2002-2005 (c) GetJealous.com, All rights reserved. http://www.getjealous.com/pm/rss.xml?crawling=1 This is the journal of a passage around the world, made possible by The Winston Churchill Memorial Trust (www.wcmt.org.uk) who have awarded me a Travelling Fellowship. My award is under the Photography and Documentary Film-Making category of 2005. My project is entitled 'Recording Change Through Re-Take Photography' and the Fellowship is allowing me to travel and meet with scientists and photographers around the world, who are using re-take or repeat photography as a means of recording change. Anne is here with me, sharing the experiences and doinga little bit of her own exploration. We'll both be contributing diaries and thoughts to this along the way http://www.getjealous.com/pm Friday, 23rd September, 2005 Awake early again this morning, almost before the light but not before whatever birds they are kicked off with their calling. Anne discovered that the breakfast element of our bed and breakfast was in a fridge in the wardrobe and so, breakfast consisted of a yoghurt and a museli bar. Paul collected me at nine for our first appointment which was a few blocks along the road with Breck, the Robert and Genevieve Patrick Professor of Watershed Science and Planning (Are you serious?) its a great title, but only just fits on his card and takes hours to type in here! Hes recently finished renovating or recovering his house from years as a student squat and has obviously had quite a job on. Plenty to discuss arising from last nights talk mostly about the basin management similarities of the Spey, Notueko (in NZ) and the Champlain basin; one thing quite different is that the Americans have identified the sea lamprey as a major problem in their basin management plan .. for its detrimental impacts on salmonids ! as a result are expending considerable effort to knock seven bells out of them; as some of you will be aware, we on the other hand, have identified the critters as being of European worth and have whole rivers designated for their protection. On to Delahunty mid morning to get into the detail of the picture archive side of the Vermont Landscape Change Programme - enquired innocently at one point as to why the University of Vermont is known as UVM and not UVT per the other Vermont abbreviations. Ah, its from the latin; Universitas Verides Montes Uni of the Green Mountains - no wonder its known as UVM. Really interesting look through the web development, evaluation and the finer points of the outreach program, some spectacular photographs of flood events here on the Winooski and quite a remarkable number of buildings surviving in the state. We lunched downtown and then on for a quick breeze through the Echo centre on the waterfront; big roomy functional space and some nice interpretation ideas huge tanks with various fish living out in lake Champlain and a pickled sea lamprey in the resource room. Anne meanwhile, decided that the life of a student was in keeping and retired to an internet café with book and very large cappuccino for most of the morning and generally kept tabs on the student life in the Downtown, before strolling the waterfront, lunching and meeting us back at the guest house for a drive out along the Winooski in the mid aftrernoon. The trip was slightly delayed as I tried to get my head around the complex system of navigation out here - you either go east/west or north/south and, well suffice to say there was a bit of wandering around a few blocks east of where I was supposed to be! We visited the site of a picture postcard and I did a quick retake from nearby; the actual picture would have been from the second floor of the old brick building behind me but nonetheless the effect is spectacular and its amazing how much of the landform in the area and the development has been influenced by a single flood event from 27. All the bridges were taken out for example, huge terraces cut through the valley sides up to twenty feet deep. It also highlights the sense of the some of the settlers in locating their dwellings and the older farms are just slightly raised out of harms way. Paul pointed out the design evolution of the old barns, the older ones, which I think they call English Barns have doors on the sides, but these have caused a problem when the snow falls off the roof and dumps itself and blocks off the door. Various modifications have been made like little porch constructions in order to chuck snow either side, but the later buildings have their doors in the end to avoid the problem altogether. The water control now on the river is made by huge inflatable booms, which they can easily collapse. The falls have been dammed for power take off and have no fish ladders; the way they manage this is to collect the fish in large buckets, haul them up the thirty or so feet, empty them into the back of a truck and drive them along up stream and tip them back in the truck was there on standby for this process. We joined half the world in Burlington this evening trying to get a meal; settled on the Three Tomatos Italian restaurant which was great, but unfortunately we were both slightly beaten by jet lag. http://www.getjealous.com/pm/diary/97216.html Sun, 11 Dec 2005 03:25:25 GMT Sunday 13th November, 2005 We were awake fairly early this morning. Anne went for a swim and I sat out in the sun and caught up on a few notes. We went along to breakfast at about 8.30 determined to crack on with what was on offer and get on with the day but the pace of life took over. Our man of the moment, David had very obviously had a heavy night and short-term memory was non-existent. The order for juice passed him by and the order for coffee but in the meantime he did appear with a plate of fruit the main choice of breakfast arrived at least a quarter of an hour later and we reminded him about the coffee (wince and brief apology - something about a back log in the kitchen!) Coffee didnt immediately manifest itself so I went and made some at the 24-hour bar nearby and returned with it. Ten minutes later up wanders the bold boy with his coffee not the sort wed ordered which was just a regular and decaf but some form of latte with frothy milk. Oh well he tried; (mental note to be extremely explicit with him tomorrow). There was a snorkelling expedition going at 10 and we decided to go on that and then take a boat and a picnic lunch around to Yanks Harbour and snorkel ourselves for the rest of the day. I collected a disposable underwater camera from the shop just in case and we went round to the reef in Research Bay with another four others. We dropped off the front of the barge. Quite shallow water and a slightly disappointing reef in that it was suffering badly from bleaching and looked fairly knocked about. The other point was that the visibility was really poor; not nearly as clear as the Caribbean and this put a slightly dull bluish sheen across everything you looked at enjoyable nonetheless. One or two giant clams and quite a few reef fish. We got back around to the resort at about midday and duly collected our picnic