Lockdown Walk – Wheathampstead (27^th February 2021)

Stretching the word “local” again, this time I chose a circular walk, starting (and finishing – that’s how it works with circular walks…) in Wheathampstead. This time less eventful, but there appeared to be several interesting features…

Devil’s Dyke

The first site of interest is known as “Devil’s Dyke”. Before we look at this any further, let’s talk about the word “dyke”. Surely, it can only be the English language where one word can mean almost complete opposites: according to the Oxford Dictionary it means either “a long thick wall that is built to stop water flooding onto a low area of land, especially from the sea”, or “a channel that carries water away from the land”. How can something be either a wall (that’s what we call a “dijk”), or a ditch…? I sometimes wonder how it is possible we get anything communicated in English…!

Back to Devil’s Dyke: excavations suggest that it was constructed between 75-50 BC, perhaps to protect an “oppidum” (a large fortified settlement in the Iron Age). It is also suggested that Julius Caesar fought the English king Cassivellaunus here; however, there is no evidence for or against that this battle actually happened here.

Part of the land that once was part of the oppidum, defended by Devil’s Dyke

John Bunyan’s Chimney

The next site of interest is “John Bunyan’s chimney”: all that is left of a 17^th cottage where John Bunyan was said to have stayed and preached on his journeys.

According to the information sign, the cottage – except for the chimney – was demolished in 1877. A plaque was then put on the chimney, reading “John Bunyan is said by tradition to have preached and occasionally to have lodged in the cottage of which this chimney was a part“

Cottages replacing cottage where Bunyan stayed and preached

When the cottage (together with 2 adjacent cottages) were demolished, the cottages across the road (photo above) were built instead.

Spring has sprung

Even if it was just end of February, it really felt like a spring day. Of which the following evidence:

Note how the snow drops (left) seemingly grow out of the dead leaves from last year… Reminded me of God’s promise after the flood when Noah and his family were the only eight people to survive in the whole world:

21 And the LORD smelled a sweet savour; and the LORD said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake; for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done.
22 While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.
Genesis 8:21-22 (KJV)

Verse 22 is what I thought of, but verse 21 is so encouraging in the current time when so many people die with corona.

River Lea

The last part of the walk followed part of the Lea Valley Walk – a long distance walk following the river Lea from Luton to east London where it joins the Thames.

My walk description calls the river Lea “Hertfordshire’s largest river”… but every time I hear such things, I feel a bit like Naaman, captain of the host of the king of Syria, who was told by the prophet Elisha to go wash in the river Jordan to get recovered from his leprosy: he thought the rivers in his own country much better than any of the waters in Israel. The comparison is not exact, but this is not what I would call a river… it’s no more than a trickling stream…!

And finally – sign of the times…:

Lockdown Walk – Sandridge (23^rd January 2021)

Here in England, during lockdown III, we can go for a “local” walk – once a day. But as there is only so much I can reach by just stepping out of my front door, and to keep myself mentally healthy, I decided that a short drive was still “local”. After a look round on the world wide web, I found a nice walk near Sandridge, just north of St Albans. Looking forward to seeing something different than just the village I’m living in, I cheerfully started walking, not knowing that I would actually even have a bit of an adventure as well… 😀

Sandridge (in the distance), seen from Heartwood Forest

A nice, cold day – there was even a hint of sleet for a few minutes – great for a nice walk. Nice light, together with some dark clouds makes for interesting (I know… personally choice…) pictures:

Nice light and dark clouds in the background…

The walk was graded easy, but with my lack of exercise during the covid period, I felt my legs, even doing rolling hills like these:

And he (she?) just posed for me, giving me ample time to select the right lens… If all else fails, that may well be my New Year’s cards sorted for this year:

Robin redbreast, posing to get his picture taken

Even if it was nice weather that Saturday that I went out for this walk, we have had quite a bit of rain during the winter months. So some parts of the route were rather boggy…:

And then, I got to this tree… Thought it would make for a nice picture against the blue sky, with a bit of cloud as if it was smoke coming from a far away house, the moon out (just above the tree). So a photo I took. Then checked my phone to see if I was still on the right path, and continued my walk… not knowing what had just happened…

Where the adventure started (in hindsight)…

This was one of the parts of the route with a bit of an incline, and at the top I needed to decide if I was to turn left or right… so I reached for my phone in my pocket. But much to my despair, there was no phone in my pocket! Checked again, checked my bag… still no phone… must have lost it…! What to do, other than retracing my steps to see if I could find it somewhere. All the way back to the boggy patch (see photo above) where I was absolutely sure that I had used my phone… nowhere a phone to be found.

Walking round the boggy patch, thinking what to do next, I then heard whistling and shouting. Looking where the noise came from, I noticed 2 fellow wanderers who clearly were trying to get my attention, as there was nobody else there. And yes indeed – they had found my phone!

