updated Thursday, August 1, in the evening.

The Kilsby Sinkhole episode is live now but its show notes will be updated Thursday, August 1, in the evening.

A weekly podcast recorded in Adelaide that puts South Australian passion on centre stage with a featured guest who joins us each week as a co-presenter to share how they're pursuing their passions. We venture across topics as diverse as history, wine, food, art, music, relationships, critical thinking, health, news, interviews, chat and quizzes. 

Every single interview, every single show, unlocks insights into what drives people to be doing what they're doing and what keeps them striving. 

The Adelaide Show is produced by Steve Davis and Nigel Dobson-Keeffe.

Please subscribe to our In Crowd list; you get an email each Friday (when we have published a new episode) with an overview of that week's show. Plus, consider joining our Inner Circle; a small group of passionate South Aussies who allow us to pick their brains and gain interviewee suggestions.

This podcast began life as Another Boring Thursday Night In Adelaide from episodes 1-79.

A podcast recorded in Adelaide that puts South Australian passion on centre stage with a featured guest who joins us each week as a co-presenter to share how they're pursuing their passions. We venture across topics as diverse as history, wine, ...

The Adelaide Show

A podcast recorded in Adelaide that puts South Australian passion on centre stage with a featured guest who joins us to share how they're pursuing their passions. We venture across topics as diverse as history, wine, food, art, music, relationships, critical thinking, health, and general news. Every single interview, every single show, unlocks insights into what drives people to be doing what they're doing and what keeps them striving. The Adelaide Show is produced by Steve Davis, and ends with an original song by a South Australian artist. Please subscribe to our In Crowd list; you get an email each Friday with an overview of that week's show. This podcast began life as Another Boring Thursday Night In Adelaide from episodes 1-79.

A podcast recorded in Adelaide that puts South Australian passion on centre stage with a featured guest who joins us to share how they're pursuing their passions. We venture across topics as diverse as history, wine, food, art, music, relationships, critical thinking, health, and general news. Every single interview, every single show, unlocks insights into what drives people to be doing what they're doing and what keeps them striving. The Adelaide Show is produced by Steve Davis, and ends with an original song by a South Australian artist. Please subscribe to our In Crowd list; you get an email each Friday with an overview of that week's show. This podcast began life as Another Boring Thursday Night In Adelaide from episodes 1-79.

Steve Davis talks to Graham Kilsby and Jen Will about the Kilsby Sinkhole near Mount Gambier

286 - The Kilsby Sinkhole

Dr Samantha Battams

Musical Pilgrimage

South Australia’s History Festival gets a fitting soundtrack in episode 432, and it arrives in three distinct voices: a geneticist-historian overturning stones in founding-era South Australia, Mr South Australia himself bringing context and colour to every corner of the conversation, and an original paddle steamer shanty that had Keith Conlon attempting to haul imaginary ropes.

Dr Samantha Battams is back for her fourth visit to the Adelaide Show, this time with a book that drops her own family tree right into the founding moments of this state.

There is no SA Drink of the Week in this episode. The interview was recorded at the State Library with a room booking that had a firm end time, so Steve, Keith, and Samantha made the most of every minute with stories instead.

The Musical Pilgrimage this episode is Steve Davis and the Virtualosos performing Away Away: The Canally Crew Song, an original river shanty written in tribute to the paddle steamer PS Canally, which is being restored at Morgan and set to relaunch in late May 2026, and the song features in Keith and Steve’s show, History Hit Parade show at the Mercury Cinema.

You can navigate episodes using chapter markers in your podcast app. Not a fan of one segment? You can click next to jump to the next chapter in the show. We’re here to serve!

The Adelaide Show Podcast: Awarded Silver for Best Interview Podcast in Australia at the 2021 Australian Podcast Awards and named as Finalist for Best News and Current Affairs Podcast in the 2018 Australian Podcast Awards.

And please consider becoming part of our podcast by joining our Inner Circle. It’s an email list. Join it and you might get an email on a Sunday or Monday seeking question ideas, guest ideas and requests for other bits of feedback about YOUR podcast, The Adelaide Show. Email us directly and we’ll add you to the list: podcast@theadelaideshow.com.au

If you enjoy the show, please leave us a 5-star review in iTunes or other podcast sites, or buy some great merch from our Red Bubble store – The Adelaide Show Shop. We’d greatly appreciate it.

And please talk about us and share our episodes on social media, it really helps build our community. Oh, and here’s our index of all episode in one concise
page.

Running Sheet: All Singing All Reading South Australian History Festival

00:00:00 Intro

Introduction

00:00:00 SA Drink Of The Week

There is no SA Drink Of The Week this week.

00:02:09 Dr Samantha Battams on Paving the Way

May is South Australian History Festival month, and if you want to know why that matters, consider this: the western suburb we now call Grange was once known as Reedbeds, where Captain Charles Sturt made his first home while the colony was being developed. One of our guest’s ancestors was the gardener there. Dr Samantha Battams has written a book that puts her own family tree right in the founding moments of this state, and she’s launching it at the History Festival on 15th May. Samantha, has previously been on The Adelaide Show in 249 – Captain Harry Butler and his Red Devil, 279 – The Secret Art Of Poisoning, and 344 – True Crime SA style.

The western suburb we now know as Grange was once called Reedbeds. Captain Charles Sturt made his home there in the colony’s earliest days, and one of Dr Samantha Battams’ ancestors was his gardener. That’s the kind of connection Paving the Way is full of.