lunch (in a wicker basket) and a huge (and heavy) Esky or cool box presumably something to do with Eskimos? After a few minutes briefing on the mechanics of the boat we set off down the channel and out through the navigation buoys and took a hard left towards the headland. We rounded to the jetty at Yanks Harbour quite a large floating dock with a fixed walkway out to it and a set of picnic tables set up under the shade of a canopy. We took up residence there, unloaded the boxes and set up our picnic; a box about 12x8 of seafood, another of cooked meats and another of salad along with a loaf of bread, cheese and biscuits. Quite a feast and we made a very respectable dent in it. The fishes around the jetty were quite incredible and we spent a bit of time feeding them and then taking some shots. It was hot out on the beach but I wandered along a few hundred yards and then sought some respite in the trees. Wed planned to snorkel just around the headland back at a place called Little Sandy and as the tide was rising it was an ideal time to work our way in there, take the anchor ashore and let everything take its course in the knowledge that we wouldnt end up having to carry the boat half a mile across the sand to re-float it. Grounded the boat and then set off out to the reef buoy off shore. Visibility wasnt great and we just pottered about on the edges of the coral. There were a good number of fish but we didnt really get spectacular sightings. Swimming back to the shore we came in across sands that had been exposed previously and the water temperature was, in places, almost unbearable; certainly as hot as the hottest bath youd normally have at home. We lazed about on the beach for a while, until these nippy little crustaceans took a hold. They seemed to frequent the splash zone and took a real grip of your ankles. Back across the bay, we made another landing straight across near to where theres a colony of Giant clams drifting over the top of them you could look down and see the shapes but we decided to forgo the snorkelling, because there was no ladder on the back of the boat and I reckoned it was a dead cert for a capsize if you tried to haul yourself in over the side; couldnt be bothered swimming to shore. We got back to the resort at 5.45 and had a bit of fun as Anne tried to balance on one of the giant clamshells at the top of the beach, which they have filled with water as footbaths, to wash off the sand. Sadly I just missed the moment as the whole lot tipped over spilling out the water. We sat along the beach outside the room watching the sun go down. Dinner was the usual performance and it seems worth noting the various courses for posterity; Amuse Gueule involving a microbe of salmon; Cream of asparagus soup with confit spatchcock and smoked paprika oil; A tataki of yellowfin tuna complimented by a petite salad of pickled fennel, chilli, snow peas and bocconcini, glossed with a fragrent soy and sesame vinaigrette; A whole snapper oven roasted with lime and coriander, served with buttered kipflers and a rocket parmesan salad; Bread and buter pudding with blueberries with kind island double cream; Smoked applebox cheddar cheese with petite poached apples and water crackers. Hows that? Spreads over about two and a quarter hours its quite a measured experience. http://www.getjealous.com/pm/diary/106435.html Wed, 7 Dec 2005 12:21:22 GMT Saturday, 12th November, 2005 Ian has an early golf appointment this morning and his arousal was even earlier by the need to go into town at 4am to retrieve his daughter. Anyway he had left by the time we surfaced I went down to investigate some persistent knocking at the door downstairs which turned out to be a plasterer and a while later we heard Frances returning from her early morning walk amidst a string of Viszlas. The house is going to be superb. Two storeys with wide verandahs all around. A very traditional feel to the place in terms of design and in fact its an old property, having been shifted on the back of a lorry from its original location on to this new plot. Ian and Frances have put in a pool and divided the ground into horse paddocks and extended the house considerably, by putting on the verandahs; quite a project. We were away by 10, en route to Townsville to pick up one or two things on the way and then to arrive at the airport to take a seaplane out to the island of Orpheus. I didnt have much to do with the planning of this little sojourn and writing this a couple of days later am still blissfully unaware of the damage to the credit card though the signs are ominous! Anne was getting more and more morose about the prospect of being up here in the tropics within a boat ride of the barrier reef and not having done any snorkelling so I said to her, why dont you just sort something out and then I nipped out to take some photographs and left my credit card behind and well, the rest is going to be history! Orpheus has a couple of dwellings; a research station run by James Cook Uni and a resort complex which has been operating since the 50s in fairly grand style. It is reputed to have a fine fringe reef around the island a convenient insight into what the reef has to offer, readily accessible from the mainland. Were booked in to the resort and apparently we have (according to Anne) a really good deal on it. We were met by the Seaplane pilot inside the air port terminal and our baggage taken and stowed in the back of the single prop Cessna. It has floats fitted with retractable undercarriage so its just outside the terminal, on the runway. Having cleared security slightly odd as our bags went the short route we waited briefly at a gate and then wandered out across the tarmac with another couple and loaded onto the plane. Smooth take-off and out over the Queensland coast where we passed various islands on the twenty minute run up to Orpheus. Landing on floats in a smooth, blue lagoon in front of an hotel is a very nice way to arrive. I couldnt quite remember where my impressions of seaplanes have come but its gradually dawned on me that its probably Biggles. I can picture him in one or two of his adventures swooping over azure blue lagoons with palm trees and scurrying natives below and with exception of the scurrying natives, its just like that. Anyway the Biggles moment was completed on landing. A gradual descent with the ocean getting closer and closer, a slap, slap as we made an initial touch and then a whoosh of spray to the sides and we planed across the surface of the bay and coasted up to a pontoon moored offshore. A small landing crafttype barge awaited us nearby and we transferred for the short trip to the beach. Here, we were met and ushered to a lounge for a fruit punch and a briefing on the set-up. There area five or six other couples some a similar vintage, but most a little older. Anyway as a result, its thankfully not Ibiza; its quiet. We had a bit of a look around and then headed in for lunch. Lunch was great; not speedy which was to become a feature of the meals times here but it was fresh and appetising. The daily programme of events is posted