You may well wonder why I think that I’d lost it when taking the above picture of tree, cloud and moon… Well – I had a GPS tracker on, revealing the journey my phone had made, and at which point that had diverted from my journey while going on its own journey with the fellow wanderers… (Btw – I’m not even sure I like that tree-cloud-moon picture that much… the berries or the robin are better, I think…)

Anyway – thus reunited with my phone, I happily finished my walk.

The website describing my walk, suggests that the concrete block in the above photo could be part of one of the WW II road blocks, which were thrown up in 1940, and intended to help Dads’ Army (the Home Guards) slow German invasion forces.

And that was the end to a nice walk, across nice country side. With an adventure – not so enjoyable at the time, but all’s well that ends well!

Lockdown Walk – London Colney (25^th December 2020)

After initial excitement of being allowed to visit 1 family over the Christmas period, just a few days before I was to travel to Scotland to see some friends, the government decided that no travel was allowed at all… So – stuck at home… What to do instead?

Well… go for a walk to explore the local area… thoroughly…

Coal Posts

All around the Greater London Area boundary marks, set up by the Corporation of the City of London, can be found like the ones below:

Many of these posts were erected under the London Coal and Wine Duties Continuance Act 1861. A very interesting website, tells me that already since medieval times the Corporation of the City of London had rights to measure and tax all coal that entered the port of London. When in 1666 a large part of the City of London was burnt down in the Great Fire of London, these coal duties paid part of the rebuilding of the city.

Whilst initially duties were levied on coal entering London via the Port of London, with the coming of canals and railways, coal duties were extended to coal entering London via any route – including road – as well. Hence 2 coal posts in London Colney on the roads that lead to London. To begin with, the coal tax area comprised an area within a 20 mile radius from London (or more precisely: from the General Post Office in St Martins le Grand). But in 1861 the London District was redefined to coincide with the Metropolitan Police District. As this area was much smaller, many boundaries were moved, but also – many new coal posts, including those in London Colney, were erected.

All Saints Pastoral Centre

When passing London Colney on the M25 during the time of year that there are no leaves on the trees, a rather grand building can be seen:

As it is in London Colney, I was going to include it in my explorations, but when arriving at the beginning of the road leading to the site I was met with a sign saying that it was private property… However, as there was also a rather large sign saying that it is for sale, I thought I would ignore that and take a look at it anyway… Perhaps a new office… 😀

The building looked to me to be rather old, but what do I know about that… apparently the main building was designed in 1899 and built in 1901, originally as a convent for the Anglican Society of All Saints Sisters of the Poor. The Comper Chapel is even newer: built between 1927-1963… The whole site was then bought by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Westminster, which converted it to a conference centre, after which it was finally sold a property developer. And for sale again (or still?)…

Round the farm to Napsbury Park

Next my explorations led me to a nice path round the farm to end up at Napsbury Park (well, I think it actually goes between different parcels of land of the same farm).

What is now known as Napsbury Park, opened in 1905 as Middlesex County Asylum, designed for 1152 patients with varying mental illnesses: sick, infirm, epileptic, chronic, chronic refractory and working patients. There were separate wings for male and female patients, separated by a common dining hall (largest building with small tower in photo above). A water tower provided water to the different buildings.

During the First World War it operated temporarily taken over by the army. The hospital finally closed in 1998, and is now a Grade II listed park with residential housing, combining some of the existing buildings (mostly converted to apartments) with new builds. More information can be found here.

Bridge over Colne

According to what seems nowadays to be the source of all knowledge – Wikipedia – London Colney was first recorded in 1555: “Colney on the road to London”. The High Street (part of an old coaching route between London and St Albans) crosses the river Colne, originally by means of a ford, but since ca 1777 a bridge carries traffic across the river (unless you go walking with children, who like to cycle across the ford, and then fall in when they loose momentum in the water, and get stuck in the middle…).

Telford Bridge. The original ford is also visible as the largely flooded area between the left of the photo to approximately where the white car is.

The bridge is commonly known as “Telford Bridge”, however, apparently it is disputed that the bridge is actually by Thomas Telford… Nonetheless, a nice looking bridge!

Finally – near the bridge is also the parish church of St Peter, in the church yard of which apparently 7 commonwealth graves (1 from WW-I, 6 from WW-II) should be. A quick walk (it was getting late, and I really started feeling my legs…) over the church yard didn’t reveal much, so perhaps I’ll be back for another look round another time.

Great Ocean Road – Apollo Bay to Port Campbell

After a nice breakfast, back on the road again… up to Port Campbell with the Twelve Apostles.

Unplanned Stop

My first stop was planned to be at Cape Otway Lightstation, however, I had an unplanned stop before getting there… Driving along the relatively narrow road, I suddenly spotted a group of people in the road, all looking up and pointing at something, some even taking pictures… What could be so important to see that people would even get out of their cars for?

