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Snow,Snow,& more snow

Normally I wouldn't post more than once in a week but.... today was so cool, literally.
Last night we had our coldest night since leaving Cairns, -1, Brrrr.. Thank goodness for heaters, otherwise I would have had to cuddled Les.... it was cold.
So, why was today so cool? Glad you asked.
Snow, we went for a drive up to Thredbo to start with and although we could see snow, we could only scrape the sides of the road to touch it, so we turned around and went up the Kosciosko road to Perisher and  Charlotte's Pass. OMG. How cool, I mean HOW COOL!!  Snow everywhere above 1400m, the first time the girls and I have ever seen it and it was amazing. It even snowed while we were there.
And yes Janine, I lobbed a snowball on Jess, Grace and Les.  made a snowman, pretty sad though, will be better prepared next time.

 

                                                               My snowman

Look Out Julia - Morrisons have come to town

Well, here we are, in our Capital. We had to extend our stay as it was just impossible to see everything in the week we had allowed for it. 
For a city oozing with so much culture and so many grand buildings it seems to lack personality, not to say the people are not friendly or helpful, as they are, but just seems the city itself is bland, parking a nightmare, and no fish and chip or pizza shops.
So, what have we been up to in Canberra? Well, Les and Jessica went to question time in the house of Reps, the day after budget, and yes Jess will tell you Tony Abbott's ears are as big as they make them out to be.  Also, to my surprise, Les was not vacated from the gallery for out spoken comments.
While Jess and Les were in the House Of reps Grace and I met Her Royal Highness QEII



We spent a day at Questacon, which was interesting.  Grace had a great time on the gravity free fall and also had a go on the 360 swing, but didn't quite have the strength to get it all the way round.
On our way out of here we passed Wayne in the street, he didn't have time to chat as he was busy on the phone, probably discussing the budget with Julia.

 

 

One of the highlights has been our visit to the High Court. The girls were even allowed to have their pictures taken holding the book :"The Constitution of The Commonwealth of Australia"

 

Learning about the three different court rooms and their individual purpose, what cases have been tried there, it was quite amazing.

Another highlight would have to be the Museum of Democracy, which is housed in the Old Parliament House.  Here the girls were given a study book to work out puzzles around the building, which is like a rabbit warren, and Les and I took a tour of the rooms and wings of Parliament from not really that long ago, Bob Hawke was the last Prime Minister to use these chambers.

A visit to Canberra would not be complete without paying tribute to our Service Men and Women at the Australian War Memorial.   We were overwhelmed by all the information  here, there is just so much to see and take in. We spent three days here and still have not seen it all. 

Les found Kingsbury's display, Kingsbury is the suburb Les grew up in, named in honour of Bruce Kingsbury, a real estate agent from the area who became a VC Recipient through the Kokoda Campaign.

The closing ceremony was very moving, Every night a story of a fallen soldier is told, and the last post played outside the grave of the Unknown Soldier. 

 

 





Poll Position - Trakmaster.

Since leaving Jingellic we have headed North through Tumut, where we based ourselves for a few days to catch up on some bookwork, we also did a day trip out to Blowering Dam,  the largest of the 16 dams of the Snowy Hysro scheme, it is also home to the largest Murray Power Plant No 3, unfortunately it is closed for upgrades so no inside tour was available, but still got to have a good look at the 6 huge pipelines coming down the mountain to run the turbines.

The Blowering Dam Wall

and the view down the valley from the top of it

 Murray Power Station No 3

 

 

While we were at Tumut we experienced our coldest night yet. 1 degree.  Brrr..

 

The highlight of the past week however, was our crcuit of Mount Panorama. Driving around the track has given me a whole new respect for the race, you have no idea how steep that mountain is. I can' t

wait for that weekend in Bathurst. To know we managed to break the 20km/hr going up that hill in low gear and as you come into Skyline change into 3rd and 4th, just before switching down to 3rd to get down the Mountain. Definitely a highlight. 

Hey Robynne- Brighty better lookout. Trakmaster got Poll Position this weekend:)

 

 

Heading North

Well, here we are, Northward bound, but oh its nice to be back in the van and on the move again.

We have timed this part of the journey perfectly to catch all the Autumn colours.  As we entered Bright, the views took our breath away and rightly so as it was the weekend of the Bright Autumn Festival and the town was alive with activities.

We did day trips from our camp in Porepunkah to Mt Buffalo and up to the Horn, where the view of the Snowy Mountains was breathtaking, no snow just beautiful clear skies and uninterupted views for miles.

The girls loved the swinging bridge at the caravan park, as did the adults.  Who can make it swing the most??

 

Today we leave Victoria, Hello NSW and continuing through the colourful countryside, we ended up at one of Les' old haunts, the Jingellic Pub, camped right on the Murray behind the Hotel and once again the Autumn colours just took our breath away, nothing to do with the Sambucca one has to have to stay warm.

 

Day trips once again took us up to the Kosciowsko National Park, and to the Geehi Hut and for education sake theSnowyHydro Scheme at the Murray 1 Power Station. What an amazing engineering feat even in modern day terms.

 

                                         Mt Kosciosko hidden by cloud in the background

Geehi Hut