on a board and theres a canoe expedition across to a mangrove swamp at 3 which we decided to take part in as a gentle introduction to the area and what the guided tours will be like. Most of the visitors appeared on the beach to collect canoes and we were lucky enough to get one that looked slightly older than the others and had thus been rejected by most but it was in fact a sturdy and stable double canoe. During the briefing the guide (Angela) mentioned that the objective was to go across to observe the rays as they drifted in on the tide to feed under the mangroves she then mentioned that unfortunately they were quite easily disturbed and that sometimes the first visitors in had the best views at which point it was like the start of the Iron Man contest with flailing paddles as everyone struck out for the mangroves which were about half a mile away. We rather disdainfully hung around at the back of the melee and headed slightly further up the edge of the swamp. The rays cleared out fairly smartly, but once the dust had settled and the crowds had thinned (remarkably most of the paddlers went straight back to the resort as soon as theyd clocked a ray) we went in and although very wary, were able to see one or two large rays gliding through the shallow water and around the canoe. Back across the bay, the tide was racing in and we id a little more exploring. At the back of the buildings is a set of steps which leads past the lap pool (clockwise only please) and out onto a path which takes you up to a lookout on the hill above the resort. We took a stroll up there in time to watch the sun drop down below the mainland. The trees on the far side are short and wind clipped, being open fully to the winds from the Pacific. Also above is the grave of a fox terrier called Mr Nicholson who toured the islands back in the 50s and 60s on board a yacht. He evidently had a penchant for his masters shoes and when he was interred (and its a fairly monumental cairn with polished marble plaque), his owner left the last shoe that he was working on by his grave in the intervening years, the pile of shoes grew and it became a bit of a good luck ritual to leave shoes at the grave. As there were no shoes in the vicinity when we passed and signs of scorch marks on the nearby rocks, it looks as if someone had had a bit of a clean-up. Wandered back down, Anne went for a swim, I took some pics and then it was time to wander along for dinner. Dinner on Orpheus is a bit of a marathon; seven courses but lest there be any further concern as to my increasing girth, it has to be said that the portions are suitably small, beautifully cooked and presented and the whole thing is a very memorable experience. What is noticeable about this occasion and we now gather its a feature of Queensland service is that it takes a hell of a long time. Dinner takes at least two hours and the ten to fifteen minute gap after your first course (one mouthful of vol au vent) or after a scoop of sorbet half way through, is absolutely fine if you have nothing better to do (and as the view is perfect and the climate perfect and theres nothing trying to eat you, there is nothing much better to do) but the eager anticipation of whats coming is a bit wearing but it certainly works up an appetite. All in all I think I prefer to get it down my neck at a reasonable, but unhurried pace and then bask in the digestive process. Highlights of this evenings offerings would be soup and the seared clams (Anne being allergic to some shellfish) had reef trout. Tree frogs calling, the odd raucous call which sounds suspiciously like some form of petrel and the odd flying fox overhead and around your feet at the dinner table rather timid long nosed bandicoot hoover up the crumbs. A quick tour round the cabin with a torch soon revealed an echidna snuffling around on the grass. http://www.getjealous.com/pm/diary/106434.html Wed, 7 Dec 2005 12:19:19 GMT Friday, 11th November, 2005 Breakfast at 7 and over this we had a bit of debate as to where and how we would try to see something of the Great Barrier Reef in the next couple of days. The reef itself is about 80km distant from Townsville and, therefore, a long spin in a boat which may or may not be memorable. Closer to home there were several islands on offer most, it has to be said connecting via Cairns, to the north. I left Anne in charge and set out back to Pioneer to retake the pictures wed sussed last night. I managed to line up most of the images I wanted had to undertake a bit of tree surgery to sort one, but from the looks of the CSR operation (the current owners of the mill) theyre not in to either the natural or cultural heritage and so wouldnt miss a couple of bushes. I got back at 8.30 and during this time, Anne had booked a couple of days on an island within the reef national park, packed our bags and checked out of the motel. I had gone off leaving my credit card in my trousers pocket which had made the former possible. So we loaded up the car and went in search of Harold (this time) who is going to accompany us along to Inkerman mill where he has a nephew working as a senior engineer who can by-pass much of the indifference and make the very strict health and safety precautions seem slightly lesss intrusive. At 9 we met Wayne Cislowski, described the work and showed him a few Inkerman images. One interested him in particular which was an interior shot looking along the mill machinery and he put on his garb and walked through the works in order to check out whether the present roof laddering system lined up with our shot. It did and he agreed to take me in to re-take the image provided that I could meet the health and safety needs of the company. Closed toe boots so I swapped sandals for hiking boots and Wayne withdrew the other kit from the stores; fluorescent orange shirt, eye protection, ear protection, gloves and of course a hard hat. Sweating profusely from this get-up we set off back into the mill. The gantry from which I re-took the images must occupy almost the same elevation as a 1920s one, because the camera angle onto the roof is very similar. Outside, we crossed the tracks and took another angle and as we moved around the camera stations, it was possible to begin to pick out the core of the old sugar mill and visualise the building which had been extended, removed and in a few cases restored in the last 90 years. One gable end, a notable feature in the 1920s image, suddenly became visible as we moved about and there it was, dwarfed and submerged in the heart of the present mill. As I was getting escorted around turning rapidly into a greasy mass in all my protective gear, Anne had managed to forge a conversation with someone who happened in to the foyer as they sat waiting. This lady had been raised at Pioneer and provided Anne with a whole load of contact numbers and directions as to where she should go. We left Inkerman having completed what we set out to do, dropped Harold back, had a farewell coffee with Glenis. It had been a whirlwind couple of days and wed achieved so much ... and heard so much, that it is