A Capital Idea! - A Tale of Two Cities

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Yes, we're in Canberra, Australia's national capital, and a place where most traveller's dare not even venture! We thought that we should come here before we headed to Sydney, the city that most people think is the capital, and give poor old Canberra a chance to impress these two backpackers.

A brief history of federal Australia - Australia is a federation of six states and two territories, and it's well known that Sydney, in New South Wales, and Melbourne, in Victoria, have become Australia's two biggest and most populous cities. Thus, when it came to deciding where the nation's capital would be all hell broke lose! To stop this catfight in it's tracks the national compromise stated that a new city should be built, at least 160 kilometres away from Sydney, half way between the two rivals! The site of Canberra was chosen for its rolling hills and four seasons climate, the previous occupants were sheep farmers, who argued the city was a waste of good grazing land well after the city was up and running (the previous occupants before them were obviously the aboriginal population, where the name 'Canberra' originates - a nice gesture when you've stolen all the land - it means 'meeting place' apparently).

Designed by American architect Walter Burely Griffin, the city is pretty difficult for backpackers to navigate, the streets are all duel carriageway boulevards which sweep across the city in a very grandious style. The car rules in Canberra, which means we had to catch buses everywhere and even fork out for a taxi from the airport (this is a pretty shocking extra cost for backpackers like ourselves!). Our hostel was actually more of a bed and breakfast, which was kind of cute, and unlike most places we stay it was in a leafy suburb (actually Canberra is one huge leafy suburb, but hey).

Canberra's workforce is largely employed in the public sector, working for the federal government, and this really showed - on our first day walking to the bus we observed the locals drinking their coffee at the local cafes, suited and booted. We headed straight for the centre of the city, Parliament House, which is neatly tucked into Capital Hill, to symbolise that the government is not looking down on its citizens, but instead you can walk all over it! Well maybe we missed the point there, but it was cool to be standing on top of a hill knowing there was a parliament beneath your feet! We had a pretty good guided tour of the chambers, but there were some pretty dubious claims about the architecture and its meanings - we thought the fountain was there to look pretty, but apparently it's there to conceal state secrets which may be overheard. Also, the chambers aren't red and green, they are the colour of the eucalyptus leaves and blossom. Why? Can't they just admitt they stole all their ideas from the British Houses of Parliament? Guess not.

Saddest part of Canberra was running into the now imfamous (amoung Joanna and James) West Austrailian racist male. We've avoided mentioning it up till now, but it really hasn't been a one off - even since leaving Western Australia. On this occasion, the person in question had a perfectly nice conversation about mueseums and travelling with us, when he suddenlly felt he needed to fill a pause in the dialogue by blurting out that Australian museums were being ruined by talking about Aboriginal history, adding the line we have heard about a dosen times 'They just can't help themselves'. ARGH! We give up, we really do, we've tried everything - including blaming ourselves, after all it was the British which started it! Joanna usually likes to challange this point of view, but we've both given up, we just sat in silence even Joanna didn't think she could take on this one, the battle had already been lost.

Incidentally, the National Museum was very good and was probably the highlight of our trip, not particularly high-brow, but very cool and modern, with lots of self examination and vegemite references! We wrapped up our visit by eating in some of Canberra's cute cafes, which were really nice - no Kangaroo yet, but very good food! And so, if you are coming to Australia and thinking about Canberra, please go - don't give it a miss because the usual crowd say 'it's dull', make the effort, just try to avoid the touring Western Australians!

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Photos

Parliament House
See how it fits nicely into capital hill?

View Across to Anzac Parade
The long stretching boulevards reminded us of European cities

National Museum of Australia
Sculpture outside the main entrance