Canberra to Albury

First stop today was the National Museum of Australia to see the museum itself, which is new since my last visit to Canberra, and the exhibition "Rome: City+Empire", which features objects on tour from the British Museum.

Many attractions in Canberra are free to enter, but you have to pay for parking. eg the Arboretum, the Botanic Gardens, and the Museum. Each attraction has signs up saying that the parking proceeds are invested in the attraction. At the museum this morning, the parking machine took all my money, said it was printing a ticket, and then nothing happened. Someone else tried it after me and the same thing happened, so it wasn't something I'd done wrong. We took note of the machine number, and went into the museum to report it. But they were not a lot of help - they don't run the parking machines, it is another company. The guy at the desk looked up a phone number for me to ring and tell them what had happened so I wouldn't be fined. I duly did, but after I had given the lady the machine number and my rego, she told me that I had to ring their faults number to report it. She couldn't put me through. I had had enough of being messed around by then and we just went and bought another ticket from a different machine. To me, if the car park is for your attraction, you should have some idea how to solve issues with it, not just fob people off with, "We don't run the carpark". Rant over!

The Rome exhibition is very good. Objects range from giant marble statuary:

To tiny objects like this copper and enamel brooch found in England, and made between 100-200 CE:

And this beautiful silver wine cup found in France:

It looks like it could be from the 1920s, but was actually made in 220-270CE.

We had a quick look through some other parts of the museum. It would take more time than we had to see everything, but our general impression was that it seemed rather "NSW-centric" rather than "National" in its focus. Melbourne, I kid you not, is represented by some mud and muddy water from the Yarra River. If you want to talk about water, how about an analysis of Melbourne's lovely drinking water compared with the disgusting water of other cities. Like Sydney. Or Canberra, for that matter! We've been missing our Lal Lal rainwater on this trip.

Phar Lap's heart is here:

Or maybe it's a fake. See the linked Wikipedia article for details. Sorry about the reflection of my hand.

Display in the foyer of an FJ Holden (one owner, who purchased in it 1955 and drove it until 1980) with a Propert "Trailaway" caravan from 1956 (no owner, it was a promotional unit).

Farewell, Canberra!


Back on the road, our next stop was the Dog on the Tuckerbox again. Compare these two photos:

It is interesting to see what has changed and what hasn't in the intervening years. The top photo was some time in the early 70s.

Next stop - Holbrook, where there is a submarine in a park:

 a submarine museum,

and a picnic shelter that resembles parliament house:

 If you would like to know why the town is obsessed with submarines despite being 430km from the nearest port, you can check out the Wikipedia article I linked to.

Finally, our destination for the day, Albury. We are staying in a "self-rated 4-star" motel, which anyone else might rate a star or two less, but which is quiet, comfortable enough, and close to the Albury Botanic Gardens.

It was a beautiful evening for a walk around the gardens.

A friendly-looking dinosaur (and baby behind) at the entrance to the children's section of the gardens - unfortunately closed on Wednesdays.

The gardens were opened in 1877, and have some beautiful big trees, including bunya pines, a massive kauri, and this ginkgo included for Jenni:

They also have an app you can use to report sightings of wildlife in the gardens, which could be fun if you were a local:

Our holiday is drawing to a close. This time tomorrow we will be back home.