Kapital Tour Day 2 – They see me rolling to Parliament House

I made sure everything was charged the night before as I did not know how busy my day would be and my laptop was nearly dead too. I had finished a book that I had been reading by the name of 1984. My alarm went off and I nearly faceplanted the wall to turn it off as I left it sitting on the light that was above my head. I was up at 7am as my plan was to find where the bus left from when I left Canberra on Friday. Then hire a bike so that I could get to both parliament houses without too much of a problem. I was meeting up with a friend by the name of Jeanette Purkis who I knew through Facebook and met in person the year before.

I was looking for breakfast as well at 7am on my way to find the bus station. I found I seemed to be on the wrong road though I thought I was going the right way until I found I was not meant to be following Kings Circuit, which is meant to be a huge roundabout. I wasn’t far off at all, but it was like Canberra was deserted as no one was around and even MacDonald’s was closed. I found that to be unusual and while I found the bus terminal I had to go back as it was the only place that had food to be open. I would not think of Canberra as a capital city, but more like a country town. I was able to hire a bike for the day with a deposit, but it was only the afternoon where I could hire the bike for half the day. I chose bike number 3 as the others did not feel quite right.

I had not been on a bike for some years and as soon as I left I could feel the burn in my legs, but I was warming up. I was following the bike paths down to Parliament house though I knew I wanted to do the tour at 930am. I nearly wandered off to other areas to ride, but I was wondering how to get to the underground carpark. On my way through I found a little walk along the lake with Australians of the Year, but I was going to leave it for later in the day. The Tent Embassy was still empty and I found my way underground by following the arrows. I was surprised by how little traffic there actually was as I was never run over by cars going to park. It is good there are plenty of places to park a bike unlike cars that have to pay for a place to park. I had at least 10 mins before tour and the security guard loved my camera.

The first step I took before joining the tour, I went into the Great Hall that has an enlarged painting that is actually a tapestry. The original is by Arthur Boyd. The tour took us through to the House of representatives and the senate chambers. The house of reps were actually oddly numbered through the states as some states had more than other people. The Hansard was actually taken by computer software now, which also seems to take out words like umm and uh. On the table is a two year printed Hansard reports so that both sides of government can use as reference to what someone said. The senate on the other hand is based on the American model and has equal representation from all states. The actual building was built into Capital Hill instead off on top so it wouldn’t disturb the area and the courtyard was blank of trees to be a welcoming area. I think thats how it was explained. On the wall between the two houses of parliament were the ex Prime Ministers excluding Rudd and Gillard as it takes time to paint more like 3 years or so. There were small displays with examples of Sorry to Forgotten Australians and the stolen generation. I thought these were interesting especially since I had written an essay about the Forgotten Australians recently. Another display was about the Magna Carta though it was talking about the current Parliament with little bits from 1200. I knew it was time to visit Old Parliament House before I headed back to meet a friend. I was in the bookstore and got a book. I learnt there was no book on one Prime Minister that I wanted to know about, Stanley Melbourne Bruce as he seemed eccentric. Information online was available, but no book.

I should have gone to Old Parliament, but still wanted to do a circuit around Parliament to see what I could find. I did find a small soccer pitch on one side, but there was no one around. It was funny when I walked up the stairs behind the building. The police came to meet the aimless wanderer who told me the visitors entrance was at the front and I told them I already been there. I was wandering around the building to see what there was and the cops seemed to be satisfied with my response especially when they directed to wander in the gardens not far away. I thanked them though not surprised if they were watching me and they had big guns too. They must have known I was no threat. The garden was not that big and it was winter so there was not much growing there at all. I did find a memorial for the Bali bombing on the grounds. I was surprised by how many guard shacks there were around the Parliament drive or circuit. There was at least four or five, but I did wave to the security cameras while giggling to myself.

Once I got to the bike I exited the underground parking where I headed to Old Parliament House where I was going to get an early lunch and a coffee before exploring. I noticed there was quite a few people that were standing out the front. Walking in I found the building to be really crowded with people. I did not know what was going on until I seen medieval people fighting in one court yard, but in the Cafe I knew I would not get far with the line as long as it was. I was hungry needing some food and to rest for a couple of minutes. I wasn’t going to wait around and see the exhibitions so I went to to the National Gallery of Australia. I got help from a cleaner who showed me where the cafe was there. I was happy to have something to eat and some water. There was one painting I had heard about that had been bought by Gough Whitlam that was controversial at the time and that was Blue Poles by Jackson Pollock. It was not what I was expecting though could have been a bit more too. Another artist I had seen only in books were the works of Sidney Nolan with his Ned Kelly series. I am not a big art fan, but was well worth taking a wander at different artworks from all over the country.

It was soon time for me to leave to head to the Canberra Museum and Gallery, which ended up being against the wind and I could feel it starting to get chilly. The ride did not take long, but I knew that it was well worth the money for the hire to get me around the city. I went to the place I was going to meet Jeanette, but the museum was shut for the day as it was the Monday as it was a public holiday. I felt very silly for not realising, but Jeanette arrived and we went off for a coffee since she was local. We spent some time chatting until we both had to leave. It was good to chat as last time we had met it was with many other people vying for attention, but one on one was really nice. After we left I needed refreshing and to take the bike back before getting a quick bite to eat for dinner and visited the local supermarket that is local to Canberra called Supabarn. The interesting part was you could buy alcohol. I had not seen that before other than New Zealand, but it was pretty cool. The milk was $2 for two litres and $3 for three litres so like Coles, but not Coles. It was dark so I headed back to the room at the hostel to relax and charge devices.

Tomorrow my plan is to visit Old Parliament House and do the tour first thing in the morning. There is a church building on the other side of Parliament House that I kept on seeing that I want to see what it was about as I had seen it in the distance. I want to visit Questacon and the National library too. I have no idea what else to do though the War memorial does sound like a great idea.