A closer look revealed the cause, and made me copy their behaviour: I parked my car, grabbed my camera, and joined the group of spectators… to take the following picture:

Koala… my first Aussie animal in the wild…

Really glad I b(r)ought my extra zoom lens! He/she wasn’t quite asleep (yet), but didn’t seem to have plans for moving about much either. But then, as I’d learned earlier: koalas sleep 18-20 hours per day…

Telegraph Station at Cape Otway

After this short interlude, Cape Otway Lighthouse was my next stop. It appeared to be a very interesting site with much more than “just” a lighthouse to visit. To begin with, there was the telegraph station (1859), which connected the island Tasmania to mainland Australia using a 386 km long cable under the sea (ok, that’s about 240 miles… if only just everyone started using the metric system consistently…).

But already after 2 years, the cable failed, after which the building was used as signal station to communicate with ships that sailed passed in the Bass Strait using signal flags that were flagged from the flag pole in front of the building:

Signal flags
Flag pole for signal flags

Signal flags could be used for many different things: to communicate where the ship came from and was going to, if it was an immigrants’ ship: how many people on board, births, deaths, diseases (so the ship could be immediately quarantined upon arrival), but also personal messages from passengers. These would then be passed on to Melbourne (and beyond) by telegraph – it would take 4 minutes for a message to arrive at Melbourne. It was also a means of getting the “latest” news from eg Europe, and pass on the latest news from Australia to the passing ship.

A very informative board in the telegraph station told me the following interesting information about communication in the late 19^th and early 20^th century:

In 1872 Australia was connected with Europe by a submarine cable from Darwin in North Australia to the island of Java, while overland cables carried the telegraph messages to the cities in the south
This was a vast improvement: the congratulatory message from the Mayor of London to the Mayor of Adelaide in South Australia took “only” 7 hours – compared to several months by ship
In 1876 Australia and New Zealand were connected by cable
In 1902 the loop was closed by a cable under the Pacific Ocean

As great as these improvements were at the time, it is unimaginable at the moment with a flight from London to Sydney taking only about 24 hours (including stop over), and instant access via mobile phones and internet!

As telegraphy is basically sending messages by electric signals over long wires, telegraphs need to be powered by a large bank of big batteries, all filled with sulfuric acid. To prevent that any spillages would leak everywhere, the floor of the battery room looks a bit like a bath tub:

The telegraph station was also used as Lighthouse keeper’s lodgings, and even as school. As I used to play the organ a bit, it was good to see this nice example… if only my house was big enough…

It is not clear how this organ came into the telegraph station (from Canada…!), but one story is that it was on board of the “Eric the Red”, a ship that brought exquisite exhibits from New York to Australia for the first “International Exhibition”. The ship was shipwrecked at Cape Otway, however, and it is thought that the organ was a survivor of that shipwreck… Not too sure about this story: I mean, I didn’t try to play it, but I’m sure salt water isn’t exactly improving the sound of an organ…

Cape Otway Lightstation

Let’s get on to the actual lighthouse:

The lighthouse was built between 1846-1848. Each stone of the building was hand carved by stone masons, and fitted together without any mortar, by locking each stone into surrounding ones.

Hand carved stones – no cement or mortar used to lock them in place!

At the top, there was a curved dome, which carried the actual light, weighing about 4.5 tonne – that is 4500 kg, or if you really must know: nearly 710 stone! (Which reminds me of a story a colleague told me: her son started to learn about weights, and wondered how many “pebbles” were equal to one stone…). Great craftmanship was used in the actual lantern room: with the round valves the amount of air could be regulated so the light would burn with optimal fuel efficiency.

Curved stone roof
Great craftmanship

Visitors could climb up to the lantern room in the top of the lighthouse to admire the view:

Some other buildings

Scattered around the site were several other buildings. A radar station from World War II, that was used to track Japanese submarines:

The antenna could be swept round 360 degrees, while looking out for “blips” in the signal. Any suspicious signals would be passed on by phone or radio to Air Defence Headquarters in Melbourne.

In the bushes surrounding the lighthouse was a (newly built) aboriginal hut:

Note how the rain is lashing down… Whilst the weather was mainly nice, I did have some heavy showers every day during this week. As they were just very short, most of the time I just stayed in the car until the rain stopped before getting out to visit the next attraction along the route.

Lastly, the oldest surviving building – the dwelling and workshop of the assistant keepers and their families, built in 1850:

Assistant keeper’s quarters and workshop

On account of one of the inhabitants, it wasn’t the greatest of accommodations, “on account of the damp coming through the end wall, as the plaster is all hanging with moisture”…

Twelve Apostles

After all the delights at the museum of Cape Otway Lightstation (well worth a visit!), I finally made my way to the Twelve Apostles… The road had moved away from the ocean, and went through lovely rolling hills:

Rolling hills between Cape Otway and Port Campbell

And finally I arrived at the attraction that the Great Ocean Road is so famous for… the Twelve Apostles:

Some of the Twelve Apostles
Some more of the Twelve Apostles

They are – or rather: were… five have collapsed over time – twelve limestone stacks along the coast near Port Campbell. I had hoped to be able to get to the beach, however, when I was there the tide was coming in, so I couldn’t walk round the base of the Apostles. The pictures above are therefore taken from a viewing platform at the top of the cliffs, which doesn’t quite show how majestic these 45 m tall structures are…

Razorback, Loch Ard Gorge, Arch, London Bridge

But the Twelve Apostles aren’t the only limestone stacks along the coast at Port Campbell. And having been there, I’m not yet sure which one is my favourite… Take a look for yourself. To begin with, here is the Razorback:

The edges and bumps along the top of the rock are formed by spray from the ocean below: softer rock is eroded away, leaving the harder areas, which form the current razorback shape. The grooves that are visible at the bottom of the stack, are similarly formed by waves.