Battams’ three-times great-grandfather, Johann Gramp, arrived at Kangaroo Island in 1837 as an eighteen-year-old orphan aboard a vessel that wrecked shortly after. He had lost both parents by age seven, worked for a baker in Bavaria, and made his way to Hamburg where the South Australia Company was recruiting German labourers. He would go on to establish what Keith Conlon describes as the first commercial vineyard near Jacobs Creek.

Keith also notes that he gets there by a roundabout route, and Samantha fills in the Bavarian versus Prussian distinctions that get flattened when viewed from Australian distance. The animosity ran deep enough that during the First World War, Bavarians were reportedly directing Allied forces toward Prussian positions. The Prussian Lutheran refugees who arrived sponsored by George Fife Angus get their own thread. Their pastor Kavel had travelled to London and secured passage for a group who had been holding secret chapel meetings in barns rather than accept the king’s new prayer book.

One Schulz ancestor was accused by the pastor of leaving for earthly reasons rather than faith. Steve’s response: “I think had it been the time of the prosperity gospel, he would’ve been welcomed with open arms.

“From Germany to Ireland, and the Fahy family from County Clare. Edmund Fahy arrived with two younger sisters, one of them just ten years old, and the family was almost immediately separated. Edmund headed to the Kapunda mines while the girls went south with an aunt. Samantha spent years untangling the network of Irish immigrants who came out together, sponsored one another, and intermarried across the colony.

One thread leads to Dave Graney. “I’ve always loved Dave Graney,” Battams says. “I didn’t know I was related to him.”

The Rumbleow family at Encounter Bay ran the first tourist operations in the area. Caroline Rumbleow, who married a man named John Cakebread (“What a name,” says Steve), was said to be the inspiration for a character in the novel Paving the Way by Simpson Newland, which also gives Battams’ book its title.

Family accounts suggest Newland followed Caroline to the Ballarat goldfields and asked her to leave her husband. It did not eventuate.

Samantha undertook a cultural consultation before writing sections involving Aboriginal people. Old newspaper language was either replaced with more appropriate terminology in square brackets or, in one case involving a funeral pyre, stripped of its sensationalist framing while the story itself was kept. She also describes firsthand colonial accounts of a corroboree of 500 people on the banks of the Torrens near what is now the Paradise Bridge.

The interview closes on a revelation hidden since 1890. Battams had her DNA tested to find her adopted father’s biological family, and dismissed a recurring surname, Hazelhurst, as irrelevant to her mother’s side. A later ancestry update showed 25 per cent of her DNA tracing to northwest England and Wales. Following the Hazelhurst name led to Christchurch, New Zealand, and to the conclusion that her great-grandmother Edith Thompson was already pregnant when she married, with a father other than the man recorded.

The cover of Paving the Way is a photograph of Edith and Battams’ grandfather. “The true story had been kept from 1890 to 2025,” Battams says.

Paving the Way is being launched at the 2026 History Festival on 15 May. Dr Lanie Anderson, a previous Adelaide Show guest (107 – Lainie Anderson: View from the hills), will launch the book.

00:27:59 Musical Pilgrimage

In the Musical Pilgrimage, we feature Steve Davis & The Virtualosos‘ “river shanty” song, Away Away (The Canally Crew Song).

Steve Davis wrote this original river shanty after time spent aboard the PS Marion, sister vessel to the PS Canally, a paddle steamer launched in 1907 that is now being restored at Morgan ahead of a relaunch in late May 2026.

Keith Conlon puts the song in context: Morgan once had queues of paddle steamers and six freight trains a day departing with river cargo. He also produces a story about a paddle steamer loaded with materials to build a pub at Bourke that ran aground in a drought and only floated free two years later, by which point the pub had been built by other means.

Away Away is one of ten original songs Steve has written about South Australia for History Hit Parade, the show he and Keith Conlon are performing at Mercury Cinema during the 2026 South Australian History Festival. Keith is confident audiences will want to sing along. A stage jig from Keith is, in his own assessment, highly in doubt. Booking details are in this link: History Hit Parade tickets and information. It’s on Monday, May 11, 11am, and Sunday, May 17, at 4pm and it will simply be an enjoyable show of historical anecdotes, fun, and music.