difficult to try to capture all the information we have started to accumulate. We drove back in to Ayr and stopped off to buy a newspaper to find ourselves splashed over page 4 complete with photograph and we then stopped at a very small café for a smoothie and in order to re-group. The newspaper story included Annes phone number and as we sat in the café some one called in order to claim possible Drysdale links The final visit necessary was to try and nail Pioneer, speak to someone called Desley and if possible, see someone called Robin Juffs who is an old Pioneer Man. If possible, the objective was to visit a building called Pioneer Lodge where the mill board of directors and various dignitaries have stayed over the years. Deslee proved to be a good contact and agreed to smooth our path at about 3 that afternoon, so we duly turned up in the car park then entered the second office on the right and were assigned Pam. Pam is a receptionist and was obviously not wildly keen on having to drive us around. Poor girl, she was shaped like a tele-tubby and due to the CSR uniform which all employees have to wear on site as it meets the various safety requirements, she was decked out in a thick blue CSR work shirt and jeans and due to this fact and her bulk obviously thrived on air conditioning. Her trip to The Lodge tested her resolve to the full. The Lodge is a low, 1950s building kitted out in veneers and formica and while housing the original full sized billiards table from Old Pioneer, it contains nothing of the painting or photographic wealth that had been hinted at. The house had only been vacated some weeks before, after a retiring manager had been in residence for some years. This seems to have been the pattern; a series of managers occupying the house in the last twenty years for relatively short periods. Its possible during this time that the place has been incrementally stripped. I found the old visitors book lurking in one of the bedrooms and we looked though it, with Pam quietly melting I attendance nearby. It dated only from the 50s presumably new with the house and included a few familiar names. Lots of entries of Russell Drysdale visiting in his capacity as one of the directors and also in 1977 the visit of one Penny Drysdale ! Back at the office, Robin Juffs was somewhat reluctantly sprung from his office and he took a few minutes to warm-up but once wed persuaded him round he was full of memory and anecdote. We left at about 5 and after taking a few shots of the mill on the way out, headed towards Townsville. Just on the Ayr side of town, wed been given a contact and potentially offered a bed by friends of friends, so decided to try and drop in and sound them out for a bed on Monday. A rather broken phonecall just as it was getting dark and we got directions down to Ian and Frances new home near Nome set in a twenty acre plot and being actively worked on! We hadnt really developed a plan for the night but had the Comfort Inn in Townsville earmarked as convenient and relatively inexpensive and a good stepping off point for the airport toorrow, but as it turned out, Frances very kindly offered us a bed and we thought no further. Ian and Frances emigrated eighteen months ago from Deeside; he to work for CSIRO the government environment organisation here, she to take a chair at James Cook University in Townsville. We went along to a local café for dinner which is run by one of the guys in charge of the a local research lab; had a great time and back at about 10 and fell into our upstairs building site. http://www.getjealous.com/pm/diary/105121.html Wed, 7 Dec 2005 12:14:59 GMT Thursday, 10th November, 2005 Up at 6.30 and in spite of the early hour, its already baking outside. We had breakfast at 7.15 and although the initial thought was that wed have it outside; its too hot so we retreated to the aircon. Glenis arrived at about 8.30 to begin our whistle stop tour of the area and we climbed aboard her 4WD so as not to curtail our explorations. First stop was to drive along Kilrie Road near Home Hill, in order to visit Kilrie House. Although retaining the core of the verandahs, which would have adorned the first floor have now been enclosed and the fig trees which formed an entrance avenue only relatively recently removed. Elsa who owns the property now was delighted to meet Anne and we chatted for quite some time and had an opportunity to have a look underneath (the house is raised about 6 or seven feet on stilts to raise it above the Burdekin floodwater) Here it was possible to see the very strong structure of the core of the house and also see the marks on one of the support pillars indicating the levels of floodwaters in the last seventy years. We had a look at the Burdekin itself. A huge river, looking extremely benign on this day, but bearing all the tell-tale signs of huge potential power of massive volumes of water and loads of debris. A lone fisherman was ignoring the warning signs for the saltwater crocs and casting his lines out into the muddy flow. We retired back to Gleniss house or more correctly her husband Harolds work shed where there was a group of men sitting around discussing life in a typically Australian way. These were middle aged cane farmers, with battered, sweat stained and bleached wide brimmed hats, working boots, battered jeans and open neck shirts revealing nut brown sun scorched flesh. They were an interesting group and the meal time gathering reminded me of the sort of characters depicted by Russell Drysdale (yep were back to Drysdales again) in his Burdekin River sketchbook. Line drawings of cattle and cane men. After a restorative coffee we left for Home Hill and after meeting Graeme, who is involved with the exhibition we toured the Power Station exhibition and corporately funded exhibition in a shop premises on the main street which has a series of archival photographs enlarged and mounted on the walls, showing the mills in the area and the various events associated with the river several bridge crossings, flood events and old ferries. We stopped for lunch well a packet of crisps and about a litre and a half of fluids. Its baking outside and I should, by rights, be sweating pounds away. At this stage we also tried to arrange a viewing of a private machinery collection owned and largely restored by Tom Callow. An appointment was duly arranged for 2pm and we made ourt way along the dusty cane trackes to the Callow Farm. I had a good laugh when to Annes stockpile introduction which involves variants of 'Hi, I'm a Drysdale' he responded 'Well now, that's not necessarily a good thing'. I'm going to be noting that one for the future! Tom is a cane farmer and in 1984 decided to purchase a Lister JP2 engine to pump some water. Little did he know that it was the start of a collection which after twenty years now numbers over 250 fully restored engines, tractors and pumps and the yard is littered with another several hundred wrecks which have been acquired for spare parts and some which are awaiting his detailed attention. It all seems a bit strange given the amount of trouble