A place with a lifting bridge

It is so quiet here in South Ballina. No traffic and no sounds other than the sound of rain on the roof last night. When we eventually decided to get out of bed the rain had dried up and the clouds were almost gone. In fact the sky was so blue after we had eaten our breakfast that I persuaded my stay at home hubby to come for a walk to the beach. The beach is almost adjacent to the caravan park we are staying in.

The walk did us both good and Colin looked quite happy to be out on the sands.

There wasn't another person on the beach for as far as the eye could see. This is supposed to be a surfing beach but the waves were very small indeed.

We needed a few pantry items from the shops in Ballina (we are a ferry ride across the river from Ballina) so the day was planned so that I could take a few shots in Wardell which was on the road trip to Ballina from here, There was time for a cup of coffee before we left so I can show you the little cabin that is our temporary home here in South Ballina.

I had read that Wardell had a few historic buildings in it – historic in Australia terms but only just over one hundred years old. I took a few pictures of what I could see were old building – the original Post Office is now closed and empty of everything except a few pieces of large furniture.

Post offices like this one were to be found in country towns all over country Australia. They were painted white and proudly displayed the Aussie flag on the flagpole out the front.

The most dramatic old structure in Wardell is the lifting bridge over the Richmond River that is still used by all the cars buses and trucks that use the Pacific Highway between Sydney and Brisbane. I really do not know if the bridge is still operational or if it even needs to be. Once upon a time paddlesteamers and yachts would sail up and down the river and need the higher clearance. I did once see the bridge lift for a high masted yacht but that was a few years ago.

And under a small road bridge beside the big lifting bridge is this wonderful painting. Obviously done by someone who loves music!

Before heading back to the caravan park I drove Colin along the track I walked along the Richmond River. When I walked it I stopped before reaching landsend where the river met the ocean but this time we bounced our way over deep holes and corrugations on the gravel track and then walked out along the breakwater where we were lucky enough to see whales passing by. The whales did not do anything exciting – like breaching or like tail flapping but they did break the surface of the water and occasionally blew spray into the air. This was a lucky shot! We stayed and watched for half an hour and in that time saw at least a dozen whales – many too far away to see anything more than the spray but a few close enough to capture with the 200mm lens.

As we retreated to the car we paused briefly to watch as an early fishing boat headed out to the open waters, The bar is calmer on the further side, the waves were really rolling towards the rocks on our side of the estuary.

Another fascinating day and lots more photos to pack into my hard drives!

I have made tentative plans for tomorrow but if the weather changes (it is like summer) then our plans will change too! I will tell you about what we did, tomorrow!

AJ

From razor wire to paint brush

I think tours for “oldies” are more strenuous than any trip I have organized for my family! I am “bushed” and I have done none of the driving! Where do I start to tell you of today’s adventures? Hmm! I will leave out the preliminaries (great breakfast!) and the drive to Maitland and tell you about our experiences in Maitland Gaol!

The grey skies and cold wind set the right mood for a visit to a disused gaol.

We were all given headphones and an ipod each and shown how to operate the self guided tour – there are numbered markers that correspond with the text on the ipod and by touching the right text we are given audio information and inmates’ stories of that part of the gaol. I thought it was such a clever idea and it gave the freedom to follow the map and do the tour sequentially or go in any direction and start the audio when you encountered a numbered marker.

As well as learning about the miserable side of jail life we had a few laughs too – one of our group is full of fun and he manages to make all of us laugh and he wanted his wife to take a photo of him as a prisoner but of course I was ready for him too!

The guide who accompanied through the gaol (the place is called a gaol, not jail but is pronounced the same way.) changed his outfit to black top hat and cloak and rode with us to Morpeth where he explained the former use of many of the old houses and stores in that fascinating town. What a fascinating place is Morpeth! There are so many old places that look amazing in a photograph and there are so many fascinating little shops filled with the most unusual items.

I loved looking over fences and discovering very special scenes – like this one!