Next is Loch Ard Gorge, named after a ship – the Loch Ard – that was shipwrecked nearby.

This time I went down to the beach, to see the rocks and the erosion close up.

After dinner I decided to do 2 more sites – firstly the Arch:

And finally – sunset at London Bridge:

But… London Bridge is fallen down… At least, partly… Until 1990 it was a double spanning bridge that was connected to the mainland. However, unexpectedly the part closest to land collapsed, leaving two visitors stranded on the outer part. They were saved, uninjured, by helicopter not too much later. And needless to say, the viewing platform is now a lot further away and London Bridge itself cannot be accessed any longer.

So far my adventures of this second day driving the Great Ocean Road. The next day I’d see some more great limestone stacks. Perhaps even the best one is left for last…

So: more again next time!

Great Ocean Road – Torquay to Apollo Bay

The second week of my holiday in Australia I drove the Great Ocean Road:

Another spectacular part of this amazing country! Very different (and much colder…) compared to the first holiday week.

Torquay

On Monday I flew from Sydney to Avalon airport, where I hired a car and drove to my first motel in Torquay:

My trusty vehicle for the Great Ocean Road adventure

I had booked motels for every night, but hadn’t exactly planned what I would visit every day… and there is so much to do and see along the Great Ocean Road! So there was some last minute planning to do… water to hand (I was in Australia after all, where everyone seems to carry a bottle of water around all the time), phone and computer, but also my trusty paper map – love a good paper map!

After a big thunderstorm, the weather improved significantly, and we ended up having a lovely evening and sunset:

Note how much the trees along the coast are grown completely bent due to the prevailing wind from the sea (yes, the sea was on the right hand side in that photo).

Start of the Great Ocean Road

The next morning it was grey and drizzly weather. But that couldn’t dampen my spirit for the day: I was going to drive the Great Ocean Road, which I had been much looking forward to.

It would be a week of driving, but probably at least as much stopping – to enjoy the scenery. First stop was therefore already as quick as 5 minutes from Torquay: Bell’s Beach, renowned for surfing. Not that I’m such a keen surfer, or am particularly interested in the sport, but when in Australia, it is almost unavoidable. And it makes for nice pictures…

Bell’s Beach
Surfers at Bell’s Beach

Loveridge Lookout

My next stop was at the Loveridge Lookout. The weather started to brighten up a little, and the views were in one word amazing:

Loveridge Lookout itself was built in 1938 in memory of James Loveridge by his widow Bertha Loveridge. According to a information panel, it was the favourite place of her former husband to look out over the Bass Straight.

During the Second World War the lookout was an observation post for the Volunteer Air Observers Corps. From 1942 to 1945 it was continuously manned, and played an important role in the ground warning strategy of the Royal Australian Air Force.

Great Ocean Road war memorial

The Great Ocean Road is the world’s biggest war memorial. It was built between 1918 and 1932 by the returning soldiers who had fought in the First World War, and dedicated to the many soldiers killed during that war. A memorial arch has been erected between Lorne and Aireys Inlet:

Being from The Netherlands, which remained “neutral” during the First World War, my knowledge of this part of world history isn’t the greatest – the Second World War has made much more of a scar in Dutch society, and therefore that is talked about much more. I certainly had never realised that so many Australians (330,000 according to a plaque at the war memorial) had volunteered to fight in Europe, Turkey and the Middle East, as “when the [British] Empire is at war, so is Australia at war” as the then Prime Minister of Australia, Joseph Cook, said. 60,000 men would never return as they got killed, and another 160,000 were wounded, making the total casualty rate more than 64% – very sobering data.

In order to rehabilitate successfully in civilian life again after returning from the grueling experience it was important to find employment. 3,000 of the returning service men found work building the Great Ocean Road. Despite the hard work that was needed (most of the rock had to be hacked away by hand!), the conditions were relatively good, as there was regular pay for working 8 hours per day and half a day on Saturday. They had access to a piano, a gramophone, newspapers and magazines – what more does a man want… Relatively good quality food was also provided and sold for a small fee. In addition, it was an opportunity to again work outside and share comradery.

Teddy’s Lookout

The next stop at Teddy’s Lookout nicely shows how this part of the Great Ocean Road literally curves around the rocky curves of the coast line.

View from Teddy’s Lookout
Great Ocean Road, curving around coast line

Erskine Falls

Inland of the Great Ocean Road is Great Otway National Park , which is known, amongst other things, for many water falls. So I had to visit at least one of them. Be warned, though:

Snakes… ok, we’re in Australia; slippery… yes, we’re near a water fall; but falling trees…?

