I left the Snowy Mountains that didn’t have any snow yet and headed northeast through some really beautiful grassland until I reached the Australian Capital Territory. It’s a smallish territory created specifically to encompass Australia’s capital city, Canberra. I wanted to see the capital, of course, but I was most excited about all the museums. I started at the main one, the Australian National Museum. Right in the lobby was the Muttaburrasaurus, Australia’s own native dinosaur. They named it that because it was discovered in Muttaburra, up north in Queensland.

There was a lot to take in at this museum, natural history, ecology, political, and what turned out to be my favorite, aboriginal history.

The painting above is of a cyclone. Apparently, northern Australia has as much trouble with cyclones as America’s southeast has with hurricanes. I had no idea.

That’s a crocodile below. I haven’t seen one of them yet, but they’re coming eventually

There were a lot of aboriginal artifacts also, boomerangs, hatchets, shields, spears, fishing nets, displays about how they made tools and grew foods. It was really interesting.

I didn’t know this before, but Australia had it’s own car, the Holden. They were in production from 1948-1984. The one below is a 1955 FJ. I don’t know anything about them really, but based on looks, I’d drive it.

Next up was the Canberra Museum and Gallery. It was more of a modern art museum, but I went to see the Ned Kelly series by one of Australia’s most famous artists, Sidney Nolan. You may remember, Ned Kelly was Australia’s most famous outlaw from the 19th century who was eventually hanged in Melbourne for murder. Him and his gang wore these homemade suits of armor, depicted in the paintings and which I also saw for real back in Melbourne.

I later learned that this is only a small portion of the whole series, but more on that in a minute.

Canberra was established in 1913 as the capital, though the parliament didn’t officially open until 1927. Before that the federal government used the Victorian Parliament building in Melbourne. Today the downtown area is kinda drab in my opinion. The museums and the capital itself, which we’ll get to soon, are interesting, but as far as just strolling around the streets, kinda boring. But there was this guy, so yeah.

Next I stopped at the National Capital Exhibition. It told the whole story of how Canberra was chosen to be the capital and about the contest they put on to see which architects could design the best city. There really wasn’t much of anything here when the site was chosen, so they had to build their capital city from scratch.

The Molonglo River that runs through the city was dammed to create Lake Burley Griffin. There were lots of joggers and cyclists making the rounds. From the Capital Exhibition I got a great view of the National Library and the Parliament Building.

Canberra has a National Gallery and a National Portrait Gallery. The National Portrait Gallery had a contemporary exhibit that incorporated the real portraits, so I kind of had to hunt for the real stuff. There were lots of portraits of the “discoverers” of Australia. William Dampier was the first European to land at Australia in the northwest in 1699. He apparently made a very bad impression on the natives. He sounds like a horrible human being. The next European, James Cook, landed in what is now Sydney Harbor in 1770 and claimed it for Great Britain.

The National Gallery next door was much much better. I learned that the Ned Kelly series by Sidney Nolan was actually 29 paintings and the rest of them were here on display. Awesome! Sidney Nolan gifted the whole series along with a few other paintings to Australia before he died. They’re kind of comical, but apparently that was his intent.

The last painting in the series is the one seen above, his trial. I love how Ned is wearing that suit of armor in every one.

Sidney Nolan’s other famous paintings are of the Burke and Wills expedition. They’re Australia’s mid 19th century version of Lewis and Clarke, but the Australian version was plagued by ineptitude and bad luck. They both died. Anyway, in Nolan’s painting we see Wills riding his camel, “discovering” the Australian outback by asking an aboriginal man for directions. Ha!

There was also a lot, I mean a LOT of aboriginal art at the National Gallery. Way too much to include here, but here are some of my favorites. Below right is a depiction of the universe.

Below left is a serpent with a kangaroo head, and below right is a yawkyawk. A yawkyawk is an aboriginal mythological creature similar to a mermaid that can control the weather.

By far, my absolute favorite piece at the National Gallery was this Jackson Pollock. I wasn’t expecting to see this, but wow did I get excited when I turned the corner and there it was. I’m not usually an abstract expressionist fan, but I LOVE his work! Honestly, I could’ve just sat there and looked at this one painting all day.

Now it was time to check out the Parliament Building. I didn’t realize this ahead of time, but I ended up exploring Canberra over Easter weekend, Sunday and Monday specifically. This sounds like a bad thing, but it actually turned out to be the best time to explore the capital. First because all of the museums were still open. Second because this usually busy city was a ghost town and all the parking lots were pretty much empty and FREE. Yay!

I’ve seen these parrots all over the country, bright red ones and these pinkish guys, but this is the first time I’ve been able to get decent pictures of them. This group was foraging on the giant lawn in front of the Parliament Building.

Anyway, Parliament. It’s a big modern, weird looking, uh, place. It was opened for business in 1988, not that long ago. Well, it’s probably the oddest parliament building I’ve seen in any country, and I’ve seen a lot of them.

For some reason I expected to be wowed by the architecture, but then I’m reminded of how young and new this country is. Sure, non-native people have been populating this continent since the late 18th century, but it’s only been a country for just over a hundred years. Even compared to the USA this place is new and shiny.

The view from the upper level wasn’t bad at all. Even though I wasn’t wowed by it all, I am definitely a fan of this city’s geometric layout. The view extends past the old Parliament Building, all the way to the War Memorial, with Mt Ainslie in the back. Don’t worry, we’ll get to all three of those next.

Back in 1972 a group of four aboriginal men began a protest for land rights and aboriginal sovereignty under an umbrella right in front of the Parliament Building. It eventually turned into the Aboriginal Tent Embassy. It’s thought to be the longest continually running protest in the world.

Just steps away from the current Parliament Building is the old Parliament Building. This is the one that opened in 1927. Near as I can figure, they built the new Parliament Building and moved up there in 1988 simply because they outgrew the old one.

So this was kind of a two for one special on Parliament buildings. In addition to the old House of Representatives and the old Senate, many of the offices of the Speaker of the House, the President of the Senate, and the Prime Ministers offices were left intact as they were in 1988. It was kind of like walking back in time.

I finished off this day by heading up to the Red Hill Lookout behind the new Parliament Building. That’s Parliament on the left, the War Memorial and Mt Ainslie again on the right. You can only see a small bit of the old parliament from here.

It was time to check out of my hotel and drive to the next stop, but first I spent a half day finishing up with a couple of things in Canberra. I started with a visit to the Australian War Memorial. I’m not usually a big military/war history guy, but I enjoyed my visit here. There was a whole lot of history in this place, from WWI through the gulf wars, tons of memorials, and Australia’s tomb of the unknown soldier. It was also really crowded! The Easter holiday is over and it’s now Tuesday.

And finally, before leaving town, a quick trip up to the top of Mt Ainslie for a view of the whole works. Even though the downtown area of Canberra, which is far right and out of frame, was somewhat uninspiring, I liked the capital overall. It’s really spread out and there are a lot of parks and open spaces. And because it’s fall there was also a lot of color on the trees.

Now I’m headed further northeast towards the coast. I have a lot of hiking planned for the next few days and it’s supposed to rain for all of them, I think. This should be fun. Wish me luck and see you in the next post…