The Great Canberra Science Scramble

So Aunty Teesh arrived from London just in time for Science Week. Now Aunty Teesh is a Maths/Science teacher so what better way to engage her in the Canberran culture than to sign her up for The Great Canberra Science Scramble! We picked up the maps and clues from the Visitors Centre and Teesh was so excited to be greeted by a massive poster of her little brother advertising the Australian Institute of Sport she just had to have her picture taken with it! But before we could get started on our science scramble we absolutely needed to stop into Koko Black to fuel up (on chocolate!)

The boys had their first ever Baby Chino. Ryan was completely taken with it! I feel I may have just assisted in him acquiring his first addiction! Ooopps!

Then it was into the first clue of the science scramble. We had to measure the angle of the metal girders at the skate park. So our resident Maths/Science teacher introduced the boys to a protractor!

We had to scout out several art installations around the city. We had several discussions about whether the below animal was a Tasmanian tiger or a Dingo. We settled on Tassie Tiger but made a note that Art is subjective!

Another task needing completion in the city was the measuring of the extra large chess board. Aunty Teesh felt Mummy's math skill were just up to par for this task and was in charge of the ruler. However, Matthew and Ryan were in charge of the addition and Aunty Teesh took over for the formula used to calculate the area!

Now Blogger is being weird and putting all my photos sideways but the next image is another mural in the city. We had to find a carnivorous insect. Our choices were a praying mantis, a ladybug and a grasshopper. We picked the praying mantis!

Again our maths skills were put to good used with counting metal girders at a bus stop. Ben was designated counter!

So this is where we finished our scrambling on Thursday. I probably should have mentioned that Thursday was a student free day here in the ACT. So how nerdy of us to be doing scholarly stuff on a day off!

Oh! I also forgot to mention that there were 56 checkpoints! And they were all over Canberra so there was no way we were going to get it done in one student free day! So after school on Friday we hit the trail again finishing the checkpoints around the ANU. I loved the International Sculpture Garden. There is one sculpture that is spirit levels set into the hill. It is amazingly awesome! Anyway even after a couple of hours on Friday we still weren't finished! So it was back in the car again on Saturday!

We did the Dinosaur Museum clue and the Australian Reptile Centre. This was where we had our first "Mum, can't we stay?" This was closely followed by a promise to return in the very near future!

Then we had a brief footy break (we had our last game of the season!) before getting back on the trail!

We discovered the Jamison Center is named after Thomas Jamison who was a surgeon...

and Canberra has a huge amount of public art. The artworks are very diverse from sculpture to murals.

This piece of artwork is not only sideways but situated in the National Library.

This piece is made from the fire damaged steel from the Mt. Stromlo Observatory. I really like that the piece came from historically significant material to make a permanent reminder.

The scramble took in the National Art Gallery, which is already a favourite of ours. We went through it in a flash with a promise to Aunty Teesh that we would return next week!

We then dashed over to Parliament house where Aunty Teesh had never visited before. Here we received a geological lesson in fault line. The scramble required us to draw a picture of the rocks. Once again this fell to Teesh much to Matthew's disappointment.

These flagpoles were part of the scramble!

As was a trip up Mt Pleasant....

where we were required to measure the length of a canon. We were supposed to use the ruler that came on the side of the map. But we were fairly certain Matthew and Ryan's Maths ability wasn't up to scratch so we used the only thing handy that was really long.....a roll of toilet paper! We then measured it with a ruler when we got home! No addition required!

We then moved onto biological questions where we had to identify 2 living plants on this rock face. Luckily we knew what grass and moss looked like! Teesh went all intellectual on us and named lichen as well. But that only started us questioning whether fungi where plants too?

Things then got really tricky when we had to identify a nearby rock in a creek bed. Our knowledge about rocks that we had acquired near parliament house suggested it would be either shale or sandstone but then when we got to Mt. Ainslie that hinted that the rock could be limestone. So this was the only answer we submitted that we weren't confident with!

Teesh was quite impressed with all of the vistas off mountain tops Canberra has to offer! This one is Mt Ainslie. This is where we called a halt to Saturdays scrambling. We went home and fueled up to get going again in the morning!

So Sunday morning we started early by hitting the Space Tracking Station out near Tidbinbilla

After there we headed back to Canberra via the Cotter Dam. There is an awesome walk out to a viewing deck. It was at this point that Ben ran off and I experienced the difficulties of having a hearing impaired child. He really couldn't hear me calling him. He ran all the way back to the car thinking that Matthew was right behind him and he wasn't. It was really frightening for me on several levels!

We got over the fright and then moved on to Mt Stromlo. We checked out all of the telescopes that were lost in the 2003 Bush fires. So much history lost! Sad!

This is the ruins of one of the many telescopes up there.....

Part of the Science Scramble is a photography competition. Teesh is big into jumping shots so this is the Rickard attempt at a jump shot in front of one of the telescopes!

One of the questions asked us to measure the time using this sun dial. Problematic when there is no sun!

We then had a bit of a hike up a little mountain to find a grave site. I'm not sure who put the Sheean in charge but we somehow turned right instead of left and turned it into a rather long hike! But great exercise!

We had a quick pit stop for lunch near a creek in the Mt Stromlo Park. The frogs were so noisy! It was here I realised that Ben couldn't hear the frogs. There sound is at a low frequency so he couldn't hear them but he could hear the motorbikes riding past. And that is what is important to him!

From Stromlo it was over to Symonston to Geosciences Australia where thank goodness they were having their annual open day! So us and 4 billion other people searched around for geological equipment. This received another request to return again soon! The second item we needed to do was identify the above wood and name the coal deposit it contributed to. Well we couldn't find the answer so we asked some people who looked official and they didn't know but they sent us to the rock people. So we asked the rock people but they didn't know so they sent us to some smarter rock people and they still didn't know but were able to make a very well educated guess. So we went with that!

From there it was over to Deakin to find the hospital and smell some lavender!

Then keeping with the flower theme we took our English Rose to the English Garden. Matthew, Ryan and Ben were so glad that Aunty Teesh could read and speak "English" so she could translate the information we required!

Mummy was able to decipher the "Strayan" to name the native Aussie plants!

The favourite part of Sunday's efforts for the boys was the Scrivener Dam because it was releasing water. So they all pretended they were the only Olympic Swimmer that we all know....Uncle Brenty! (In case you don't get it the above picture is them breaststroking through the water!)

The final few checkpoints were around O'Connor where we did some more native plant and animal identification. Followed by some..... 

Birdwatching. Please disregard my son scratching his butt! He is a fair dinkum Aussie bloke isn't he. Only thing missing is a beer can!

The final clue threw us a bit. But after driving the whole way around the building and making Teesh get out and walk around it we decided the answer was the CCTV sign!

So that brought to a close our adventure all around Canberra! And Aunty Teesh can now go back to London having had a thorough tour of Canberra whilst also knowing that her nephews are awesome science nerds too!