To Canberra and back, Part 4

I hadn't been to Canberra for perhaps 20 years, so it was good to see it again.

I always thought it was a very pleasant urban environment, with all the extensive tree plantings, at least in the older suburbs.  But I have never lived there during an entire winter; I am sure that would be trying.

We stayed at Forrest Hotel and Apartments, within a couple of blocks of cafes of Manuka and across the road (and some extensive parkland stretches) to Parliament House.  It's a great location, and the apartments (I don't know about the motel style rooms in the other part of the complex  - the buildings they were in did look a fair bit more basic) were really well appointed, very comfortable, and good value.  Some photos:

Out the balcony, looking north:

The grounds in front of the apartment:

The lovely, tree lined streets of Manuka








So, where does one take the family in Canberra?   To all of the essentials.

Parliament House:

It is a pretty impressive building, with what is probably the best flag pole on the planet:

OK, so I have been playing with the filters on the tablet.  












Here's a night time shot, the colour came out nice as it was on this one:

 





The photo was taken just after we had sat on the grassy slope of the complex, watching the 9pm New Year's fireworks over the centre of the city.  (Lots of families go to sit on the side of Parliament House to do that; it feels a pleasantly egalitarian to use the building that way):

And everyone likes the long, straight lines of the city as viewed from it:

The free guided tours are informative, and there almost seemed to be almost more Indians, Chinese and others than white anglo saxon in the place when we went there.  Maybe those of foreign extraction appreciate our democracy more than we do...

And it was, of course, where I bought my treasured Julia Gillard coffee mug, as featured in a previous post.  The shop there tries to be pretty up market and dignified; perhaps that's why it has trouble making a profit.  (Actually, looking at the linked story from August 2013, it seems the shop was putting a lot of hope on the sales of Prime Ministerial coffee mugs reviving its fortunes.  At least it worked on me.)

I see this is taking too much space to do Canberra justice.  It will need another instalment.