The Good Shepherd Festival Day on Saturday 22 June at the Abbotsford Convent celebrated the arrival 150 years ago on the 24 June 1863 of the first four Good Shepherd Sisters in Victoria. The Chapel, the Chapel Crypt, the Parlour, the Bishop’s Parlour, the Community Room and the Linen Room were open for viewing and tours taken by some of the sisters who had lived and worked in the Convent also took participants to some of the buildings where the girls had lived.
It is a great pity that this Festival was only for one day as there was so much to see. However, the new interpretive centre in the antechamber to the Chapel is open every weekday and there is plenty to view there covering the whole history of the Abbotsford Convent while it was managed by the Good Shepherd Sisters.