From Morpeth we hopped back on the bus and went to a town called “Kurri Kurri”. I had never heard of this place before but it was a real surprise – it was quite a large town that had at one time been a very busy larger town. It was a coal mining town once upon a time but the coal mines had closed and huge numbers of unemployed drained the town of its energy. Ten years ago townspeople started a venture to draw tourists to their town – they started to decorate the large blank walls with murals.

A local guide joined us on our bus and guided us around the town to show us several of the murals. My photos had to be taken through the windows of the bus which pulled up but only stayed stationary for a few short minutes. It would have taken far too long if we had stopped completely and climbed out to take our pictures.

Kurri Kurri loves and reveres the kookaburra and has adopted it as a symbol of the town. A gigantic kookaburra made from recycled materials stands in the park in the centre of the town and when we finished our tour I persuaded everyone to go over to it so I could take their photograph with it.

By the time our group returned to the hotel we were all ready to sit down and relax for a while! The last stretch in the bus back to Soldiers Point made the eyelids feel very heavy!

 AJ

On the water

It was such a beautiful day today that I loaded my camera into the car and headed off in the direction of "The Spit" which is a narrow neck of land stretching out into the Pacific Ocean and on which is located the Southport Yacht Club, the prawn fleet, Seaworld and a couple of very expensive hotels.
My main purpose was to take photographs of flags in different situation - this is one of the topics for this month for the Visions Group. Since there was a strong breeze blowing any flags I found were flipping around at a great rate of knots! I needed a very high shutter speed to get them!
I am not going to share the flags with you, instead I am going to show you a few shots I took while looking for them.

Oops! A flag slipped in! The buildings in the background are Southport. Usually when high rise buildings are shown on the Gold Coast they are of the ones in Surfers Paradise. Southport is a suburb adjacent to and north of Surfers Paradise. Southport is considered to be the CBD of the Gold Coast while Surfers Paradise is the tourism hub. There are not as many tall buildings in Southport as there are in Surfers Paradise - but no doubt that will change over the years!

Here is a different way to explore the Gold Coast. I have caught one of the Helitours just leaving from its floating pontoon with a well dressed passenger in the front seat. The tall building at the back is a shopping centre and office block. Three floors of the Australia Fair building are shopping centre and four are car parking. The Australia Fair (Scarborough Fair originally) was first opened in 1983 and is still a vibrant and popular place to shop.

It was so pleasant rambling around the Marina along the Quay that I was often tempted to take photographs - on a sunny day like this the place looks magnificent! Of course, the large and luxurious water craft along this main walkway are on display to be sold. Several different marine brokers have strings of beautiful boats moored here.

I would love to know more about this iron boat. It sits solidly on the water beside smaller bouncy, white luxury craft and has no pretence at beauty. What is the purpose of the projection at the front? I wonder. There was no one I could ask, just a couple of other people passing the time like me and they knew even less than I did!
AJ

An unusual town

The little red car knew we had more passengers as it strained to climb the hills. I wasn’t able to fly today! Our day began in Hahndorf, a delightful little town that began as a home for German immigrants and was named after the captain of the ship that brought them to this fertile farming land. The town shed its German name, customs and language in the time of the first world war – there was so much ill feeling about the reliability of German Australians at that time. The name was restored many years later – but to learn about the fascinating history of the place you would need to do your own research!

We discovered a fascinating little place – actually, not as small as I expected, and every quaint building on the main street housed a shop that was worth walking into. There are lots of eating places too and there wasn’t a moment during the hours we spent there that we didn’t see a crowd of people eating and drinking!

Sue and Keith were tempted by a young lady offering free samples of strawberries. We bought a punnet of them to have for lunch.

 There was a sign for the Saturday Hahndoft market so we dropped in for a look.

It is always fun to look at the stalls – half of which were selling jewellery – and my eye was caught by the sight of a vegetable stall. Of course, vegetable stalls are a common sight at a market – but this one had multi-coloured carrots for sale! I was given a taste of them – four different coloured carrots had thin slices cut from them. I tasted the yellow and the purple and was so surprised to find that they tasted exactly the same and both of them tasted like . . . . carrot!