I have with only one tractor and one wrecked car outside the house !! And its not only wrecks, he has a dentists chair, a complete jailhouse moved and re-erected at his farm, he has butter makers, petrol pumps and signs and a few railway items from the cane railways. The restoration process can be a slow one and a steam roller parked in the yard is gradually being loosened off after decades of neglect. Oil points oiled and the great machine rocked back and forth and re-oiled. A day, a week or a month later he repeats the process and eventually it frees completely and more serious work can begin. After my conducted tour of what is known as Toms Toybox, Toms wife Jan made us tea and we sat around discussing the whole mechanical process. I was intrigued to hear that they travel as far as Dorset for various steam engine related gatherings and events ,,, we may see them yet in Scotland! Our final visit of the day is a look at a part of Pioneer Mill not the 24/7 production part, but the old part in the shadow of the expanded mill is the site of the old Pioneer Houses, all of which have sadly, been demolished and cleared. We didnt enter the site until about 5 and while Glenis had a notion of where the old buildings had been located, so much appeared to have changed, that the re-photography task was not going to be as easy as I had hoped. I was stomping around the back of a particularly pungent cooling pond, trying to avoid snakes, keep dry and line up some trees when a young mum arrived on the scene complete with two children on trikes. In a very unnatural moment of comradely conversation which was mostly designed to determine the likelihood of snake encounter, and/or attack in these parts I asked here whether she knew anything about the history of the mill. No she didnt, but she knew a man who did; her husband and he was just over this way if Id like to follow her. Warren Derrick was watering his roof, which I suspect is the sort of thing you do after a very hot day (?) and was not immediately delighted at being disturbed and asked three times by his wife to come down please. Once he did come down and had tuned into the purpose of the visit and also had a look at a few of the pics that I was matching, he became very interested and we walked back around the lagoon so that he could point out the drain covers for the old house and from that I could work out the camera angles accordingly. Warren also provided us with an important steer as to other unidentified locations by picking up that one shot, which we thought was Inkerman Mill included some wide guage cane railway immediately identifying it as Pioneer. Like many of the other people we met, hes grown up here and is a fifth generation sugar miller; he knows the sites intimately but is seldom called upon to remember or record his knowledge in any way. It was too late for the re-take by this time but Warren then collected some keys and took us in to the old School Of Arts building which is one of the original structures which was moved and re-built as a social club for the Mill employees, but which appears to be fairly run-down in the meantime. Inside there were a few rather poor copies of some early pics, some shots of various prize bulls from the Pioneer Stud (a relatively late venture) and a massive hand written ledger book dealing with wages back in the 1950s. We left them as it was getting dark and Glenis dropped us back at the motel by 7. Wed invited Glenis and Harold out to dinner so had time for a shower and literally a minute or twos reflection before Glenis returned. We ate at a bar in Ayr and fell into bed not long after we were dropped off at 9.30. A long, hot, exhausting day ! http://www.getjealous.com/pm/diary/105120.html Wed, 7 Dec 2005 12:11:29 GMT Wednesday, 9th November, 2005 Up at 5.20 this morning. Luckily Grayem has an early tee off this morning and so was on song to drop us off at the airport for our 6.30 check in. A brighter day altogether which was all going swimmingly until we had a bit of excitement when they told us that our Qantas flight No 4 wasnt happening. What wasnt immediately apparent was that we had been changed under some kind of reciprocal agreement. With a change of terminals and a bit of swift legwork, we were back on track and loading bound for Townsville. We left pretty well on time, we had a two and a bit hour flight, but because of the time change in Queensland (which is an hour behind) we arrived at only 9 am ! (Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to Townsville Queensland. You should put your watch back about an hour . Thats what they said !!!!) Theres also the long running joke about arriving in Queensland Please put your watches back 20 years! The first thing you notice is the heat. It hits you like a wet, hot towel; very high humidity, well up the 30s and even thinking about doing something breaks you out in a sweat. We picked up the car with only minor discussion. The need to pre-charge the card for this and that always un-nerves me and here, we seemed to be signing away an awful lot which it sounded like we might lose for such potentially minor (or major) events as kangaroo collision. Having signed all that, I was a bit perplexed to find that there was no parcel shelf in the car and as such, no means of covering our bags in the boot or offering even a modicum of respite from the baking temperatures within the car. I queried it and after a phone call was told that the shelf had been missing for some time and also that the car (the cheapest two door with aircon) which I was due to have had been returned damaged so they had to let me have a four door (Errrr, right . ?). The upshot was that I should be glad I had a bigger car, even though I had no parcel shelf. Sorry about that Mate said the young girl behind the counter ... Oh well! Anne had had a couple of brief correspondences with the Burdekin Shire Council. One the purposes of this leg of the trip was for Anne to catch up with her Drysdale family history and for me to retake one or two images lurking in their family photo albums. Annes forbears established the Pioneer Sugar mill near Ayr and her great, great uncle introduced a revolutionary irrigation system which increased the area available for productivity. Her grandfather was also a director of the company in the teens and twenties of the 20th Century. As we drove across from Townsville, at regular intervals across the fields we could see the billowing stacks of the sugar mills. Still using a steam driven process which hasnt changed for over a century. We crossed the cane railways small railways lines running out of the fields, alongside and across the roads towards the mills. All the mills run on a two foot guage that is, two feet between the rails except for Pioneer, which is the only mill to run on three foot six a Drysdale legacy where he either standardised his rolling stock for the national network or possibly got a cheap deal on a locomotive or two; the tales vary. Annes contact in the council was going to help us find some contacts with the current mil owners a huge multi national