South Australia&rsquo;s History Festival gets a fitting soundtrack in episode 432, and it arrives in three distinct voices: a geneticist-historian overturning stones in founding-era South Australia, Mr South Australia himself bringing context and colour to every corner of the conversation, and an original paddle steamer shanty that had Keith Conlon attempting to haul imaginary ropes.
Dr Samantha Battams is back for her fourth visit to the Adelaide Show, this time with a book that drops her own family tree right into the founding moments of this state.
There is no SA Drink of the Week in this episode. The interview was recorded at the State Library with a room booking that had a firm end time, so Steve, Keith, and Samantha made the most of every minute with stories instead.
The Musical Pilgrimage this episode is Steve Davis and the Virtualosos performing&nbsp;Away Away: The Canally Crew Song, an original river shanty written in tribute to the paddle steamer PS Canally, which is being restored at Morgan and set to relaunch in late May 2026, and the song features in Keith and Steve&rsquo;s show,&nbsp;<a href="https://events.humanitix.com/history-hit-parade">History Hit Parade show at the Mercury Cinema</a>.
You can navigate episodes using chapter markers in your podcast app. Not a fan of one segment? You can click next to jump to the next chapter in the show. We&rsquo;re here to serve!
The Adelaide Show Podcast: Awarded Silver for&nbsp;Best Interview Podcast in Australia&nbsp;at the 2021 Australian Podcast Awards and named as Finalist for&nbsp;Best News and Current Affairs Podcast&nbsp;in the 2018 Australian Podcast Awards.
And please consider becoming part of our podcast by joining our Inner Circle. It&rsquo;s an email list. Join it and you might get an email on a Sunday or Monday seeking question ideas, guest ideas and requests for other bits of feedback about YOUR podcast, The Adelaide Show. Email us directly and we&rsquo;ll add you to the list:&nbsp;<a href="mailto:podcast@theadelaideshow.com.au">podcast@theadelaideshow.com.au</a>
If you enjoy the show, please&nbsp;<a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/another-boring-thursday-night/id696302138">leave us a 5-star review&nbsp;</a>in iTunes or other podcast sites, or buy some great merch from our Red Bubble store &ndash;&nbsp;<a href="https://www.redbubble.com/people/theadelaideshow/shop?asc=u">The Adelaide Show Shop</a>. We&rsquo;d greatly appreciate it.
And please talk about us and share our episodes on social media, it really helps build our community. Oh, and here&rsquo;s&nbsp;<a href="https://theadelaideshow.com.au/complete-list-adelaide-show-episodes/">our index of all episode in one concise page.</a>
Running Sheet: All Singing All Reading South Australian History Festival
00:00:00&nbsp;Intro
Introduction
00:00:00&nbsp;SA Drink Of The Week
There is no SA Drink Of The Week this week.
00:02:09&nbsp;Dr Samantha Battams on&nbsp;Paving the Way
May is South Australian History Festival month, and if you want to know why that matters, consider this: the western suburb we now call Grange was once known as Reedbeds, where Captain Charles Sturt made his first home while the colony was being developed. One of our guest&rsquo;s ancestors was the gardener there.&nbsp;<a href="https://www.samanthabattams.com/">Dr Samantha Battams</a>&nbsp;has written a book that puts her own family tree right in the founding moments of this state, and she&rsquo;s launching it at the History Festival on 15th May. Samantha, has previously been on The Adelaide Show in&nbsp;<a href="https://theadelaideshow.com.au/podcast-episodes/249-captain-harry-butler-and-his-red-devil/">249 &ndash; Captain Harry Butler and his Red Devil</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://theadelaideshow.com.au/podcast-episodes/279-the-secret-art-of-poisoning/">279 &ndash; The Secret Art Of Poisoning</a>, and&nbsp;<a href="https://theadelaideshow.com.au/podcast-episodes/344-true-crime-sa-style/">344 &ndash; True Crime SA style</a>.
The western suburb we now know as Grange was once called Reedbeds. Captain Charles Sturt made his home there in the colony&rsquo;s earliest days, and one of Dr Samantha Battams&rsquo; ancestors was his gardener. That&rsquo;s the kind of connection&nbsp;Paving the Way&nbsp;is full of.
Battams&rsquo; three-times great-grandfather, Johann Gramp, arrived at Kangaroo Island in 1837 as an eighteen-year-old orphan aboard a vessel that wrecked shortly after. He had lost both parents by age seven, worked for a baker in Bavaria, and made his way to Hamburg where the South Australia Company was recruiting German labourers. He would go on to establish what Keith Conlon describes as the first commercial vineyard near Jacobs Creek.
Keith also notes that he gets there by a roundabout route, and Samantha fills in the Bavarian versus Prussian distinctions that get flattened when viewed from Australian distance. The animosity ran deep enough that during the First World War, Bavarians were reportedly directing Allied forces toward Prussian positions. The Prussian Lutheran refugees who arrived sponsored by George Fife Angus get their own thread. Their pastor Kavel had travelled to London and secured passage for a group who had been holding secret chapel meetings in barns rather than accept the king&rsquo;s new prayer book.
One Schulz ancestor was accused by the pastor of leaving for earthly reasons rather than faith. Steve&rsquo;s response: &ldquo;I think had it been the time of the prosperity gospel, he would&rsquo;ve been welcomed with open arms.
&ldquo;From Germany to Ireland, and the Fahy family from County Clare. Edmund Fahy arrived with two younger sisters, one of them just ten years old, and the family was almost immediately separated. Edmund headed to the Kapunda mines while the girls went south with an aunt. Samantha spent years untangling the network of Irish immigrants who came out together, sponsored one another, and intermarried across the colony.
One thread leads to Dave Graney. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve always loved Dave Graney,&rdquo; Battams says. &ldquo;I didn&rsquo;t know I was related to him.&rdquo;
The Rumbleow family at Encounter Bay ran the first tourist operations in the area. Caroline Rumbleow, who married a man named John Cakebread (&ldquo;What a name,&rdquo; says Steve), was said to be the inspiration for a character in the novel&nbsp;Paving the Way&nbsp;by Simpson Newland, which also gives Battams&rsquo; book its title.
Family accounts suggest Newland followed Caroline to the Ballarat goldfields and asked her to leave her husband. It did not eventuate.
Samantha undertook a cultural consultation before writing sections involving Aboriginal people. Old newspaper language was either replaced with more appropriate terminology in square brackets or, in one case involving a funeral pyre, stripped of its sensationalist framing while the story itself was kept. She also describes firsthand colonial accounts of a corroboree of 500 people on the banks of the Torrens near what is now the Paradise Bridge.
The interview closes on a revelation hidden since 1890. Battams had her DNA tested to find her adopted father&rsquo;s biological family, and dismissed a recurring surname, Hazelhurst, as irrelevant to her mother&rsquo;s side. A later ancestry update showed 25 per cent of her DNA tracing to northwest England and Wales. Following the Hazelhurst name led to Christchurch, New Zealand, and to the conclusion that her great-grandmother Edith Thompson was already pregnant when she married, with a father other than the man recorded.
The cover of&nbsp;Paving the Way&nbsp;is a photograph of Edith and Battams&rsquo; grandfather. &ldquo;The true story had been kept from 1890 to 2025,&rdquo; Battams says.
<a href="https://festival.history.sa.gov.au/events/author-talk-dr-samantha-battams-paving-the-way/">Paving the Way&nbsp;is being launched at the 2026 History Festival on 15 May</a>. Dr Lanie Anderson, a previous Adelaide Show guest (<a href="https://theadelaideshow.com.au/podcast-episodes/107-lainie-anderson-view-hills/">107 &ndash; Lainie Anderson: View from the hills</a>), will launch the book.
00:27:59&nbsp;Musical Pilgrimage
In the Musical Pilgrimage, we feature&nbsp;Steve Davis &amp; The Virtualosos&lsquo; &ldquo;river shanty&rdquo; song,&nbsp;<a href="https://stevedavis.com.au/blog/away-away-the-canally-crew-song/">Away Away (The Canally Crew Song)</a>.
Steve Davis wrote this original river shanty after time spent aboard the&nbsp;<a href="https://exploremidmurray.com.au/experience/heritage-riverboats/ps-marion/">PS Marion</a>, sister vessel to the&nbsp;<a href="https://exploremidmurray.com.au/experience/heritage-riverboats/ps-canally/">PS Canally</a>, a paddle steamer launched in 1907 that is now being restored at Morgan ahead of a relaunch in late May 2026.
Keith Conlon puts the song in context: Morgan once had queues of paddle steamers and six freight trains a day departing with river cargo. He also produces a story about a paddle steamer loaded with materials to build a pub at Bourke that ran aground in a drought and only floated free two years later, by which point the pub had been built by other means.
Away Away&nbsp;is one of ten original songs Steve has written about South Australia for&nbsp;<a href="https://events.humanitix.com/history-hit-parade">History Hit Parade</a>, the show he and Keith Conlon are performing at&nbsp;<a href="https://themercury.org.au/">Mercury Cinema</a>&nbsp;during the 2026&nbsp;<a href="https://festival.history.sa.gov.au/">South Australian History Festival</a>. Keith is confident audiences will want to sing along. A stage jig from Keith is, in his own assessment, highly in doubt. Booking details are in this link:&nbsp;<a href="https://events.humanitix.com/history-hit-parade">History Hit Parade tickets and information</a>.&nbsp;It&rsquo;s on Monday, May 11, 11am, and Sunday, May 17, at 4pm and it will simply be an enjoyable show of historical anecdotes, fun, and music.

