For a ’room with a view, you can’t beat this monstrous mushie! She sprouted up beside the Belconnen Fresh Food Market in 1998, with a well-appointed playground beneath her colossal cap. Just be warned that, with so many slippery dips and see-saws, there’s not mushroom inside for adults.
With a diameter of almost 16 metres, the Giant Mushroom is the grandest Big Thing in the ACT. She could do with a new coat of paint, however, and it can be difficult to grab a photo with her because she’s tucked away amongst the markets.
A downpour added to my difficulty, but it was a fun adventure to dodge the cyclone to snap a photo! And maybe all that rain will see her grow even larger!
It wasn’t all swings and roundabouts when I visited, however, because the playground was sadly closed for undisclosed reasons. Otherwise I would’ve been able to scurry up her stalk, peek through her windows, and have all sorts of fun-gus.
Oh well, I found a nice toadstool to hunker down on as I admired this Big. A few curious shoppers asked me what I was doing, and I assured them I wasn’t stalking the Mushroom. To a person they agreed this is a mush-see tourist attraction!
The Giant Mushroom was the star attraction Belco until 2011, when the Big Powerful Owl was installed just a few hundred metres away. The Big Acorns and Big Thorny Devil are also nearby. Oh, and it’s also a great place to meat for vegetarians (which is a joke that absolutely nobody who reads this will get).
I could spend all day saying how much I love this ‘shroom, but don’t want to get mushy!
