| Submitted by: David StybrUnited States |
| Submission Date: 14 February 2005 |
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This 45-minute tour gives a good insight into the structure, materials and design of the building. Afterward we perused some of the displays, artwork and of course the gift shop. We're glad we went to Parliament House in the morning, because by noon the underground car park had started to fill up with cars and busses.
We enjoyed lunch at an outdoor café at nearby Manuka Arcade on Franklin Street. Manuka is an area of art-deco shops and cafés near the diplomatic and bureaucratic neighbourhoods. After lunch we drove leisurely along scenic Lake Burley Griffin with views of Old Parliament House, the National Library, the High Court, the Captain Cook Memorial Water Jet, Regatta Point, the Carillon etc.
In the afternoon we visited the Australian War Memorial which stands majestically at the foot of Mount Ainslie and overlooks the wide avenue of Anzac Parade. ANZAC = Australia and New Zealand Army Corps, which joined forces in World War I. Opened in 1941, the Australian War Memorial is a shrine, museum, art gallery and repository of priceless records. It has an impressive collection of wartime relics and pictorial memorabilia, and the Hall of Memory features stained-glass windows, mosaics and the Tomb of the Unknown Australian Soldier. The displays are primarily from the perspective of the ordinary soldier instead of famous commanders. Overall it was fascinating and stirring, but eventually we began to feel that it glorified war a bit too much.
Canberra has several scenic overlooks. Red Hill at 722 metres (2370 feet) and Mount Ainslie at 840 metres (2755 feet) have fine views of the city centre, Parliament House and Lake Burley Griffin. Black Mountain rises to 812 metres (2665 feet) and Telstra Tower and stands 195 metres (640 feet) tall at the summit. Telstra Tower has the revolving Tower Restaurant, where we enjoyed a romantic dinner and some spectacular views of the city as the southern summer sunset approached. In many such towers the food is expensive but mediocre and secondary to the panoramas. However the gourmet cuisine in Telstra Tower was superb and the overall experience was well worth the bill of about AU$100.00 per couple. We're glad we decided to splurge while we were in Canberra. As at the Colonial Tramcar Restaurant in Melbourne and the Wrest Point Casino Restaurant in Hobart, we had expected a meal that was secondary to the splendid panorama or experience, but in all 3 cases we were delightfully surprised that the food was equally splendid.
My favourite single photo is of both of us atop Mount Ainslie in Canberra with Lake Burley Griffin and Parliament House in the background. I set my camera and tripod atop a flight of steps that led down to the main lookout, set the telephoto to maximum and activated the 10-second timer. Then I ran the 20-metre dash to Denise at the rail of the lookout with time to spare. Some other tourists wondered aloud if I would make it in time, but I managed, and didn't sail over the rail either. With the camera 20 metres from us and maximum telephoto, we look normal size while the beautiful background looms impressively large behind us.
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Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve.
Canberra Deep Space Communication Complex.
Cuppacumbalong Craft Centre.
Lanyon Historic Homestead.
After a day of government buildings, we spent Friday mostly outdoors in perfect southern summer weather. Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve is set in eucalyptus forests in mountain ranges 40 kilometres (25 miles) southwest of Canberra. The reserve has large walk-through enclosures of Australian wildlife in very natural settings, such as kangaroos, koalas, emus, waterbirds etc. We spent several hours there and were delighted with the animals and the natural beauty of the gentle mountain landscapes.
Nearby is the Canberra Deep Space Communication Complex, a tracking station run jointly by Australia and the United States to monitor interplanetary spacecraft such as Voyager and Galileo. We also stopped at Cuppacumbalong Craft Centre, an arts & crafts centre built on a former homestead; and at Lanyon Historic Homestead, built in 1835 by John Lanyon as a sheep station on the southern outskirts of the city near the Murrumbidgee River.
Yes, Canberra and the entire Australian Capital Territory are well worth a visit. We are very glad we ignored conventional tourist wisdom, and instead saw Canberra for ourselves. This is probably more than many Australians have done because they seem to overlook their own fabulous national capital. Certainly few foreign visitors know it exists.
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D. Hume Highway: Canberra to New South Wales border.
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Gundagai: The Dog on the Tuckerbox.
Albury: Ettamogah Pub, Memorial Hill, Murray River.
Saturday was our longest drive, 650 kilometres (405 miles) from Canberra to Melbourne. We divided the drive in half. The 1st half took us back into New South Wales and on to its southern border at the Murray River. Hume Highway is mostly freeway from Sydney to Canberra, but in the rest of New South Wales it reverts to a standard 2-lane highway in 8 or 10 large sections. This repeated alternation annoyed us somewhat, but at least these sections had frequent overtaking lanes. These will be upgraded to freeways as well. In Victoria, Hume Highway is a freeway almost throughout.