I’m glad to report that I didn’t see any falling trees… or snakes for that matter… The path was somewhat slippery indeed, and there were in particular a lot, I mean, really an AWFUL LOT of steep steps:

But it was worth it… here is the view from the bottom:

Erskine Falls – some 38m according to a sign

And finally – the lush surroundings (I took plenty time during the climb up to take pictures… I mean, to catch breath taking these steps up again…):

The lush surroundings of the Erskine Falls with many ferns and other greenery

Howard Hitchcock Lookout

Howard Hitchcock was the founder of the “Great Ocean Road Trust” in 1918: a private company that secured a vast amount of money for building the Great Ocean Road.

Road, hewn out of the rocks
Reminder…
View from Hitchcock Lookout

At this lookout it was very clear that the road was literally hewn out of the rocks. And as was the case from every lookout that I stopped at, the view was stunning again…

Last Stop

I really cannot remember where I found the information to stop here, so I cannot remember where exactly this is… it is not one of the usual lookouts that are advertised on most websites. But it is a nice stop nevertheless that got me close to the sea (ocean…? ok, water side).

Apollo Bay

Finally – Apollo Bay where I had booked a motel for the night. The weather had become really nice indeed, so I went for a lovely evening walk along the coast.

After a bit of preparation for the next day, an early night: the next part of the Great Ocean Road would turn inland before passing the Twelve Apostles… something I had heard and read about a lot already, so was looking forward to see with own eyes. But not before I had spent an interesting morning visiting Cape Otway Lightstation… More about all these interesting things in the next blog DV!

Daintree National Park

As you probably already gathered from my previous blog, I’m back in the UK, where it really has been freezing (as opposed to the “freezing” in Australia, which apparently happens already at 10℃): I have had to scrape the car already. And I can freely use the word “sorry” again. As often as I like… Which is getting the very familiar response again: “sorry”… On this island we just don’t sort out who was at fault when bumping into each other (which happens a lot in a busy city like London), we just say “sorry” to each other and get on with our lives. As a Dutch person I had to learn to say “sorry” a lot (yes, I know, we are rather impolite by British standards…), whether I’m really sorry or not, so when I was in Australia I still said “sorry” a lot. Which wasn’t greeted with the same word back, but with a “no worries, mate”… Well – to all the Australians out there: no worries, mates, I didn’t really worry… it was just part of my adaptation into the British society.

Enough rambling, and back to my amazing time in Australia. The other thing I did when in Port Douglas, was visiting the Daintree National Park. Another interesting day. I took a tour with Tony’s Tropical Tours: I can thoroughly recommend them!

Mossman Gorge

Our first stop was at Mossman Gorge, a rainforest located in the southern part of Daintree National Park. As can be expected from a rainforest, it was warm and humid… but again, the flora and fauna was very impressive indeed:

Cauliflory
Native ginger
Bird’s nest fern
Mossman river
(Little) turtle in Mossman river

Cauliflory is a term referring to plants that flower and have their fruit from the main stem, rather than new off shoot (begs the question: how did the humble cauliflower get its name…?). I believe the example above is a fig tree. Native ginger… rather large! And the bird’s nest fern: the brown “signature” on the leaves are the spores, which is how the plant is reproduced.

The ground around Cairns and Port Douglas is very fertile, and there are many large farms growing sugar cane all around.

The sugar cane is made into sugar at Mossman Sugar Mill, which serves an area over 8500 hectares. Sugar cane has to be processed rather quickly after harvesting, and in order to get it transported easily over such vast distances, there are narrow gauge railways connecting the sugar cane fields, and the freshly cut sugar cane gets a train ride to the mill.

Daintree river cruise

Next we did a cruise on the Daintree river:

In search of some wild life… which we found… how about the following:

Yes, indeed… crocodiles… The one on the left, poking his head just above the water, is a fully grown example. The one on the right, sunbathing on the bank, was only a small baby croc. Very impressing to see nonetheless!

And then this lovely flower:

A lovely flower, but it lasts only a day… made me think of Psalm 103:

15 As for man, his days are as grass: as a flower of the field, so he flourisheth.
16 For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more.
17 But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear him, and his righteousness unto children’s children;
18 To such as keep his covenant, and to those that remember his commandments to do them.
Psalm 103:15-18 (KJV)

The vegetation along the banks is generally just rather nice:

Vegetation along the banks of the Daintree river

The brown spikes at the bottom of the photo are extensions from the trunk of mangrove trees. These extensions anchor themselves in the soil, and help stabilise the tree in the wet, muddy soil at the water’s edge.

Kulki track and lookout

Our next stop was the Kulki track and lookout: the place where the rain forest meets the reef – the only place apparently where 2 World Heritage Areas meet… And indeed, the rainforest goes as far as the beach (see top-left photo)… couldn’t see the reef, but am sure it is in the water there somewhere.

