About Canberra
The name Canberra means “Meeting Place” in the local Ngunnawal Aboriginal language.
It has a population of some 325,000 which makes it small enough to be relaxed and sociable, yet it offers all the facilities and cosmopolitan lifestyle of a much larger city.
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Canberra is a planned city with many places of interest for the curious visitor.
View to parliament house
Canberra – the capital of Australia – is sometimes referred to as the bush capital because pockets of bushland reserve extend almost to the city centre and over half of the Australian Capital Territory, within which Canberra lays, is classified as national park or nature reserve.
Canberra is the city that Federation created. Australia’s national government sits here, as does the highest court of Australia. Many of the most important monuments in the country are located in Australia and they’re visited by millions of people each year. Some of these attractions include the Australian War Memorial, Parliament House, the National Gallery of Australia and Canberra’s newest attraction, the National Museum of Australia.
The city is built round Lake Burley Griffin and you can see a good deal of it by taking a cruise around the lake. Lunch cruises, offering good cooking at reasonable prices, are particularly recommended.
Canberra Lake Burley Griffin
The six Australian states became a Federation in 1901, and the first Federal parliament met in Melbourne. The search for a new site to build Australia’s capital city began, and a site was finally chosen on the Monaro Plains, near the existing towns of Yass and Queanbeyan. You can see a beautifully restored example of pastoral settlement in pre-Canberra days at Lanyon Homestead just south of the city.
A competition was held to choose a master plan for Canberra, and this was won by the American architect and town planner Walter Burley Griffin.
Canberra was officially proclaimed as the nation’s capital in 1913 and the original Parliament House was opened in 1927. But the lake that Burley Griffin had planned had to wait until 1963, when the Molongolo River was dammed to create it and two bridges had been built to cross it.
Canberra is located 300 kilometres from Sydney and 655 kilometres from Melbourne and is accessible by road, train and air transport.
Panorama of Canberra
Parliament House
Parliament House which was built on Capital Hill overlooking Lake Burley Griffin dominates Canberra and can be seen from nearly every part of the city. Designed so that visitors can actually walk on top of the building, the new Parliament House boasts an excellent art gallery and facilities which feature Australian timbers and gracious interiors. There are guided tours every 30 minutes. For details of opening times (usually 9.00 a.m. – 5.00 p.m.) contact the Sergeant at Arms on (02) 6277 4889.
Old Parliament House
The first parliament house in Canberra was completed in 1927 at a cost of triple the initial estimate. The architect was John Smith Murdoch, who was so determined his style should consistently prevail that he even designed most of the original furniture and waste paper baskets. Timber from almost every state was utilised. For sixty one years it was the hub of the nation’s political life.
A pommy as PM, sacrilegious!
It was replaced in 1988 by the superb new Parliament House which was built on Capital Hill overlooking Lake Burley Griffin. There are guided tours by informed insiders and a range of changing exhibitions. It is much more interesting that you would expect, with a hidden safe revealed by stepping on a particular floorboard, a secret hiding place for journalists above the opposition leader’s office, doodles made in the drying cement by the original builders, and other eccentric facts revealed by the guides. For more information and opening times contact (02) 6273 5130
Tourist Information
the Canberra Visitors Centre in Northbourne Avenue. It is open from 9.00 a.m. – 5.00 p.m. and has assistants who can answer queries and provide suitable maps and information. For details contact (02) 6205 0044.