Dr Samantha Battams joins Steve Davis and Keith Conlon for a deep dive into her new book Paving the Way, tracing the founding families of South Australia from German vineyards to Irish immigration and one very surprising DNA revelation, before Keith and Steve preview their upcoming History Festival show, History Hit Parade, with a rousing original river shanty.

432 - All Singing All Reading South Australian History Festival

Wayne Taylor

When 80,000 people descend on an event, somebody has made it look effortless. Wayne Taylor has spent three decades being that somebody, from the Sydney 2000 Olympics to Wimbledon, Formula One on three continents, and right here in Adelaide at the Clipsal 500. His company, First Facilities Group, now brings that same discipline to commercial and residential properties (and events) across Adelaide.

There is no SA Drink of the Week this episode, but Wayne does weigh in on the relative merits of beer events versus wine events versus spirit events, and the answer is exactly what you would expect from a man who has cleaned up after all three.

The Musical Pilgrimage features Steve Davis and the Virtualosos performing “Cellar Door Shuffle,” a celebration of the great South Australian wine country ritual, which also gets a preview mention for the upcoming History Hit Parade show at the Mercury Cinema.

You can navigate episodes using chapter markers in your podcast app. Not a fan of one segment? You can click next to jump to the next chapter in the show. We’re here to serve!

The Adelaide Show Podcast: Awarded Silver for Best Interview Podcast in Australia at the 2021 Australian Podcast Awards and named as Finalist for Best News and Current Affairs Podcast in the 2018 Australian Podcast Awards.

And please consider becoming part of our podcast by joining our Inner Circle. It’s an email list. Join it and you might get an email on a Sunday or Monday seeking question ideas, guest ideas and requests for other bits of feedback about YOUR podcast, The Adelaide Show. Email us directly and we’ll add you to the list: podcast@theadelaideshow.com.au

If you enjoy the show, please leave us a 5-star review in iTunes or other podcast sites, or buy some great merch from our Red Bubble store – The Adelaide Show Shop. We’d greatly appreciate it.

And please talk about us and share our episodes on social media, it really helps build our community. Oh, and here’s our index of all episode in one concise
page.

Running Sheet: Gather Round To Learn About Major Events

00:00:00 Intro

Introduction

00:00:00 SA Drink Of The Week

There is no SA Drink Of The Week this week.

00:02:17 Wayne Taylor, First Facilities Group

Right now, as Gather Round unfolds across South Australia, tens of thousands of people are doing what they always do at a footy match: finding a seat, grabbing a pie, visiting the loo, and not once thinking about any of it. That invisibility is because someone’s doing their job brilliantly. Wayne Taylor has spent the better part of three decades making sure that when 80,000 people descend on an event, the wheels don’t fall off. He’s done it at the Sydney Olympics. At Wimbledon. At Formula One races on three continents. At Clipsal 500 when 200 staff, 15 supervisors and a $300,000 budget had to deliver a spotless result across four days. And he’s done it right here in Adelaide, quietly, at events you almost certainly attended. He now runs First Facilities Group, bringing that same discipline to commercial and residential properties across Adelaide.