Rain Forest meets Reef
Fan Palm
King Fern
Palm with fruits

Furthermore, lots of palms and ferns in the rainforest. The Fan Palm is endemic to the rainforests in North Queensland, including the Daintree. And the King Fern can grow to a height of about 5 meter when fully mature – the one in the photo isn’t quite that large, but still quite impressive. It also seems to be “one of the most ancient” ferns in the world…

Noah Valley

Noah Valley – our next stop – is a World Heritage listed private property, only accessible to people on our tour. It, again, had some interesting plants:

Buttress Roots
Fishtail Palm

Since the soil of rainforests is generally rather poor, many trees generate really large and wide root systems, known as “buttress roots”. Not only does this give the tree more chance of extracting nutrients from the soil by spreading over a larger area, but it also gives more stability as the roots are generally not very deep. The fishtail palm indeed grows like this – the leaves are seemingly torn off, but this is not the case…

And some spiders…:

And some other crawlers and jumpers:

In the afternoon we went for a nice and refreshing swim in a rainforest stream – look how clear the water is…

Rainforest stream where we went for a refreshing swim…

Cape Tribulation

Cape Tribulation was so called by James Cook, after his ship scraped a reef and then got stuck at another reef nearby. He called it Cape Tribulation, because “here begun all our troubles”. We visited the beach in the national park:

At the beach our guide found some green ants that apparently can be eaten… Or at least, the stomach is edible, and is said to taste like lemon… Probably not surprisingly, I have politely declined the delicacy…

I scream, you scream, we all scream, for…

On our way back, we went for a nice cold treat – ice cream. From the Daintree Ice Cream Company. Very nice indeed:

Alexandra Lookout

Our last stop was at the Alexandra Lookout where we had great views of the Daintree river Estuary:

And finally – on our way back we were told that this was a special traffic light:

According to our guide, this is the only traffic light north of Cairns… To put it in perspective, from Cairns to Cooktown – which isn’t even the furthest north in Australia, but it is pretty much where all roads end – is about 327 km, or 203 miles…

It would be a fun fact if it was true… On my way back to the airport in Cairns I discovered that there are indeed very, very few traffic lights, but there are some between Cairns and Port Douglas… Very few anyway, so we’ll take it as a “fun fact with a pinch of salt”…

55 Broadway

Today I went on one of the Hidden London Tours, organised by the London Transport Museum – to 55 Broadway: London’s first skyscraper and London Underground’s iconic headquarters. I’d done another Hidden London Tour (to Downing Street station, where Churchill resided for a period during the Second World War) some time ago, and I can really recommend these tours! So I thought I’d share this as a little interlude between the Australian stories (they will continue, no worries – in fact, there is one that I’ve half written already…)

So, on a grey Saturday afternoon I undertook the journey to St James’s Park underground station, above which the Grade 1 listed building was built:

London Underground hasn’t always been run by a single company like it is currently: it started off as a bunch of individual companies – this is btw the reason why there are still so many stations that are really close to each other: each company had their own station at more or less the same strategic place – until in 1902 the Underground Electric Railway Company of London (known as the Underground Group) was formed.

In the 1920s the Underground Group looked to build a new headquarters, and tasked the famous architect Charles Holden to design a building that would be in line with the Group’s bold vision for the future of London’s public transport.

The result was what is now known as “55 Broadway”. An interesting building… London’s first skyscraper – not in the sense that it is really tall (in fact, St Paul’s Cathedral, built much earlier than 55 Broadway, and is also taller), but in the sense that it has a steel frame, the same way of building as used for the skyscrapers in cities like New York. Oh, and at the time it was the tallest office building… tallest in some way then… And apparently, the council in London responsible for the planning permission, didn’t want it to be a tall, straight building, like the American skyscrapers, that would take away the sunlight (the little bit that London gets…) from the streets and surrounding buildings. This is also one of the reasons that it isn’t a straight building, but rather gets narrower the higher you get:

Another prominent feature is the cruciform (like a cross) shape, a shape mostly used for churches. There are several explanations for why it is this shape: it makes best use of a rather oddly shaped building plot, and it may well be by design, as this allowed the maximum amount of natural light to flood into the building.

Both the exterior and interior show grandeur: the steel frame was faced with high quality Portland stone – the same stone as used to built for instance Buckingham Palace and St Paul’s Cathedral. Inside there is lots of marble, bronze and walnut panelling, making it a very luxurious office:

Original ceiling lights
Ceilings in corridors
Plinth… for flowers…?
Fountain on every floor
Look at these doors…
Bronze door knob… and walnut panelling…

An interesting feature is the mail system:

Apparently from the higher floors letters could be “posted” into the mail chute – note the separate chutes for “London and abroad” and “Country” – which would then be picked up by someone on the ground floor and posted to be sent by Royal Mail.