and with a bit of luck open a few doors. We phoned from Townsville and arranged to drive straight down to Ayr and to meet with them first of all. About an hour after we were turning left at the clock in the centre of Ayr erected to perpetuate the memory of John Drysdale, Annes great great uncle and parking outside the council chambers. Inside, things started to get fairly organised, Anne was met by Lyn, the Mayor and introduced to David Jackson, the senior journalist from the Ayr Advocate, the local newspaper, who was standing by camera in hand ready to record everything which was all a little bit unexpected. There was a presentation of a commorative book about the sugar industry and a whole heap of stuff about the Burdekin in general and Anne was photographed outside with the Mayor. Afterwards, we were able to sit down and Anne outlined what we wanted to do in terms of seeing some of the old mill buildings and visiting the places where her family lived and then the Mayor picked up the phone and started making calls. At about this time we were marched down the street and photographed in front of the commemorative clock, for an article in Fridays Advocate and finally we made good our escape with a list of contacts and phone numbers. Yikes. The first of the meetings was with a man called Peter Toomey who is involved in putting together a museum collection along at a place called Brandon. We stopped off and in the baking heat of a tin shed looked through the various machines and implements ... most of which was of limited interest, but outside, was a traction engine which had been one of the first in the Burdekin and the guy was sure that John Drysdale had been present at its inaugural outing. Yes . Well After that we were suitably exhausted to feel the need to book in to a motel as soon as possible and settled on the Country Ayr Motel. Relaxing in a cool darkened room is excellent therapy for being over Drysdaled as Ive discovered over the last twenty years or so and even Anne was in need of a bit of a break, if only to be able to absorb all the information that was flying around! The Country Ayr provided such an environment but it wasnt very long before Glenis, the President of the local Family History and Historical Society visited us at the room and we had another hour or so of information, snippets and planning. Outside the skies darkened and the cane fires were lit. putting great plumes of smoke into the air and lighting the sky with an orange glow. For five minutes of so the fires raged through the fields and then they died, leaving the cane, free of debris trash as they call it locally and ready to cut. They aim to have the cane fields burnt and the crushing completed at the mill within 24 hours and at this time of year its a 24/7 operation One of the recommendations logged early on in both our minds was the need to eat Burdekin Barramundi which is a very large freshwater fish and one which thrives apparently in the Burdekin River. It turns out that the season closed last week but we enquired at the local restaurant and they had a couple of portions squirreled away which they were delighted to prepare for us. The Barra turned out to be really fine fish. Large chunks of white flesh, seared to perfection and served up with local vegetables. By 9.30, a combination of a delicious dinner, half a bottle of local wine and the heat. We were ready to pass out and at about 9.31 we did. Anne stayed awake long enough to phone Penny back in Scotland to get some extra Drysdale info, but I was gone and slept really well. http://www.getjealous.com/pm/diary/105119.html Wed, 7 Dec 2005 12:05:47 GMT Tuesday 8th November, 2005 Grayem had suggested that we have an early morning swim and a brisk walk down at Coogee Bay in the morning, in order to work up an appetite for breakfast. During the night, it poured with rain and I mean poured. Tropical. Torrential whatever you want to call it accompanied by thunder and lightning and it was still dabbling with showers when I surfaced at about 7.30 in order to go for the walk and swim. While not wildly enthused by the prospect of freezing my parts off and getting soaked to boot, I was equally keen not to be branded as a woossey Pome so the Are you sure you want to go? from Grayem was met with a measured amount of enthusiasm and as he obviously didnt want to be branded a woossey Aussie and hes an exemplary host we were underway as planned. Well, the sea was grey and mountainous, it was blowing a five or six and it was raining. Not the Australia I was expecting; more like Skegness on a particularly bad day. (mental note to berate my friend and future host down in Canberra who emigrated from Aberdeen partly in favour of the weather!) We did the brisk walk like as quickly as you can achieve it, battling against the wind and spray and then retired to the car by a short cut. Anyway that was sufficient exercise for honour to be satisfied and ample justification for the cooked breakfast Grayem whipped up on our triumphant return. After a shower and after Anne had surfaced, we sorted the day. Briony had a couple of things to drop off in the north of the city and I had a couple of cards of Balmoral Beach and Mosmans Bay to re-photograph, which were relatively near to where she was heading. Off we went; Balmoral beach was the first stop; very grey but not raining and showing some signs of brightening up. The location was relatively straight forward to find and I rephotographed it. Sadly the 1905 image has quite a number of people of the day on the beach in long skirts and sporting parasols and it would have been nice to have got some contemporary fashion into the frame but its simply not the day for it. After completing Brionys deliveries we spent an opportune moment or two (as we passed) in looking for the angle on another postcard, this time of Mosman Bay. We stopped off in Mosman for a coffee and walking along the High Street, I glimpsed a lady pinning a notice up on a wall and the old postcard reproduced on the notice drew my attention . it was advertising an exhibition of local postcards! Something about deltiologists which I can only assume refers to postcard buffs and it had opened the day before at the local library. Inside the exhibition was a stack of card depicting Mosmans Bay and I looked carefully through them all. There were similar but none the same as the pics I had with me so I spoke with one of the librarians who gave me various contacts with the library there (I offered to let them have a scan of my images, which they were thrilled about) and she also directed me very precisiely to where the location of the picture I have. Armed with this information, we made tracks in the direction and made a pass along the waterfront to suss out the likely angle; It was clear that it was taken from up above the road we were on and equally obvious that the road had considerable modern development along it. We went for a quick look and the initial prospect was gloomy until Briony spotted a covered car parking area with an open back almost cantilevered behind the new houses and I nipped round