Wayne Taylor has a habit most of us would find exhausting. Every time he walks into a building, he is quietly checking the mirrors, the bins, the general state of things. It is not fussiness. It is decades of conditioning that started when his parents cleaned Memorial Drive as a boy from Broken Hill, and he mostly just got in the way by raiding the office stationery drawers. That origin story matters because the values Wayne brings to First Facilities Group now, respect, honesty, and an obsessive eye for what others walk past, were baked in early. As he puts it, “If you can’t get your housekeeping correct, how can you then operate your business?” It is a lens that applies equally to a gleaming corporate lobby and to the pit lane at Albert Park.

The stories from his career read like an event passport. At the Sydney Olympics he managed 1,100 staff, set an 80% minimum recycling target, and navigated vehicle bomb checks just to get to work each morning. At Wimbledon, he learned that a single cigarette butt on the ground was enough to earn a conversation with the CEO, and that some corporate boxes were quietly serving spirits in coffee cups because you cannot legally drink alcohol watching football in England. At Formula One, a certain unnamed driver, “Mansell,” parked his car next to the waste compactor despite clear signage, and paid for it when a bin tipped onto the vehicle. Wayne watched from the level above and, eventually, laughed.

The Clipsal 500 holds a particular place in his story. He worked it for twelve years and is clear-eyed about what it meant to Adelaide after the Grand Prix left in 1995: “The place went dead.” The Clipsal helped rebuild that. His team delivered the best margin in the company that year not through corner-cutting but through relentless post-event debriefs, 4am starts, and crews walking the entire circuit in a line with headlamps, because the lighting was never quite good enough.

One of the sharper insights in this conversation is about the people who do this work. Wayne keeps what he calls a little Bible, a list of standout workers from each event. The good ones get taken to lunch, thanked properly, and connected to the next opportunity, whether that is the Grand Prix in Melbourne or something interstate. It is empathetic at a human level, and it also happens to be smart: one well-led supervisor with 20 people will outperform a rabble of 50.

His principles for First Facilities Group are unchanged: respect, honesty, punctuality, and a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work. He once disciplined his own teenage son for repeated lateness in front of the whole crew, because anything less would have been unfair to everyone else. That is the standard he holds himself to and expects from others.

01:08:34 Musical Pilgrimage

In the Musical Pilgrimage, we feature Steve Davis & The Virtualosos‘ new song, Cellar Door Shuffle.

This song is a love letter to the ritual of winery visits across South Australia, from the Hills to Barossa, McLaren Vale to the Clare.

Wayne is still in the room for this one, and Steve uses it to draw a neat contrast from the week’s main themes: beer events are loud, spirit events are rough, wine events are, as Wayne says, “a little more sophisticated.”

The song will also feature in the History Hit Parade show with Keith Conlon at the Mercury Cinema. It’s on Monday, May 11, 11am, and Sunday, May 17, at 4pm and it will simply be an enjoyable show of historical anecdotes, fun, and music.

