Canberra ? Ideas for visit?

[Cody21]

Me and my BF will be driving from Sydney to Melbourne the week after the Mardis Gras. We're trying to figure out how to break up our drive to spend 2 nights SOMEPLACE in between the two cities.

We were thinking to drive the Coast road and then cut up to Canberra. Our undertsanding is that Canberra is a very conservative town. That being said, does Canberra offer anything as far as site seeing? What about the outlying areas?

Any suggestions as far as places to see between Sydney & Melbourne?

Thanks so much ... you have all been great help for planning our trip "down under".

[jackie87]

We were thinking to drive the Coast road and then cut up to Canberra. Our undertsanding is that Canberra is a very conservative town. That being said, does Canberra offer anything as far as site seeing? What about the outlying areas?

I definitely wouldn't say Canberra was any more conservative then Sydney or Melbourne, but by my understanding I think its even more tolerant than both. Can't give you any reccomendations, but you wouldn't really want to stray too far away from around the Civic City Centre or southside (Manuka and Kingston), otherwise anywhere else would be a pain.

If you're coming up through the Princes Highway (the coastal route) from Melbourne you have two options, you can go up the Monaro Highway at Cann River and stop by at Cooma which is the gateway to the Snowy Mountains (still beautiful in summer), or you can continue along the Princes Highway and stop in one of the Sapphire Coast towns, Eden or Merimbula, which are stunningly beautiful and if you're in Eden catch the whale museum. After that you just head up the Snowy Mountains Highway to Brown Mountain (again stunning scenery) and then on to Canberra.

[ChrisDude]

As a resident, I can say that Canberra's a pretty unconservative place. A little quiet and with a significant bogan problem, but not conservative.

As far as sightseeing, most of the touristy stuff is pretty central (National Museum, Library, Gallery, War Memorial, the old and new parliament houses, etc). There's some stuff outside town too (Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve, and a NASA tracking station).

Nightlife is basically Dickson in the north, Civic in the middle, and Kingston and Manuka in the inner south. Only one gay club, Cube in Civic, if you're into that sorta thing.

[danny corvini]

Canberra is not more conservative, but it IS more suburban (take that however you wish!). So if you walk thru a suburban mall holding hands, well.. we warned you :)

The cafes in Civic (centred around Garema Place) and Manuka are pretty damn good, and the gay club Cube is pretty good, too. There is also a gay-friendly, older style (for Canberra) music venue / cafe called Tilley's, too.

There is a little more about Canberra in the Spartacus guide if you can manage to pick one of those up...