Hume Highway in New South Wales and Victoria is not the most scenic route for time-conscious tourists, but it is scenic enough. Compared to my daily drive to work near Chicago in January on Interstate 55, an incredibly busy 6-lane superhighway where traffic is bumper-to-bumper at 100 kilometres (60 miles) per hour on sheet ice at -15°C (0°F), Australian roads are a welcome improvement.
Along the way we stopped 8 kilometres east of Gundagai to see The Dog on the Tuckerbox (tucker = food). Gundagai features in several famous songs, particularly the 19th Century bush ballad in which 'The dog sat on the tuckerbox five miles from Gundagai' and refused to help while his master's bullock team was bogged down in a nearby creek. Every Australian knows this ballad from early childhood so we knew it was famous, but we were amazed to see several busloads of Australian tourists crowd around the statue of the Dog on the Tuckerbox. It seemed like just another tourist trap to us, and we couldn't quite understand the big fuss over this great but unpretentious Australian icon. However The Dog on the Tuckerbox Tourist Centre was right next to Hume Highway, and a good excuse to stop and stretch our legs.
Although the great attraction of The Dog on the Tuckerbox eluded us, we heartily enjoyed the grotesque Ettamogah Pub just north of Albury. Ettamogah Pub is a real-life re-creation of a fictional dilapidated Australian pub by cartoonist Ken Maynard, complete with a Foster's Lager truck on the roof. The largest inscription on the east side reads: 'Ettamogah Beer, mate. It tranquilises th' tonsils, tickles th' throat, tantilisises th' taste buds, soothes savage thirsts, pleases th' palate, recharges your batteries, & tastes good too, mate!' Ettamogah Village is a tourist trap and proud of it. It is also great fun, well worth a visit.
Albury itself was founded 4 June 1859 along the Murray River and now has a population of 43,200. It is a pleasant city with lovely views of the surrounding area from atop Monument Hill. Albury is at about the halfway point between Canberra and Melbourne, which makes it a good place for a lunch stop and a short rest.
The Murray River forms most of the border between the states of New South Wales and Victoria. It flows 2600 kilometres (1600 miles) from the Great Dividing Range in northeast Victoria into Encounter Bay south of Adelaide, South Australia. Its waters, and those of its major tributaries the Darling and Murrumbidgee Rivers, are used for irrigation and hydroelectricity. It was named for Sir George Murray, Secretary for the Colonies.
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Reminiscences of Australia: V. Victoria.
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. Victoria: 5 days, 28 December 1996 - 1 January 1997.
General information.
Hume Highway: Victoria border to Melbourne.
Wodonga.
Beechworth.
Williamstown.
Nelson Place.
Williamstown Beach.
Port Phillip Bay.
Melbourne.
Yarra River.
Southgate Complex.
City Circle Tram tour.
Healesville Animal Sanctuary.
Ballarat: Sovereign Hill.
Colonial Tramcar Restaurant.
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Victoria:
Area: 228,000 square kilometres (88,000 square miles)
State population: 4,500,000
State capital: Melbourne, city population 3,200,000
Victoria is the smallest but most multi-faceted state on the mainland, with a history that is intertwined with the 19th Century quest for gold. Permanent European settlers arrived at Port Phillip Bay in the centre of the southern coast only in 1835. Today 3/4 of the state population remains centred around this vast bay. The rest of the state is scattered with picturesque rural communities which stretch from the temperate rainforests in the east, across the majestic alpine areas of the central High Country, to the western desert regions of the Mallee.
Victoria (VIC) occupies only 3% of the Australian continent but is the 2nd most populous state. It is bordered by New South Wales to the north, South Australia to the west, Bass Strait to the south and the Pacific Ocean to the east. The Great Dividing Range curves east-west across the centre of the state. The highest peak is Mount Bogong at 1988 metres (6522 feet). The eastern and southern parts of the state are fertile rolling farm country. The dry, western, volcanic plains merge into the desert wilderness areas in the northwest. Approximately 35% of the land is forested, and Victoria has 31 national and 46 state parks.
Melbourne, Victoria: Population: city 3,200,000. State capital, founded 1835, now 2nd largest city in Australia. Youngest city of its size on Earth. Largest network of trams on Earth. Latitude 38°S, longitude 145°E (analogous to San Francisco, California or Wichita, Kansas at 38°N). Late December sunrise 5:55 AM, sunset 8:45 PM; average December temperatures 12 - 26°C (54 - 79°F).
Melbourne, Victoria is the 2nd largest city in Australia, the financial, fashion, cultural and culinary centre of the country and a dignified, gracious and very charming city. On the Yarra River near Port Phillip Bay, Melbourne is simultaneously cosmopolitan and suburban, cultivated and sport crazy, conservative and avant-garde. It is a commercial centre with such industries as ships, automobiles, farm machinery, textiles and electrical equipment. It has some of the finest shopping, restaurants, nightlife and sporting calendar in Australia. |
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