When 80,000 people descend on an event, somebody has made it look effortless. Wayne Taylor has spent three decades being that somebody, from the Sydney 2000 Olympics to Wimbledon, Formula One on three continents, and right here in Adelaide at the Clipsal 500. His company, First Facilities Group, now brings that same discipline to commercial and residential properties (and events) across Adelaide.
There is no SA Drink of the Week this episode, but Wayne does weigh in on the relative merits of beer events versus wine events versus spirit events, and the answer is exactly what you would expect from a man who has cleaned up after all three.
The Musical Pilgrimage features Steve Davis and the Virtualosos performing &ldquo;Cellar Door Shuffle,&rdquo; a celebration of the great South Australian wine country ritual, which also gets a preview mention for the upcoming&nbsp;<a href="https://events.humanitix.com/history-hit-parade">History Hit Parade show at the Mercury Cinema</a>.
You can navigate episodes using chapter markers in your podcast app. Not a fan of one segment? You can click next to jump to the next chapter in the show. We&rsquo;re here to serve!
The Adelaide Show Podcast: Awarded Silver for&nbsp;Best Interview Podcast in Australia&nbsp;at the 2021 Australian Podcast Awards and named as Finalist for&nbsp;Best News and Current Affairs Podcast&nbsp;in the 2018 Australian Podcast Awards.
And please consider becoming part of our podcast by joining our Inner Circle. It&rsquo;s an email list. Join it and you might get an email on a Sunday or Monday seeking question ideas, guest ideas and requests for other bits of feedback about YOUR podcast, The Adelaide Show. Email us directly and we&rsquo;ll add you to the list:&nbsp;<a href="mailto:podcast@theadelaideshow.com.au">podcast@theadelaideshow.com.au</a>
If you enjoy the show, please&nbsp;<a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/another-boring-thursday-night/id696302138">leave us a 5-star review&nbsp;</a>in iTunes or other podcast sites, or buy some great merch from our Red Bubble store &ndash;&nbsp;<a href="https://www.redbubble.com/people/theadelaideshow/shop?asc=u">The Adelaide Show Shop</a>. We&rsquo;d greatly appreciate it.
And please talk about us and share our episodes on social media, it really helps build our community. Oh, and here&rsquo;s&nbsp;<a href="https://theadelaideshow.com.au/complete-list-adelaide-show-episodes/">our index of all episode in one concise page.</a>
Running Sheet: Gather Round To Learn About Major Events
00:00:00&nbsp;Intro
Introduction
00:00:00&nbsp;SA Drink Of The Week
There is no SA Drink Of The Week this week.
00:02:17&nbsp;Wayne Taylor, First Facilities Group
Right now, as Gather Round unfolds across South Australia, tens of thousands of people are doing what they always do at a footy match: finding a seat, grabbing a pie, visiting the loo, and not once thinking about any of it. That invisibility is because someone&rsquo;s doing their job brilliantly.&nbsp;Wayne Taylor has spent the better part of three decades making sure that when 80,000 people descend on an event, the wheels don&rsquo;t fall off. He&rsquo;s done it at the Sydney Olympics. At Wimbledon. At Formula One races on three continents. At Clipsal 500 when 200 staff, 15 supervisors and a $300,000 budget had to deliver a spotless result across four days. And he&rsquo;s done it right here in Adelaide, quietly, at events you almost certainly attended.&nbsp;He now runs&nbsp;<a href="https://firstfacilitiesgroup.com.au/">First Facilities Group</a>, bringing that same discipline to commercial and residential properties across Adelaide.
Wayne Taylor has a habit most of us would find exhausting. Every time he walks into a building, he is quietly checking the mirrors, the bins, the general state of things. It is not fussiness. It is decades of conditioning that started when his parents cleaned Memorial Drive as a boy from Broken Hill, and he mostly just got in the way by raiding the office stationery drawers.&nbsp;That origin story matters because the values Wayne brings to First Facilities Group now, respect, honesty, and an obsessive eye for what others walk past, were baked in early. As he puts it, &ldquo;If you can&rsquo;t get your housekeeping correct, how can you then operate your business?&rdquo; It is a lens that applies equally to a gleaming corporate lobby and to the pit lane at Albert Park.
The stories from his career read like an event passport. At the Sydney Olympics he managed 1,100 staff, set an 80% minimum recycling target, and navigated vehicle bomb checks just to get to work each morning. At Wimbledon, he learned that a single cigarette butt on the ground was enough to earn a conversation with the CEO, and that some corporate boxes were quietly serving spirits in coffee cups because you cannot legally drink alcohol watching football in England. At Formula One, a certain unnamed driver, &ldquo;Mansell,&rdquo; parked his car next to the waste compactor despite clear signage, and paid for it when a bin tipped onto the vehicle. Wayne watched from the level above and, eventually, laughed.
The Clipsal 500 holds a particular place in his story. He worked it for twelve years and is clear-eyed about what it meant to Adelaide after the Grand Prix left in 1995: &ldquo;The place went dead.&rdquo; The Clipsal helped rebuild that. His team delivered the best margin in the company that year not through corner-cutting but through relentless post-event debriefs, 4am starts, and crews walking the entire circuit in a line with headlamps, because the lighting was never quite good enough.
One of the sharper insights in this conversation is about the people who do this work. Wayne keeps what he calls a little Bible, a list of standout workers from each event. The good ones get taken to lunch, thanked properly, and connected to the next opportunity, whether that is the Grand Prix in Melbourne or something interstate. It is empathetic at a human level, and it also happens to be smart: one well-led supervisor with 20 people will outperform a rabble of 50.
His principles for First Facilities Group are unchanged: respect, honesty, punctuality, and a fair day&rsquo;s pay for a fair day&rsquo;s work. He once disciplined his own teenage son for repeated lateness in front of the whole crew, because anything less would have been unfair to everyone else. That is the standard he holds himself to and expects from others.
01:08:34&nbsp;Musical Pilgrimage
In the Musical Pilgrimage, we feature&nbsp;Steve Davis &amp; The Virtualosos&lsquo; new song,&nbsp;<a href="https://stevedavis.com.au/blog/cellar-door-shuffle/">Cellar Door Shuffle</a>.
This song is a love letter to the ritual of winery visits across South Australia, from the Hills to Barossa, McLaren Vale to the Clare.
Wayne is still in the room for this one, and Steve uses it to draw a neat contrast from the week&rsquo;s main themes: beer events are loud, spirit events are rough, wine events are, as Wayne says, &ldquo;a little more sophisticated.&rdquo;
The song will also feature in the&nbsp;<a href="https://events.humanitix.com/history-hit-parade">History Hit Parade</a>&nbsp;show with Keith Conlon at the Mercury Cinema. It&rsquo;s on Monday, May 11, 11am, and Sunday, May 17, at 4pm and it will simply be an enjoyable show of historical anecdotes, fun, and music.

Wayne Taylor, the man quietly keeping South Australia’s biggest events spotless, takes Steve Davis behind the scenes of the Olympics, Wimbledon, Formula One, and the old Clipsal 500, in an episode recorded right on Gather Round weekend, with the Musical Pilgrimage pausing to celebrate the Cellar Door Shuffle.

431 - Gather Round To Learn About Major Events

Joe Evans

Joe Evans was last on the show in 2018, picking grapes and talking about his craft. A lot has changed at Ballycroft Vineyard & Cellars since then. Joe has turned a $6,000-a-year electricity bill into a source of profit, using 33 kilowatts of solar, a bidirectional V2G converter, and two Nissan Leafs to run his house, his winery, and his cellar door without drawing from the grid. He believes Ballycroft is the world’s first winery to make and mature wine entirely on solar and car battery power. Photos of Joe for the show notes and the podcast player, were taken by Thomas Wielecki.

There is no SA Drink of the Week this episode, though Joe does give a tantalising description of his 100% Mataro and a very limited release Small Berry Shiraz Pressings 2022 that had already sold half its 400-bottle run within a month of release.

For the Musical Pilgrimage, Steve shares an original composition recorded with his virtual session band, The Virtuosos. Another Bloody Year was written just a fortnight before recording, prompted by rising fuel costs, global instability and a CS Lewis speech from 1939 that turns out to be as timely as ever.

You can navigate episodes using chapter markers in your podcast app. Not a fan of one segment? You can click next to jump to the next chapter in the show. We’re here to serve!