there. The view while perhaps not exact were certainly with in a few feet and while I lined a few things up and wasted a few minutes checking the location against various features, out came a ferry and hovered briefly in the exact location of the ferry in the original postcard from 1905. At that moment the whole image came together; it was a really satisfying moment. Mission accomplished, we retired home for lunch and to plan the afternoon, which Grayem was in charge of. Our first stop was along a cliff walk to the south of Bondi Beach which houses an annual display of sculptures which are set along a cliff-top route sculptures by the sea is the simple title and the website is all those words put together with either dot com, dot net or dot org after them. A very inspiring exhibition. At the end of the walk I tackled my Bondi postcard images, which again, date from about 1905-06. There were a few problems with the angles largely to do with the submersion of some rocks which features in the pics, as a result of what appears to be a massive build up of sand. Not sure whether theres a seasonal angle on this or whether perhaps the postcards were taken (or one in particular) was taken after a particularly severe storm from the east which took out the sand for a while anyway, got the pics and careful layering on the computer will reveal just how good the camera locations of the retakes were no time today to really work on them in the field. We dropped into the Royal Sydney Golf Club for a restorative pint, which was very welcome indeed, and sat watching the practice and eighteenth greens. We went back to The Avenue through a part of Sydney called Paddington. Its an area which has lost of wrought iron work on the front of the houses. I gather that this is as a result of ships being sent back to Australia empty with iron pigs inside as ballast so it was a relatively cheap commodity at the time, which could be readily utilised to decorate and smarten some of these terraces. Back to base late in the afternoon and then had a fantastic dinner of lamb cutlets followed by crème caramel, beautifully prepared by Briony. http://www.getjealous.com/pm/diary/105117.html Wed, 7 Dec 2005 12:00:16 GMT Monday, 7th November, 2005 We let the weekday melee of school and work exits (which takes place before 8 oclock) clear this morning before venturing down to check out a cup of tea. Crecy had been investigating some harbour tours for us on the net and we had a number of options; Dorothy was fussing around making tea and toast tea in a teapot; warmed for a minute, boiled water onto the tea leaves and drawn for 8 minutes. It was the best cup of tea wed had for months!! The American tea, in spite of the selection of pekoes, Earls and Lady Greys, English breakfasts and Liptons etc simply doesnt match up probably the water and also the milk ... and according to Dorthy, the fact that they dont boil the water properly. She has had, oin occasiona cup of tea made with hot water out of the tap! Anyway this was a treat and I had several cups. Jeremy had left early to drive out to somewhere in the country for a business meeting but then discovered that the meeting was in fact in the city at 8 oclock so he was running badly late. Crecy had done the school run but was now on standby to pick up Jeremy and deliver him to the city. Apart from all that it was very relaxing. After breakfast, Dorothy rummaged out a very old family scrapbook with newspaper cuttings, sketches and engravings dating from the mid 1700s; an incredible document archive, with some fascinating first hand reports of the Indian Mutiny and the Siege of Lucknow. Also she brought out her fathers game book .. her father being a great uncle of Annes who died quite early on in the 20th century. The game book was another fascinating document with reports of early shooting exploits at various familiar places and he invariably shot with his brother (Annes Grandfather). Of particular interest were the entries relating to some driven grouse days at Ettridge!! Part of the Phones Estate. Some of the writing was slightly difficult to decode without concentrating and it was only when I recognised a photographic view looking up the Truim with Loch Ericht in the background that the whole thing began to fall into place the main problem being that the Ts in Ettridge hadnt been crossed. Anyway it was an interesting insight and fascinating from the point of view that this is familiar ground, with current family connections these Ettridge shoots took place in the early 1920s. I took a few notes for later scrutiny but didnt have much time to study things too deeply. Anne and Dorothy spent the rest of the morning discussing family and delving into the scrapbook. I hooked up to the net and sorted through the backlog of e-mails and web uploads. Crecy dropped us down at Circular Quay in the shadow of the harbour bridge and we booked ourselves onto a Majestic Tour of the harbour which was leaving at 1pm. Sadly the skies are grey and theres a bit of a breeze blowing not the Australia of the tourist brochures for sure but equally we werent troubled by the heat! Sydney is a beautiful city. Our introduction from the water showed just how leafy it really is, although there are two distinct developed districts, north and south of the bridge, the rest of the city comprises low houses interspersed with trees and much of the shoreline is state park and so protected. After the boat tour we walked around to the Opera House and got a light lunch sitting out on the wharf, before walking around this bizarre building and also re-taking an old postcard shot from the Man o War Steps, squeezed in between the Opera House development and the Botanical Gardens. Its probably impossible to get to the exact camera location at least without the aid of a ladder but remarkably little has changed in the intervening hundred years. We took a taxi back to Woolhara for another restorative cup of tea but almost immediately we were off again along to Centennial Park to look at another postcard location. Another very early 20th Century card taken on the central drive and after a slight false start, we found it! The road has shifted very slightly and the trees are probably not the same but its very recognisable. Our stay with Dorothy was drawing to a close and Grayem an old friend of the Drysdales was going to pick us up from Dorothys and look after us for the next couple of nights. Grayem lives across in Randwick and we bade a fond farewell Dorothy and whizzed across the suburb to meet Grayems wife, Briony at Chez Forrest a three storey townhouse in a quiet part of the town. A lovely dinner and some great Aussie wine and once wed got our heads fully round the time changes involved, we phoned Julia in Barbados; Eleven oclock at night on the 7th, translated into 8 oclock on the 8th in Barbados. http://www.getjealous.com/pm/diary/105116.html Wed, 7 Dec 2005 11:31:13 GMT Sunday, 6th November, 2005 The day firmly took hold when we landed at 5.50pm at Sydney, Australia. The plane took a turn around the city on its approach and we got a view over