There were storms through the night; apart from evidence of the rain, we woke to warmer temperatures. We were on the road into the city soon after 9 am and parked up in Kings Park without event and too early for our tour.
We passed some time in the Botanic Gardens shop and gallery where there is a lovely range of art, books and giftware available at inflated prices, the profits all going toward the upkeep of the gardens. Nothing leapt off the shelf shouting “Buy me!” so we left well alone. Instead we made our way down the avenue of white trunked gums and across to the Parliament.
Here we were greeted by James, the educational officer who spends more time taking groups of school children rather than the odd tourist. However the website does advertise the fact that free tours of the parliament are available to interested punters. We spent an hour in the Parliament admiring the buildings and discussing processes and details of parliamentary process; these matters always of great interest to political tragics such as us.
Each State or Territory Parliament throughout Australia is different although there are of course more similarities than otherwise. Here in Western Australia, the first meeting of the Legislative Assembly was held in 1832 and it was not until 1870 that the State was granted representative government. In 1893 when the Colony reached a population of 60,000, the Legislative Council became an elected body as opposed to one nominated by the Governor. Construction of the Parliament on its current site was completed in 1904, subsequent extensions made in 1964 and 1978 with further titivation in 2004. It is a lovely building although not in the same grand style as some of the other parliament buildings about the nation.
After our interesting tour, we made our way down Hay Street and called into Her Majesty’s Theatre which according to James, was well worth checking out if we were interested in the architecture. Today, and perhaps every day, there was a small table set up in the foyer and two chairs to accommodate the friendly and enthusiastic Friends of Her Majesty’s. We were at once cornered and led down to Judi in the depths of the auditorium who already had a young Malaysian women in her clutches. Judi waxed lyrical about the architecture and her own memories of ballets and shows during the last century. The iconic theatre is the only working Edwardian theatre in Australia and is home to the WA Opera. Currently the play “Driving Miss Daisy” starring Angela Lansbury and James Earl Jones is occupying the venue. We were requested not to photograph the set, but could take shots of the dome roof and lovely refurbishment. The lighting was not adequate for my modest camera so I refrained, a first for me.
The theatre was opened in 1904, built on the proceeds of the Gold Rush for 42,000 pounds. One of the theatre’s most impressive features at the time was the dome roof which was designed to improve ventilation in the auditorium. The dome slid open sideways so that on a typically warm summer evening, the audience could enjoy the cool evening air. While the renovations gave the theatre a new lease of life, the dome now remains permanently closed. Noise pollution alone would be too much of a distraction to performers if not the audience.
The theatre was in private hands right through until 1977, when an entrepreneur threatened to bulldoze it down to make way for a car park building. After great uproar from the public, the government stepped in and bought it, then spent $11 million to refurbish and restore the theatre to its current state. It is well used by all manner of performers, however the small donations by the curious is supplemented by other fund raising events, including the odd wedding. Judi suggested that we go down into the basement to see the collection of memorabilia, however our stomachs were rumbling and we were keen to escape these wonderfully delightful loyal advocates of this fascinating old building.
We soon found ourselves down in Central Park and sat amongst dozens of office workers, all dressed very smartly and showing us up rather badly; jeans and jackets just don’t cut it.
After lunch Chris returned to the WA Museum to complete his exploration of the galleries and I found my way to Office Works in East Perth to have some printing done. I was back in the museum well before our prearranged meeting time and we wandered through the disappointing collection of taxidermy before crossing to the WA State Library to see if there were any treasures to discover there.
Today there was an exhibition about the Australian RSL Clubs and an overview of Australian war participation which we gave a cursory examination. The only new information we gleaned was the anti-communism attitudes of the late 1940s and early 1950s which mirrored the McCarthy years of the USA.
Instead we were more interested in the shelves of discarded books and found ourselves an interesting collection of Australian stories which we paid a couple of dollars for and is bound to give us our monies worth and more.
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| Hale House |
After a McDonald’s coffee, we caught the Red Cat back up to Parliament, then walked on up to the interesting historic looking buildings on the hill behind the parliament. This proved to be a real bonus; we found ourselves in the grounds of Hale House.
This was originally a school building, established in the late 1850s. Economically the school struggled and the buildings have had a chequered history, however more recently they have been refurbished for the sum of $25.5 million to permanently house the State Cabinet meeting room, the Cabinet Secretariat and the Office of the Premier.
Interpretative panels all about the grounds invite the casual tourist to wander about and enjoy the surrounds, explaining the history of the place; however I could not help but think it was an awful lot of money when the government is teaching belt tightening.
We continued on our way back up into Kings Park, retrieved the landcruiser and made our way home, believing that we had completed our exploration of Perth central, however there are still several days before we must away and we are very good at changing our minds.
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