The Adelaide Show Podcast: Awarded Silver for Best Interview Podcast in Australia at the 2021 Australian Podcast Awards and named as Finalist for Best News and Current Affairs Podcast in the 2018 Australian Podcast Awards.

And please consider becoming part of our podcast by joining our Inner Circle. It’s an email list. Join it and you might get an email on a Sunday or Monday seeking question ideas, guest ideas and requests for other bits of feedback about YOUR podcast, The Adelaide Show. Email us directly and we’ll add you to the list: podcast@theadelaideshow.com.au

If you enjoy the show, please leave us a 5-star review in iTunes or other podcast sites, or buy some great merch from our Red Bubble store – The Adelaide Show Shop. We’d greatly appreciate it.

And please talk about us and share our episodes on social media, it really helps build our community. Oh, and here’s our index of all episode in one concise
page.

Running Sheet: Small Winemaker, Big Wines, Zero Power Bills

00:00:00 Intro

Introduction

00:00:00 SA Drink Of The Week

There is no SA Drink Of The Week this week, but we encourage you to browse the Ballycroft Vineyard & Cellar online store.

00:04:19 Joe Evans, Ballycroft Vineyard & Cellars

If you have ever stared at a power bill and felt a quiet fury, Joe Evans is the person you need to hear. Back in the late 2010s, South Australian electricity was already the most expensive in the country at around 28 cents per kilowatt hour. It is now around 58 cents, which Joe says makes South Australia second most expensive in the Western world. His response was not to complain but to act.

The journey started in 2019 when Joe purchased a 40-kilowatt Nissan Leaf from a rural dealership, becoming what he believes was the first person in Australia to buy an EV from such a dealer. The car he specifically chose because it had bidirectional capability: charge it during the day, discharge it at night to power the house and winery. The catch was that the V2G converter needed to make that work took three and a half years to get Australian standards approval. Joe was the first residential and small business owner in the country to install one.

Walk through a 24-hour cycle at Ballycroft Vineyard & Cellars and you begin to see how elegantly the system operates. From around 6am, the car battery powers the morning rush: kettles, hair dryers, the household waking up. Once the sun rises and the 33-kilowatt solar array kicks in, the car recharges within an hour or two while simultaneously running the house and winery. During vintage, when the fermentation chillers are working hard around the clock, Joe uses one car’s full 60-kilowatt battery per night. His figure from last year: 42 kilowatts used across 42 days of fermentation. That is one kilowatt a day, or about 58 cents. Without the system, it would have been closer to $30 a day.

He is now running two Nissan Leafs, a “his and hers” arrangement after his wife fell in love with the original car. The second, a secondhand 2021 60-kilowatt model purchased for $36,000, he describes as a generator on wheels. He bought it primarily for the battery. A 50% government rebate later led him to add a home battery as well, though the cars still do the heavy lifting.

For listeners weighing up an EV, Joe offers practical advice grounded in four years of real-world use: keep the battery between 20% and 80%, never leave it at 100%, and prioritise V2G capability when choosing a car. He notes that Tesla has explicitly ruled out V2G to protect its wall battery sales, while many newer European and Chinese models are building it in. A new Wallbox Quasar 2 with CCS2 compatibility is expected to arrive at around $5,000, down from the $10,000 Joe paid.

The conversation also covers range anxiety (real but shrinking as infrastructure grows), tyre and brake wear (largely a non-issue in his experience), battery degradation (his six-year-old car has less degradation than comparable models that only drove, because running the house draws power far more gently than driving does), and what to do when the power goes out. Joe’s answer to that last one: nothing, because the system keeps running regardless.

“Have control of your own energy. It’s a good feeling.” – Joe Evans

00:59:58 Musical Pilgrimage

In the Musical Pilgrimage, we feature Steve Davis & The Virtualosos’ new song, Another Bloody Year.

Steve frames this segment with a reference to John Schumann being told to stay in his lane after posting about Australian involvement in potential conflict, and responds with CS Lewis’s 1939 speech to Oxford students on the eve of the Second World War: “Life has never been normal.”

Against that backdrop, Steve shares an original song written a fortnight before recording, reflecting on the cost ordinary people pay when leaders make reckless decisions. The final verse lands with quiet force, borrowing a line from Schumacher: “All of us should live more simply so that others might simply live.” If there is a singer looking for material with genuine weight, Steve has flagged this one as available.

