Fabulous, Fabulous Floriade.

 I stood in the centre of a kaleidoscope of colour and was overwhelmed by the beauty of millions of blooms. People swirled around me, but I just stood transfixed, to be here, to see and experience Floriade is a dream come true. I cannot find the words to describe the feeling of pure joy, all my senses taking in being in the moment, the sweet scent of spring blooms, the happy sound of the old organ playing in the background and the laughter and chatter of the families. The vivid blue sky, and the air as clear as crystal.

I owe this experience to my blogging friend Christine of “Dadiridreaming”, who many of you know. She introduced me to her family as they needed a house sitter in Canberra for three months, July to September. Sadly Christine passed away the week before we arrived here, but I thought of Christine as I wandered around this magnificent display and knew how much she loved it. It was through a comment I made on a post Christine did about Floriade last year that this connection started.

I am constantly amazed by the power of WordPress and how it connects people from all over the world.

 Floriade is also FREE, no entry fee. I first visited the weekend it opened and, though beautiful, the tulips had not all opened. It is on for 4 weeks, so yesterday we went for a second visit.

What a difference 10 days make, the tulips were at the peak of perfection.

I tried to capture the beauty but photos can only show the colours, they cannot convey the three-dimensional effect of being immersed, surrounded and totally conscious of all that is going on around you.

There were other spring blooms among the tulips, swathes of pansies surrounded the borders. Daffodils and occasional iris. But the tulips were the heroes.

Every one seemed to be taking photos, using their phones, Ipads as well as cameras of all shapes and sizes.

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An old-fashioned, small fairground attracted the children.

A Ferris wheel will give you a bird’s eye view.

Do you remember these old favourites? They are still popular.

The music from this lovely old organ brought back memories.

Scattered around the grounds were sculptures and art works.

This is an interesting interpretation of a dandelion thistle. Jack recently did an interesting post about the dandelion, pop over and see it.

These cheery little fellows reminded me of “Gnomesville” that very unusual place in Western Australia were we found the huge gathering of gnomes.

What a beautiful place for a picnic

I think he is an artist. Lots to inspire your artistic talents here.

I have over 300 photos taken over 2 days so I will not forget this visit. It is classed as Australia’s biggest spring festival and it is a credit to the parks staff that created this spring wonderland on the banks of Lake Burley Griffin.

In the back-ground the spectacular spout of the Captain James Cook fountain rises 147 metres from the centre of Lake Burley Griffin.

To cap this wonderful day off we went into the information hub to take part in a wine and cheese tasting.

Cheers!!!!

Canberra is quite often the place that tourists ignore when they make their to visit list, but there is so much to see and do here, much of it is free. We have been here 3 months and enjoyed our stay. Even the weather is underrated as, though the winter temperatures are low the days are, mostly, crisp and clear. 

We have one more week in Canberra then it is back home to the Goldcoast.