Canberra - it's a little bit like Peterborough.

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A bit harsh, but you can see why the rest of Australia ridicules it at times. Ange had to go down there for work, so we decided to make a short break of it and booked into a hotel for a night (against the advice of just about everyone I talked to who reckoned I'd have more fun pulling my fingernails out slowly). Instead of going straight there, we zigzagged south, through Bowral and then onto Goulburn, basically so I could see the Big Merino. Every roundabout should have one I reckon, if not two. Thinking about getting one for the back yard. Be the ultimate garden gnome.

Spent most of the night in Canberra in an Irish pub drinking Guinness and eating calamari, which is never a bad way to spend time. Had a bit of a walk about through the Peterborough-y bits, before deciding to call it a night and heading back so Ange could get some work done before the conference. That didn't start until about 12.30 pm, so we had a bit of time in the morning to go round parliament together. Doesn't sound all that interesting I know, but it turned out to be an ok sort of a thing to do. You can waltz up, go through some pretty minimal security and you're in. No problems at all. Once inside you can go just about wherever you want: into both houses of parliament, the halls and up onto the roof. Not exactly riveting in truth, but worth an hour of your time. It gets you over to the other half of the city for a start, which is a much easier on the eye, even if a lot of the museums and embassies that make up the majority of the buildings look a lot alike.

Having done that, I went over to the National Gallery of Australia for one of those blockbuster painting exhibitions that pop up once in a while. The French had loaned out some of the biggest paintings they have which conveniently enough pretty much covered all the things we didn't get around to seeing when we were in Paris. Some nice stuff in the rest of the museum too, so it's definitely worth checking out if you're in Canberra.

Apart form that I haven't got a whole lot new to report. Went down to a rainforest south of us with Kylie a month or two back, which was a very nice spot. Hiked up to the waterfall, which was a pretty hard slog at times. Well worth it though even if you do get overtaken by women pushing prams.

Hope you're all doing well and have a great Easter. Nice to see City turn Leeds over last weekend. Hopefully get to see the game against Tranmere tonight.

Don't overdo the eggs,

Stu and Ange.

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Photos

The Great Hall.
Has a floor just like Hoveton Village Hall. Without the badminton court.

Inside parliament.
The perfect place to slide around in your socks.

The Big Merino.
Meant to stick up the cheesy photo of me gurning in front of it. You'll just have to imagine that instead.

Comments

[Mervyn and Carole]

Happy New year!
Hi Stuart and Ange, thanks for the blogs - we've just found the Christmas one! Canberra looks interesting - Mervyn says you could be slung out of Oz for making such blasphemous comments about your parliament! We're of course building up to our big election (yawn yawn) so we're all in for a boring few months. The big news of course is Wayne Rooney's foot, but he should be OK for the World Cup which is good. Could you please let us have your address and e-mail address so that we can contact you in between blogs, that would be great. Mervyn spoke to Charles this morning and we're hoping to meet up with them at Duxford later in the year, possibly with Iain too which will be jolly. They all seem to be keeping well, as are we thank goodness! It's lovely to keep in touch with you both and to hear how well you're getting on down under. Lots of love, Carole and Mervyn