Joe Evans was last on the show in 2018, picking grapes and talking about his craft. A lot has changed at Ballycroft Vineyard &amp; Cellars since then. Joe has turned a $6,000-a-year electricity bill into a source of profit, using 33 kilowatts of solar, a bidirectional V2G converter, and two Nissan Leafs to run his house, his winery, and his cellar door without drawing from the grid. He believes Ballycroft is the world&rsquo;s first winery to make and mature wine entirely on solar and car battery power. Photos of Joe for the show notes and the podcast player, were taken by Thomas Wielecki.
There is no SA Drink of the Week this episode, though Joe does give a tantalising description of his 100% Mataro and a very limited release Small Berry Shiraz Pressings 2022 that had already sold half its 400-bottle run within a month of release.
For the Musical Pilgrimage, Steve shares an original composition recorded with his virtual session band, The Virtuosos.&nbsp;Another Bloody Year&nbsp;was written just a fortnight before recording, prompted by rising fuel costs, global instability and a CS Lewis speech from 1939 that turns out to be as timely as ever.
You can navigate episodes using chapter markers in your podcast app. Not a fan of one segment? You can click next to jump to the next chapter in the show. We&rsquo;re here to serve!
The Adelaide Show Podcast: Awarded Silver for&nbsp;Best Interview Podcast in Australia&nbsp;at the 2021 Australian Podcast Awards and named as Finalist for&nbsp;Best News and Current Affairs Podcast&nbsp;in the 2018 Australian Podcast Awards.
And please consider becoming part of our podcast by joining our Inner Circle. It&rsquo;s an email list. Join it and you might get an email on a Sunday or Monday seeking question ideas, guest ideas and requests for other bits of feedback about YOUR podcast, The Adelaide Show. Email us directly and we&rsquo;ll add you to the list:&nbsp;<a href="mailto:podcast@theadelaideshow.com.au">podcast@theadelaideshow.com.au</a>
If you enjoy the show, please&nbsp;<a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/another-boring-thursday-night/id696302138">leave us a 5-star review&nbsp;</a>in iTunes or other podcast sites, or buy some great merch from our Red Bubble store &ndash;&nbsp;<a href="https://www.redbubble.com/people/theadelaideshow/shop?asc=u">The Adelaide Show Shop</a>. We&rsquo;d greatly appreciate it.
And please talk about us and share our episodes on social media, it really helps build our community. Oh, and here&rsquo;s&nbsp;<a href="https://theadelaideshow.com.au/complete-list-adelaide-show-episodes/">our index of all episode in one concise page.</a>
Running Sheet: Small Winemaker, Big Wines, Zero Power Bills
00:00:00&nbsp;Intro
Introduction
00:00:00&nbsp;SA Drink Of The Week
There is no SA Drink Of The Week this week, but we encourage you to browse the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ballycroft.com/wines">Ballycroft Vineyard &amp; Cellar online store</a>.
00:04:19&nbsp;Joe Evans, Ballycroft Vineyard &amp; Cellars
If you have ever stared at a power bill and felt a quiet fury, Joe Evans is the person you need to hear. Back in the late 2010s, South Australian electricity was already the most expensive in the country at around 28 cents per kilowatt hour. It is now around 58 cents, which Joe says makes South Australia second most expensive in the Western world. His response was not to complain but to act.
The journey started in 2019 when Joe purchased a 40-kilowatt Nissan Leaf from a rural dealership, becoming what he believes was the first person in Australia to buy an EV from such a dealer. The car he specifically chose because it had bidirectional capability: charge it during the day, discharge it at night to power the house and winery. The catch was that the V2G converter needed to make that work took three and a half years to get Australian standards approval. Joe was the first residential and small business owner in the country to install one.
Walk through a 24-hour cycle at&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ballycroft.com/">Ballycroft Vineyard &amp; Cellars</a>&nbsp;and you begin to see how elegantly the system operates. From around 6am, the car battery powers the morning rush: kettles, hair dryers, the household waking up. Once the sun rises and the 33-kilowatt solar array kicks in, the car recharges within an hour or two while simultaneously running the house and winery. During vintage, when the fermentation chillers are working hard around the clock, Joe uses one car&rsquo;s full 60-kilowatt battery per night. His figure from last year: 42 kilowatts used across 42 days of fermentation. That is one kilowatt a day, or about 58 cents. Without the system, it would have been closer to $30 a day.
He is now running two Nissan Leafs, a &ldquo;his and hers&rdquo; arrangement after his wife fell in love with the original car. The second, a secondhand 2021 60-kilowatt model purchased for $36,000, he describes as a generator on wheels. He bought it primarily for the battery. A 50% government rebate later led him to add a home battery as well, though the cars still do the heavy lifting.
For listeners weighing up an EV, Joe offers practical advice grounded in four years of real-world use: keep the battery between 20% and 80%, never leave it at 100%, and prioritise V2G capability when choosing a car. He notes that Tesla has explicitly ruled out V2G to protect its wall battery sales, while many newer European and Chinese models are building it in. A new Wallbox Quasar 2 with CCS2 compatibility is expected to arrive at around $5,000, down from the $10,000 Joe paid.
The conversation also covers range anxiety (real but shrinking as infrastructure grows), tyre and brake wear (largely a non-issue in his experience), battery degradation (his six-year-old car has less degradation than comparable models that only drove, because running the house draws power far more gently than driving does), and what to do when the power goes out. Joe&rsquo;s answer to that last one: nothing, because the system keeps running regardless.
&ldquo;Have control of your own energy. It&rsquo;s a good feeling.&rdquo; &ndash; Joe Evans
00:59:58&nbsp;Musical Pilgrimage
In the Musical Pilgrimage, we feature Steve Davis &amp; The Virtualosos&rsquo; new song,&nbsp;<a href="https://stevedavis.com.au/blog/another-bloody-year/">Another Bloody Year</a>.
Steve frames this segment with a reference to John Schumann being told to stay in his lane after posting about Australian involvement in potential conflict, and responds with CS Lewis&rsquo;s 1939 speech to Oxford students on the eve of the Second World War: &ldquo;Life has never been normal.&rdquo;
Against that backdrop, Steve shares an original song written a fortnight before recording, reflecting on the cost ordinary people pay when leaders make reckless decisions. The final verse lands with quiet force, borrowing a line from Schumacher: &ldquo;All of us should live more simply so that others might simply live.&rdquo; If there is a singer looking for material with genuine weight, Steve has flagged this one as available.

Episode 430 takes you to Greenock in the Barossa, where small winemaker Joe Evans explains how solar panels and two Nissan Leaf EVs not only erased his power costs but made him what he believes is the world’s first winery to ferment, store and mature wine using car battery power at night, with Steve rounding out the episode with an original song reflecting on the state of the world.

286 - The Kilsby Sinkhole

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