I just have to show you the fun that someone had with topiary. The sight of these two trees caught my eye! Aren’t they funny!

I wanted to kidnap these characters in the following photo. I think they would look terrific on my front lawn. Knowing the Gold Coast, I think I would have to anchor them to the ground or they would disappear one night! But they would look good!

The countryside around Hahndorf is a delight too. We had a wonderful drive around and even visited the Big Rocking Horse and toy factory. But that is another story!

AJ

My town

I always seem to be writing about "other places" so today I decided it was about time to point the camera at my own little town. Mudgeeraba grew from a small settlement of ceder cutters - timber-men and their families - and is now a town and district that has five large schools to accommodate all the children! A delightful statue that is a tribute to the ceder cutters stands in the "Village Green", a little park in the centre of the town.

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The plaque beneath gives the story of Mudgeeraba - click on the image to see it large enough to read.

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The timber building that is called "The Old Post Office" was once the Shire offices, it was the Post Office when I first moved to Mudgeeraba. and I was fortunate enough to be able to interview, on video, the post mistress just prior to the closing of the doors in 1993.

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A feather was put into Mudgeeraba residents' hat when the town was given a special award in 2009, it was chosen as the "Friendliest town in Queensland"! So timber sign boasts to all who drive into the cutting that gives access to the small town.

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The Wagon wheel and axe are the symbols of Mudgeeraba's heritage, below the wall is the timber sign that tells of the Friendliest Town award. The black rectangles are spot-lights for the two signs.
In the main part of the town - around the Village Green - the buildings have been constructed in such a way that they echo the history of the area. They are not genuine old buildings at all, they have been built in the last 20 years. The rounded roofs are called bull-nose roofs and that shape is typical of buildings in the early 1900's as is the colouring of the walls and veranda railings. These are "heritage colours".

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The Wallaby Hotel has been in Mudgeeraba since 1883 - what we see now is not the original but renovations of the original! Somewhere under all that weatherboard and paint there are a few original timbers! This part of the hotel is renovated in a very similar style to the original however the place is so much bigger than the original and has a large modern restaurant that is off to the right of the photo.

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I did consider doing some "Photoshop work" on this picture to remove the severe lean - but I rather like the look as it is, so left it! To straighten it would have meant losing quite a bit of the picture, including the top.
 Finally I am including a shot, which wouldn't win any prizes for composition - but it goes to show the proximity of the main Brisbane motorway to the entrance to the town. The wooden signs shown in an earlier photo are just on the right of this shot.

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The signs are on the corner of this road. Just the other side of the service road is the M1 and you can see some of the cars whistling past and missing the beauty of my little town.
For those of you interested in photography and the settings I used.  Today I used Manual because it was the middle of the day and the shadows were rather heavy and aperture priority gave either over or under exposure. I set the aperture to what I wanted and then adjusted the shutter speed to get the correct amount of brightness. The beauty of using a digital camera is that you can make mistakes and learn from them!
AJ

In the old style

Murwillumbah is a small, busy town with almost every building in the main part of town a slice of history. Murwillumbah came into being in 1902 and the name is taken from the aboriginal language of the time.It roughly translates to "camping place" – from Murrie, meaning "aboriginal people", Wolli, "a camp"; and Bab, "the place of" (Thanks to Wikipedia for that translation!)
While the shop fronts look modern (in many cases) the upper story of the buildings tells a different tale.

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Each one is a different style and a different colour.

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The Commonwealth Bank is very impressive with Grecian pillars.

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The most necessary building in any town of this size, is the Police station. The Police Station in Murwillumbah is very similar to timber police stations in many country towns. It looks cosy rather than foreboding. The little lock-up next door does not look quite so welcoming, though! Standing right next door to the lock-up is the court house so all these important buildings are together in the centre of town.

