Feel the power: Suburb # 3 Narrabundah

I was quite looking forward to visiting this suburb. I had some fond memories of visiting a good friend here in my early days in Canberra. She rented a very large house up on the hill that had an amazing tiered garden. It also had a very strange lower level with miniature size rooms that looked like they were specially built to keep people captive in the basement. It was a bit creepy (eventually they even included a fake gimp in one room to freak out visitors).

This suburb is also the home of the infamous Narrabundah college which I had never seen but has seemed to haunt me throughout my life at a slight distance. But I digress...

Narrabundah is the Ngunnawal word for bird of prey. I didn't see any of these birds either...except in the form of sculpture as you will see below. The streets are named after indigenous people or explorers.

I have to admit that I was quite disappointed by the first half of our visit to Narrabundah - and it wasn't just because there was no-where the get GF breakfast at the shops except the IGA.
I had expected this area to be a little more swish. However, the shops look like they have seen much better days - despite a few fancyish restaurants, which would no doubt be open in the evening (including an Indian restaurant that could be a possibility for chilli night). It all seemed a bit depressed. The junkie walking around desperate for his next fix didn't help the atmosphere.

Nevertheless, as we explored further - including where I used to go with my old friends to walk her dogs - we found some beautiful views of Canberra and some more leafy streets with lots of bush capital character. The significant indigenous influence in the suburb was very noticeable with lots of aboriginal artwork and flags. The diversity of religious places in Narrabundah was also intriguing - with everything from a Russian orthodox church to a buddhist centre. In addition, there there were more baseball fields...but that seems to be some weird Canberra craze that I was hitherto unaware of as they are everywhere we visit, so I guess I can't call that unexpected anymore.

Overall, interesting although not what I expected - as Jay would say "a suburb of contrasts".