Canberra, Australia

Last weekend, we drove out to Canberra to see Paul...one of George's childhood friends. George is a champ at driving on the wrong (left) side of the road.

Paul showed us a nice time in Canberra. Being the Australian capital, we checked out the "Australian national federal" area from a nice lake park. Just like DC, there are libraries, zoos, museums, and other such attractions that are called the National (Federal, etc.) ______ simply because they are located in the capital. Paul was also kind enough to point out the eagle on a pole that the US government gave to Australia. Couldn't we have done better than that?!

On Sunday, we went to a local nature preserve so that I could see some funny Australian wildlife (aside from the dead wombat I saw along the road driving to Canberra). We managed to find two sleeping koalas, a rock wallaby, an emu, and many kangaroos. For those of you unfamiliar with the strange animals in Australia, a wombat is similar to a groundhog/woodchuck. A wallaby, from a distance, resembles a prairie dog. An emu is a giant bird, something similar to an ostrich. Clicking on the links will give you the info provided by Wikipedia. Kangaroos are...well...cool! We saw bunches of them and managed to get relatively close to two of them. They're not terribly exciting to watch until they start hopping...that makes me giggle every time!

We got back to Sydney just in time to pack, sleep for a few hours, and head to the airport for a 7:00am flight.