And what about this for a ceiling…? Think it looks somewhat like railways, don’t you? That’s in the executive office (the pink is most probably not original):

No expense was spared and state of the art was used everywhere. Such as the clocks: synchronised using a big clockwork that was housed in the clock tower at the top of the building:

Original (synchronised) clock
Empty space where the clockwork used to be – the clocks are now controlled by the little grey box…
The clockwork used to be up in the clock tower

From the top of the clock tower we had great views over London:

Finally then: the stairs…

Grand entrance to staircase
Stairs
Great details on bronze handrail
Grand, even in the smallest details

Wouldn’t you agree that this suggests that this is the main staircase in the building…? Well, let me tell you… it is actually the fire escape… you know, these stairs that in modern buildings are just very functional, made of concrete, certainly not embellished like these stairs are! But it really is true: that is why the arrows in the bottom photo very helpfully point downwards…! Instead, the main way to get up and down the building was by using one of the four lifts.

All in all – a very interesting tour of a great headquarters. In that time they knew how to build office buildings – they even had (movable) dividers for the offices, rather than the horrible open offices that we have nowadays… yes, I’m a bit jealous of that…

Great Barrier Reef

One of the “must-do’s” when in Northern Queensland, is visiting the Great Barrier Reef. It is the world’s largest coral reef system, stretching all the way along the north eastern part of Australia’s coast line. It may look like plant material, however, it actually consists of millions of coral polyps, which are small organisms. Coral reef only grows in warm water – in the tropics – and only under water, but no deeper than about 150 m (ok… that’s about 490 ft for the UK…), as it needs sunlight for its growth. Due to this rather shallow depth, it can be easily seen, both from above the sea, as well as when snorkeling or diving. Apparently, it can be seen from space even, but I didn’t check that…

The reef itself is already rather colourful, and so are the fish living there. Besides, there are sea turtles and reef sharks: much to discover…

Visiting the Great Barrier Reef

There are different ways to visit the Great Barrier Reef: most companies offer a boat ride out to the reef, and then people can jump off the back of the boat for a swim and/or snorkeling. A more diverse way is what I did: take a boat out to the reef, where this particular company has an “activity platform” from where the reef can be seen and/or visited in many different ways.

So, on to a boat, leaving Port Douglas behind…

Activity platform at the reef

As said, an activity often associated with visiting the reef, is snorkeling (photo on the left). I must say – I didn’t do that… guess I’m just rather over-cautious, and hearing about reef sharks and just all sorts of animals creeped me out a bit… so I didn’t gather enough courage. However, what I did do, is look round the “underwater observatory” (a tunnel under water with glass walls), and take one of the “semi-submersible” (middle photo; basically a boat with a deep keel with glass walls). I even splashed the cash on a helicopter ride to see the reef from the air- that was really great fun!

Some fish of the reef

One thing I wouldn’t have been able to do if I had gone snorkeling, is take photos. So I guess that would be another good excuse for staying dry… Still, the photos don’t really justice to the colours, as they are taken through glass, so just imagine everything a lot brighter and even more colourful.

The reef from the sky

And here is the evidence of my helicopter flight. Well, at least if you believe that all pictures shown here are mine (which they are!)… I really liked this view of the reef!

Great Barrier Reef, seen from helicopter

Feeding fish

Just after lunch time they fed the fish. Just a little, as they weren’t pets, so needed to forage for themselves, but enough for the visitors to admire them. Some of the fish were so keen that they nearly jumped out of the water to get their food…

View from semi-submersible

Finally then some photos from insight the semi-sub, as it is also known as. Top photo shows some coral reef – I think the big round flat ones are known as “plate reef” (“bord-rif” for the Dutch). And doesn’t it look like a plate…? And then a few more different fish… Real shame that these photos look so much duller than what I could see through the glass myself. You’ll just have to imagine how it looks like in real life. Or go yourself…

And that ends this day already. It was really great to see this impressive wonder of creation. And if/when I go another time… I promise, I’ll really try and may even do some snorkeling…

Port Douglas

My first holiday week I spent in Port Douglas, very much in the north of Australia:

It really is a very long way north – the distances in this country still dazzle me: it was a 3 hour flight from Sydney to Cairns, and then another 1 hour drive from Cairns further north to Port Douglas… I already had to scale up from the Netherlands to the United Kingdom in terms of distances, but this is a completely different scale altogether! See this site for a nice way to visualise the relative scale… basically, all of Europe fits in Australia…

Another fact about Port Douglas: it lies in the tropics. Remember that from geography lessons? That’s the region between the tropical latitudes (“keerkringen” for the Dutch readers): the Tropic of Cancer (Kreeftskeerkring) in the northern hemisphere and the Tropic of Capricorn (Steenbokskeerkring) in the southern hemisphere. And Port Douglas is further north than the Tropic of Capricorn, so indeed lies in the tropics.

What else do I remember from geography lessons? That the tropics are very warm… and humid… and has tropical rainforests… All of that is true for Port Douglas: it was warm and humid, but I had a hotel with direct access to the swimming pool from my room:

Moreover, the rainforest was only a short drive away, and as an added bonus: the Great Barrier Reef is also close by. So there was lots to explore!

