Urambi Hills Nature Park

It’s easy to wax lyrical about Johnny Boy’s Walkabout Blog, and the man behind it: John Evans. John’s one of the fittest (and nicest) men I’ve ever met, is out and about conquering mountains most days of the week, and documents it all in detail to encourage others to get outside and breathe in the fresh air. All that, and he’s a huge supporter of this humble blog.

As you might suspect, John’s a tad fitter than this reporter, but (fortunately!) he’s keen to show the bush to just about anyone. Together with prolific Canberra tweeter Alison (chifley_alison) who runs Females (Ambling) Around Regional Canberra Mountains (FARCM – try saying that one out loud!), we agree on a public holiday, a 9am start time and some local Canberra hills – Urambi Hills, in fact.

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Canberra Centenary year in review

The Canberra Centenary celebrations are over. With that, it’s time to review if the One Very Big Year was as big as it should have been, as it could have been, and as it claimed to be.

Mt Clear

Have you ever been on a ride where you just want to get off, but can’t? It’s spinning around and you just want it to be over, but you have to just hold tight and wait? This is exactly how I’m feeling, bush bashing down the western side of Mt Clear early on a Saturday afternoon. It’s littered with fallen timber, spikey bushes poke through my clothes, and it’s all on a steep slope. Unlike a ride I can’t get off, the only way I can get off this mountain is to keep going.

Mt Coree, Brindabella National Park

Johnny Boy’s Walkabout Blog is the best bushwalking blog in Canberra – the most prolific, the most detailed, the most interesting, and the biggest: simply, the best. John Evans has inspired me and a lot of the walks on this blog for a long, long time – and long before he ever heard of me. You can imagine my excitement when he invited Boyfriend and I to walk the 18km up and back from Mt Coree with him (does he really know what he’s in for?).

A day (and night!) at the cricket

Lights + Manuka Oval + a handful of tickets left = a genius Christmas present for my dad (and an opportunity to see him outside of my usual trip home for Christmas).

Malamay in the Burbury Hotel

Overdue for a date night, we turned to our bucket list of restaurants and chose Malamay, another restaurant to have made the 2012 Canberra Top 20.

Trekking up Tuggeranong Hill

One of the many things to love about Canberra is that if you want to climb a decent hill and immerse yourself in nature, you’re at most only a few suburbs away from doing that. One of the many things to love about Canberra in summer is that you can do this in the hours after you finish work, thanks to glorious daylight savings.

Lunch at Bicicletta

Bicicletta had been getting some rave reviews, and when searching for a place to dine for in the dying days of 2012, it jumped to mind.

Me and Mrs Jones versus Bodega de Pintxos

It’s December, the days are long, the weather is (finally?) warm (hopefully for good!), and what better way to catch up with friends than to venture down to rejuvenated Kingston?

Battling through the thistles on Big Monks

If you’ve ever sat in somebody’s backyard in Banks or Conder, or have looked up when you’ve been travelling to or beyond Tharwa, there’s a chance you’ve probably seen a trig at the top of what looks like a nicely formed mountain. I’d spent a fair bit of time gazing at it from various positions a few hundred metres below, and after finally confirming it was ‘Big Monks’, knew it was a challenge I had to undertake.