the harbour and picked out the Opera House (looked very small!) and the bridge (looked very black!). We wandered through customs and then reclaimed our bags. The Detector Dogs were busy at work very small beagle-type dogs, wearing a smart DD uniform (!) and snuffling their way through the luggage, quietly jumping up on the trolleys and picking their way through. Right beside where Anne was standing, it suddenly sat down beside a bag and the owner was summoned by the handler. There was half a packet of biscuits inside which was confiscated. Our bags passed muster. We then had to slot everything through another x-ray, this time with the express purpose of looking for any produce presumably anything that the dogs might have missed. Out on the concourse we were met by Dorothy den Hollander an Australian cousin of Annes and a scarily sprightly 88!!! Dorothy stood awaiting us at the arrivals gate, having spent the day at a lecture series at the university. We got a bit of a taste of Sydney on our way back to Dorothys house as she whisked us away to the leafy suburb of Woolahara at an alarming speed in her black BMW. Most of the trees are evergreen so Sydney was looking decidedly leafy; the jacarandas are all blue, laden with petals and each one has a blue shadow beneath it where petals have fallen. Dorthys house is called Kilrie which has been in her family since the 1940s, prior to that she was in Melbourne at another Kilrie near Sandringham and she also lived for a time at Kilrie in Fife. She has a small flat at the back of the house which is currently occupied by Dorothys daughter Crecy, husband Jeremy and children Fraser and Fenna. We settled down to catch up over a glass or two of champagne and some smoked salmon sandwiches. We didnt stay up late, piling into bed not long after 9. http://www.getjealous.com/pm/diary/105114.html Wed, 7 Dec 2005 11:27:31 GMT Friday, 4th November, 2005. Today were goin fishin and we left the house at 6.50. Betsy had put together a packed lunch which interestingly was not allowed to include bananas; You never catch fish when there are bananas on board the boat its a well known fact. On the way to Keahou Bay we stopped in to buy a box of doughnuts and some coffee for breakfast. Down at the boat yard, Betsys friend Pat was busy hosing down a launch, re-fuelling, oiling and generally making it ready to go to sea. He owns and runs the yard but alternates between hiring fishing boats and working in construction today he was building and Jan was coming with us to skipper the boat. Jan arrived complete with cast on her arm; shes a Cattle Roper which means that she ranches cattle and catches them on a rope. One of the Roping occupational hazards is that sometimes your thumb gets caught in the rope, and off it comes! Having had a very minor staving once or twice which was sore enough, I would imagine that this is excruciating. Anyway, the occupational hazard happened and she apparently popped it into a bag with some ice and duly headed off to hospital in Honolulu (three quarters of an hours flight away) and with separated thumb in tow. The long and the short of it being that they ran out of time; there is a critical period during which you can re-attach and they missed it, so she is now undergoing a period of painful re-construction and hence the splint. We headed south along the coast having set lines out the back with lures as big as milk bottles and 4 hooks towards Kealakekua Bay. Just off the bay one of the reels started screaming out but we were slightly too slow to set the hook and whatever it had been detached itself . We spent a bit of time in the area to see whether anything else felt like taking a bite and then headed out to sea towards a number of other boats who were working an area. Here was the tuna school and an attendant pod of Hawaiian Spinner dolphins working their way back and forwards. Took loads of pics as they crossed our wake, rode under the boat, and ran parallel to us. Quite a few youngsters in amongst some of them being nursed by their mothers. We had lunch at see with the engine shut down and then headed back towards the island to be on the wharf at 2. Quite a bit of washing down and flushing through of the boat to do and then we stopped in to the post office to ply yet more trade the way of the US postal service. The postmistress was a bit of a grumpy old bat who Anne felt the need to keep referring to as This nice lady which did seem to keep her slightly sedated at moments of high stress, such as when another customer came in and worse when one came in and didnt quite close the door. He got a really entertaining roasting for his trouble! Betsy and I spent a bit of time doing short sprints between the post office and the grocery store to findf a suitable box then it was a question of raiding the free newspaper stand for packing and the saga continued but eventually Anne had her nuts packed away, Betsy had been sitting serenely out on the bench had arranged a house-warming party and the pressure was off. We went down to Kailu Kona, armed with the Kona museum pamphlet and roughly scouted out some re-take locations. The shoreline has changed considerable but one old tree, photographed in its youth at the beginning of the twentieth century, still hangs in there on the sidewalk opposite the palace. We retired to Leftys bar for a cocktail and snack supper while a parade took place on the street outside. The parade is the fifth annual coffee growers event and features lanterns and drumming and was attended by a good proportion of the town who lined the street to watch. Betsys friend Bev joined us and I chatted to her over dinner. Shes a seasonal Park Ranger up at Wrangel St Elias which is the largest National Park in Alaska and spend the other half of the year in Hawaii. She has a evry inetresting (surprising even) view on the prospect of oil exploration up in Alaska which presumably reflects much local opinion the view is that the area affected is so small that any effect is insignificant. In addition to this would be the communal gain from the investment. Anyway it wasnt a view Id heard before Id presumed that the whole thing was being driven by Dubyah, but it appears to have local support as well. In conversation, Bev mentioned a friend nearby called Bill, who lived in Kona and who was doing a repeat photography project in Breckenridge, Colorado. Betsy hastily gate-crashed his evening and we had a meeting arranged for 8 oclock very opportune !! I had an hours chat with Bill and was intrigued to find that he had turned up a completely unique set of pictures to work from and through his various presentations, was turning up yet more completely new archive material. His locations were not exactly precise but were close enough for the area to be immediately recogniseable. Really interesting and I taped an hour of discussion with him. Finally back to Betsys house at the back of 9 after an exhaustingly long but really fulfilling day day. Packed our bags and fell in to bed after checking e-mail http://www.getjealous.com/pm/diary/103781.html Wed, 7 Dec 2005 11:25:29 GMT