Canberra ACT

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We arrived in Sydney and spent the night in the airport Ibis with a view to catching the Murrays coach to Canberra at 8am. When the various States became a federation in 1910 there was a major dispute about whether the capital should be in Melbourne or Sydney - to resolve it they created the Administrative Capital Territory and hence Canberra! Being such a new city there are not many historic sites but the Parliament has moved into a new building so you can visit both old and new. We started by visiting the new Parliament and had a guided tour of the building. Unlike most cities, the Parliament is quite a distance from the centre so you either rely on buses or be prepared to walk ( it was 28 degrees that day!) It's quite an impressive building, built in 1988 with 4,700 rooms and you can go up to the roof and have an uninterrupted view of the Old Paliament building and the War Memorial. The 81m flagpole is set on a stand so that you can see through it from the War Memorial, the idea being that Australia should keep looking forward. We then visited the Old Parliament Building which was built in 1927. Between 1901 and 1927 Federal parliament was situated in Melbourne. The Old Pariament House was only supposed to be provisional until a permanent building could be built. It operated for 61 years and has been left just as it would have been in 1988. It also houses a museum and a café. The highlight has to be the War Memorial which is geographically in line with the parliament buildings. We were absolutely blown away by the Memorial which houses a massive war museum on 3 levels, mostly underground, which we didn't know was there! We only expected to spend a short time there on Saturday but ended up staying more than 3 hours. There is a lot of Anzac history but it covers all sorts of twentieth century conflicts. It has airplanes inside including a Lancaster Bomber, a Spitfire, a Fokka and others. There are also shoft film shows courtesy of Sir Peter Jackson!! Had time allowed we would have gone back. The Memorial itself is a really impressive piece of architecture which was only opened in 1941 At the far end there is a chapel where the Unknown Australian Warrior was reburied In 1993. There are 5 stained glass windows each with 3 panels representing a characteristic required by members of the Armed Forces; Devotion, Patriotism etc. and the walls are covered in Italian mosaic. Each of the Armed Forces is represented including the Nursing Corps. The Role of Honour panels cover both sides of the outdoor galleries and Honour those who lost their lives from the Boer War up to Afghanistan. On the day we visited there had been a ceremony to celebrate the return of service personnel from Afghanistan with an address from Tony Abbott the Australian PM. definitely worth a visit. On Sunday we caught the bus to the weekend market? After an hour of browsing the food and crafts we went next door to the Glass Museum where we saw glass being blown. From there we walked back along the lake to the Australian High Court where we had a guide who explained the workings of the court. We sat outside the court and listened to the 55 bell National Carillon, a gift from the British Government to Canberra to mark the 50th year of the Capital. It only chimes between 12.30 and 1.20 on Wednesday and Sunday. And so back to the YHA. We only had a few days in Canberra and didn't see everything we planned but I think the Parliament buildings and the War Memorial were definitely worth the detour from Sydney.

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