Port Douglas

Port Douglas is currently a small town, mainly living from tourism. Most of the buildings are hotels. B&B’s or holiday resorts – nearly all of them with some form of pool access as the weather is always warm, really warm or very warm. Had I mentioned already that it was warm there…?

It was established in 1877, after gold was found in the nearby Hodgkinson River as the main port for importing necessary goods for the miners and exporting the mined gold. However, when the Kuranda railway was opened, the goods were transported to and from Cairns, bypassing Port Douglas, and Cairns took over as main port. And when a cyclone in 1911 demolished almost all buildings in Port Douglas, there wasn’t much left of this once so thriving port. Until the 1980’s, when the first big holiday resort was built, and tourism started to boom.

The “St Mary’s By The Sea” church was one of the many buildings that was destroyed in the 1911 cyclone. A smaller church was built instead:

And this is the local police station:

I’m not sure this is a historical building, but with the verandas it looks pretty laid-back, right? What certainly is a historical building, is the Old Court House:

It was built in 1879, and is currently the second oldest surviving of similar buildings in Queensland. I didn’t manage to visit it, so can’t tell more about it than what can be found on internet anyway.

I think I’ll leave my visits to the Great Barrier Reef and the Daintree Rain Forest for separate posts…

Two Evenings in Sydney

This will be the last post about Sydney (at least, for now): the next posts will be about Port Douglas, the Great Barrier Reef and the Daintree Rain Forest, and then the Great Ocean Road…

But first things first – in my last weeks that I was staying in Sydney, I went into town for two evenings. I wanted to do that much earlier, but either the weather (they’ve had a lot of rain when I was there) or work didn’t allow me to do so. In the end I decided to ignore both the weather and work, and go anyway. One evening I went to see the Opera House and Harbour Bridge illuminations and combined that with visiting the “Night Noodle Markets” in Hyde Park (and shopping for a road map of the Great Ocean Road). The other evening was because of my goodbye dinner from work.

Evening 1

I took the ferry in, so arrived at Circular Quay. To get to Hyde Park from there, I walked through the Botanic Gardens. Here are a few flowers that I didn’t see last time I was there:

The top left is an Aloe – not sure which sort. And amaryllises (top right) grow in people’s front (and presumably also back) gardens. I saw several houses with a row of amaryllises in their front gardens on my way to work, but never had a camera with me, so here is the evidence that they grow outside in Australia.

There is also a nice rose garden in the Botanic Gardens, however, I didn’t manage to see that last time I went. So here are some examples of the many varieties of roses they have there.

As I said, it was “Night Noodle Markets” in Hyde Park: an Asian street food festival. According to the website, Sydneysiders could “embark on a vibrant flavour journey through Asia”. As far as I could see, this was true. Less true, however, was the mention of “balmy nights” on that same website:

Look how everyone is huddling together under umbrellas as it was raining a little. Drizzle, I’d say, but I’ve learned that Sydneysiders don’t distinguish so much between the different types of rain – drizzle, downpour, mist, shower, … For them: it rains, or it does not.

I got myself a nice Japanese teppanyaki – a dish cooked on an iron griddle or plate:

After that lovely dinner, I walked back to Circular Quay to see the Harbour Bridge and Opera House in the dark. I went via George Street (to get my map of the Great Ocean Road), so caught city hall during sun set:

The photo on the top right shows palm trees on Circular Quay that were illuminated by some “foot lights” – doesn’t it look like fire works?

As I don’t have a tripod, and there was no suitable surface to put my camera on, I had to shoot all photos handheld. A flash isn’t going to help here, so the photos are shot with relatively long shutter times: 0.5 sec for the Harbour Bridge – not too bad, but 2.5 sec for the Opera House photo. This means that I had to keep the camera perfectly still for that amount of time. And when examining in particular the Opera House photo closely, it will become clear that I don’t have such a steady hand… as well that I’m not a surgeon… My apologies for this; a lightweight and small tripod has been put on my wish list.

Evening 2

The other evening in Sydney was with my colleagues – we had a nice dinner at a Chinese restaurant in the Rocks to celebrate/lament my leaving. Together with one of my colleagues, I took the ferry to Circular Quay:

It still is my favourite way of travelling, by ferry.

Once in the city, we walked past some of the old houses in the Rocks:

to the place where we would all meet: the rooftop bar of the Palisade Hotel…

There was a pub on this site since 1880, but the current building dates from 1915. At the time it opened it doors to the many wharf workers and locals from the Millers Point area, it was the highest building in Sydney. This is by no means the case anymore, but from its rooftop bar it still has very nice views of Sydney, including the harbour:

The photo top left shows the view over Paramatta river to the west, top right is the view of the Observatory with the modern buildings of Sydney’s Central Business District (CBD) behind it, and the bottom photo is of course a view of Sydney Harbour Bridge… wonder how many photos I’ve so far taken of this iconic structure, and how many have made it into this blog…

Finally – a nice sunset over Paramatta river and Anzac bridge (yes, there are other bridges in Sydney…) from the restaurant:

And that really concludes my weeks in Sydney!