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Murwillumbah (we locals pronounce the name mer - wool - um - bah)
One of the famous people who call Murwillumbah home is Stephanie Gilmore, the young surfer who took the world by storm on the waves and holds four world titles.
AJ

Art in the country

Small towns are often full of surprises and one little place not far from where I live - but over the state border in New South Wales - is a little beauty. It is as small as a postage stamp and yet it attracts bus-loads of visitors every day and bigger crowds at the weekends. The town's name is Stoker's Siding. The little town started life as a dairy farm but a railway siding gave the necessary impetus for the town to grow. The reason the visitors love this place is due solely to the marketing skills of a very talented potter, everyone who comes here goes in to see the pottery and crafts that are for sale in a building that is close to 100 years old.

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The old building was once a general store and it has been lovingly maintained in its original form and is a photographer's delight! The panes of glass decorating the space above the main windows are not seen like this any more.

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I was rather taken by the unusual glass creations that were hanging inside the main display window. It was a bit difficult to take a photo of them with all the reflections on the glass - and even the circular polariser did not help very much.

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Inside the place is filled with the most exquisite pottery, paintings and works of art. If you want to see unusual glazes and huge platters and special pieces of pottery - this is the place to come!

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The train that converted Stokers Siding to a town has ceased to run and the grass grows tall between the rail lines, there are no noisy trains to disturb the peace any more neither to stop here nor to travel further north to Murwillumbah. The cows can graze in peace and quiet once again.

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The children must travel by school bus to Murwillumbah every morning and some creative parent has decorated the bus shelter. This must be one of very few bus shelters that does not have graffiti all over it.

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Even if you have visited Stokers Siding before, it is always worth another visit. The artwork in Stokers Siding Pottery is always changing and always interesting - and a new business that will attract visitors has opened next door.
AJ

Precious metals.

Today we are at Cobar, we called in on the way through to the centre but it was pouring with rain and we saw nothing. We gave ourselves two nights so that we would have a full day to check out the place and the weather was kind to us this time around.
Cobar is a town that has grown and evaporated a couple of times thanks to the volatile nature of the demand for copper and gold. At the moment it is a fairly prosperous little town and is riding on the mining boom once again.

Our explorations took us first to a large gold mine that initially looks like an open cut mine but it is a huge hole in the ground with a road that allows an easy gradient for the heavy machinery that drives into the hole at the bottom (Yellow arrow points to the entrance) The seam that contains the gold can be seen where the white arrows indicate where old mines have been exposed, I am assuming that they were hand dug and had buckets that were hauled up through a shaft to take the ore to the surface.

At a park opposite the Information Office is a memorial to the miners who lost their lives in mining accidents in Cobar and this imposing life-size miner working at an ore face shows how work was done in the past. Computerized machinery does the hard work these days.

There must have been plenty of gold in “them thar hills” because an information board had a photograph of one of the gold stampers. I have been to other gold mining towns where they have had ten stampers or fewer so fifty is a huge quantity! The ore was smashed into dust by the stampers and the water would wash the dust over a bed that was filled with mercury. Gold is heavier than crushed rock and sinks into the mercury while the water washes the rock off and into a pit. At the end of the crushing the mercury is scraped off the plates and put into a crucible and evaporated (?) over heat to release the gold. (If I have this wrong, please let me know!)

A visit to a working copper mine was fascinating, we were taken in a small bus around the outside of the working area and could only take our photos from behind the windows of the bus. I couldn't help being amazed at the store of huge tyres in a shed dedicated to this task. We were told that these tyres are hard to come by so when they are available a big order is made so that they are on hand for when they are needed.

Apart from lots of facts and figures giving quantities and and percentages (which went in one ear and out the other) we were shown the complex arrangement of tanks and pipes that are part of the method of separating/refining the copper from the ore. It was all very impressive.

Even more impressive is the number of pubs in Cobar! These miners are obviously a thirsty lot! The smart Great Western Hotel is named after one of the Gold Mines. I couldn't resist taking a photograph of it – it has the longest iron lacework veranda I have seen.

AJ