Canberra – Concert and Snow
Excluding Sunday night’s “adventure”, my Saturday evening and Sunday were exceptionally pleasant. The reason for my drive down to Canberra was to attend Semele’s Canberra Handel Choir concert to raise funds for the Ghana Health and Education Initiative.
A superb concert, as they all have been [I think I've travelled down to see them all]. This concert had a theme of “Light and Dark”: the first half were songs of laughter and joy, while the second-half had songs of mourning, of war, of loss. A favourite from a previous concert, Crown with festal pomp the day, made a re-appearance, and I got to hear a good many numbers from works such as Saul, Jephtha and L’Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato for the first time.
Semele had a solo which she sung beautifully; unfortunately my photographic skills, or lack thereof, made her blurry in the shots I took:
I got to have breakfast with Semele and her talented pianist BF the next morning which was wonderful. Great to catch up, chat, and have a good many laughs.
Before leaving Canberra City, I took a stroll around Glebe Park, which, while bare in winter, did have a corner of bright colours. I also, the night before, enjoyed a nice dinner at Sammy’s followed by a delicious hot chocolate and dessert at kokoblack. I love chocolate cafés: please open one of your stores up here kokoblack! I also got to walk past my favourite set of traffic lights: yes, that may be sad, but I love the fact they are enclosed in silver metal rather than the usual traffic signals.
Before I left Canberra, I headed out to Lanyon Homestead [more about that tomorrow or over the weekend]. A place worth seeing.
Travelling on my own, and with the temperature getting increasingly cooler, what else is a fellow to do but watch the temperature? So I did…1.5 degrees as I drove the backroads to Goulburn, through Tarago and Lake Bathurst, then 1.0°C, then snow. Then 0.5°C and quite heavy snow. And winds. Then down to 0°C. Either my car’s thermometer doesn’t go below 0, or the temperature remained at 0. I had not seen the snowflake(*) symbol before on my car, so that was an interesting new thing to discover about my car seven-and-a-half months after I bought it: once the temperature dips to 4°C it pops on.
It also snowed in Goulburn, where I had a late-afternoon snack, and ducked outside to take a few photos. I then continued on, a little bit on the freeway, but then off on the backroads, though to Penrose. I enjoy drives along the back roads: some nice scenery, often interesting places, and you can take it a bit easier most times [unless you have someone up your rear...then I pull over and let them past].
Cemeteries have always held a fascination for me. I was pleasantly surprised to read, and find that I was not the only one!, this entry on Fr Daren J. Zehnle’s blog in which he comments on his love of cemeteries, particularly as places to ponder on life, and its brevity, as well as places to pray. I too find this, as well as finding gravestones and tomb monuments fascinating in themself. I pulled off the road into Penrose Cemetery and had a look around. A quick look, as the temperature remained below 3°C, then got significantly cooler as snow, or sleet perhaps, started falling. A very peaceful place.
[(*) edit: thank you Kerensa; it *is* a snowflake, not an icicle as I had written; must've bumped my head as I fell down that hill -- or else, as a resident of a (mostly) warm country, I claim ignorance of cold things. 
]
August 14th, 2008 at 08:24
I never thought I’d say this on a blog with photos from Australia, but brrr it looks a bit chilly in some of those pictures!
Thanks for visiting my other blogs – I’m loving getting "cross-over" comments!
August 14th, 2008 at 11:08
Ditto JtL’s comment about chilliness. (Isn’t the symbol on your car display a snowflake? or am I looking at the wrong one?)
The traffic lights are definitely pretty sleek!
August 14th, 2008 at 13:14
*Bangs head* — thanks Kerensa. I hope I do know the difference between an icicle and a snowflake.
While we are generally warm-ish, we do have (small) snowfields — in the aptly-named Snowy Mountains. We go for simple names here: The Great Sandy Desert, the Sydney Harbour Bridge, etc…
August 14th, 2008 at 20:58
That’s really funny that you go for simple names, when you Aussies have some really creative vocabulary for other things!!
You should take a lesson from the Brits when naming bridges. In the two cities I’ve lived in most recently we have the Squinty Bridge and the Wobbly Bridge. Still descriptive and apt (well, apparently the Scots all think "Squinty" is apt, and "Wobbly" definitely was when it first opened).
August 14th, 2008 at 23:31
Oh oh. Do I now have to accept the Pedants’ Award? I only noticed the symbol because I was intrigued to see how They would depict an icicle…. it wasn’t meant as a criticism.
I can assure JtL that the formerly Wobbly Bridge is now much more stable. Your very own Kerensa was on the translation team [of two] when They needed the papers on stable German bridges translated. I was an expert on vibration, oscillation and the effects of breaking step for all of ooooh about 3 weeks in Millennium Year. I have had nothing to do with Squinty bridges. Perhaps that’s as well.
August 16th, 2008 at 08:27
Wear that Award with pride Kerensa: I would.
I too would be interested with how they’d depict an icicle…and then how they might determine when to display icicles and when snowflakes. Perhaps I’ll employ your services to write a letter to Volkswagen. 
Love the bridges’ names Jack, and how interesting to read of yet more of your translation projects Kerensa!