Mar 26, 2010 - Back to Australia

When we booked our plane tickets from Auckland to Sydney, we didn’t think about what time we were arriving. Not that easy to find our hotel in the dark, in an unfamiliar city with an unfamiliar car. This time we have a car, not a campervan, and Kim is much more comfortable driving on the left. They threw one little extra wrinkle into it though, the wiper and signal levers are on opposite sides!! Kim kept hitting the wipers when he meant the signal. Very funny later, but not so much that night. We also discovered an annoying issue here,…...

Feb 20, 2010 - moving on

Sat Feb 13 We left Port Campbell around 10am and headed inland to Ballarat. We arrive d just after noon and went to Sovereign Hill. Sovereign Hill is an old gold mining town, all the old buildings are still here and all the employees are dressed in 1800’s attire, the ultimate pioneer village. The girls got to pan for gold, take a carriage ride, see how the underground gold mining works, and see them pour a bar of gold and got to hold that bar of gold (worth about $120,000). This was an amazing place, its too bad we weren’t there earlier in...

Feb 11, 2010 - Canberra- The Nation's Capital

What a strange little place. So we leave a city of almost 5 million people in Sydney to the "little town" of Canberra. A bit of history for you here: Canberra is the capital of Australia because the two big-headed cities of Sydney and Melbourne couldn't come to a decision as to which should be the capital. Therefore they opted to have a purpose built town between the two. Canberra was designed by two Americans who won an international competition to design it....you can start to see this is no ordinary historic capital city. It is a 30...

Feb 3, 2010 - Question Time at the Houses of Parliament

Canberra is the head of the Federal Government and the car reg plates call it 'Heart of the Nation' so Parliament House is the de facto ''meeting place of the nation'. Question time is 2pm when parliament is in session so we were able to go in and listen to the prime minister Kevin Rudd waxing lyrical about his Nation Building Stimulus Plan. Everything in Canberra is BIG.. it's a little Washington like with lengthy boulevards.. The Parliament house has an 8 metre flag pole and the flag in the photo is apparently bigger than a double decker...

Feb 2, 2010 - Canberra - the Nation's Capital

Tricia, Gerard's sister took us up The Telstra Tower or Black Mountain Tower as a first port of call. At 195m high it gave us big 360 views of Canberra and Lake Burley Griffin - the artificial lake which acts as the 'heart' of the city. Given that in Canberra there is a museum for everyone and every taste - be it dinosaurs or democracy, sports or science museum, or plain ol' simple portrait galleries, it's important to prioritise (even if they are all free). After lunch in the botanical gardens (every Aussie city has botanical gardens I...

Dec 30, 2009 - Canberra for Christmas and Birthday

Well Christmas is all over for another year. When we left Perth 8 months ago we had no idea where we would be for Christmas. We had thought that it would just be the two of us some where but as it turned out we had a fabulous Christmas shared with James, Kristy and Brendan in Canberra. Ken and I flew down to Canberra on Tuesday 22nd arriving at around lunch time. Walking down those steps and seeing my beautiful James and his gorgeous wife, Kristy just made my heart swell. It has been 15 months since we have seen them both - the last time...

Dec 30, 2009 - December 30

December 30 Another beautiful day. After breakfast we had a swim and then Barb went shopping with Liz. Dave went with Rene to the Australia Institute of Sport and then to his work. We all met up back at the house and lounged around the pool. Then we all went into town and had dinner at the Wallace Hotel which is about 100 years old.

Dec 29, 2009 - December 29

December 29 We woke to another beautiful day. Rene organized us to go to the Anzac War Memorial. This was a memorial set up by the Aussie govt to commemorate the wars that Australia has been involved in from its conception. The halls really started from WWI and Aussies start to becoming a noticed nation somewhat similar to Canada’s situation. Then it progressed to WWII. This was especially important to Rene since his dad’s family had been a POW in Burma and his mother in the Dutch resistant. We moved into the aircraft section and they had...

Dec 28, 2009 - December 28

December 28 Good morning. Rene made a pre breakie and then a breakie for us to start our day. Then a dip in the pool was in order. Once we had chilled out we all went out to an alpaca farm for a post Christmas Aussie BBQ. Barb made friends with 12 baby alpacas but don’t worry she isn’t taking them home. We came back to Bol residence and worked out in the pool again. It was quite a stressful day. The sun only came out all the time and was lovely.

Dec 28, 2009 - December 27

December 27 It was another beautiful morning. The temp had already reached into the 30’s by 10 am. The bus came and took us to the airport which was only ten minute from the resort area. We had a smooth flight back to Sydney and picked up our car to drive to Canberra. We had to pay a toll to get out of the city. Evidently there are 9 toll roads around the city. From there we made good time to Rene’s. We only got lost twice. Rene hasn’t changed at all since we last saw him. We were thinking and must have been at least 25 years. Then it was...

Nov 24, 2009 - canberra

Vandaag de nationale biblioteek, het museum voor australische democratie, en het nieuwe parlementsgebouw bezocht. De bibliotheek is een modern gebouw waar alles bewaard word wat er in Australië gepubliceerd wordt en het is dus vooral een onderzoeksbiblioteek er waren enkele kleine exhibits over onder ander Nick Cave en het Russisch ballet. Hier gebruik gemaakt van het internet, omdat dit al meer dan 1 dag platligt in de hostel en zo mijn trip naar Mildura geregeld voor vanavond en wat info opgezocht over deze streek die zeker niet...

Nov 23, 2009 - canberra

Vandaag naar de biblioteek geweest en ook het War Memorial bezocht. In de lokale bib wat dingen opgezocht voor het vervolg van de reis en dan naar het War Memorial gestapt. Van veraf en ook van dichtbij lijkt het niet echt reusachtig maar eens binnen kan het wedijveren met Te Papa. Het werd opgericht in 1916 nog tijdens WO 1 en later verder uitgebreid. Bij de ingang staan 2 middeleeuwse marmeren leeuwen uit Ieper die aan het memorial geschonken werden. Na wat rondgekeken te hebben een 90 minuten durende tour gevolgd door het memorial. Hier...