Thurs, 19th Mar, 2015 Old Mac’s Farm, Norwood to Malcolm & Kerry’s, Westbury

Warmer night 19 degrees. Sunshine and clouds – maybe some showers of rain. Cyclone Nathan is heading to Cape Melville so home might get some more rain.

Headed into Launceston to spend the morning at the Queen Victoria Museum as it is not going to be a nice sunny day. Got some groceries first – tomatoes have risen to $8/kilo. Stopped at Maccas for a cuppa and yummy $2 banana bread since the Museum doesn’t open till 10am.

The tram was on the tracks – will have to check out where it goes.

Headed back into the area we had seen before. Further on from the stuffed animals was the history section. More info about Captain Kelly and some of his old musical instruments, a flutina and walking sticks etc.

Sarah Island and lots about the convicts etc, similar to what we read at Zeehan.

Another section about ‘bushrangers’.

We thought the iron heater looked interesting, from the Cascade Female Factory.

Mr Robinson and Governor Arthur information.

We thought the ground looked too rocky on the Port Arthur, Isle of Dead to dig graves – they just mounded them. Mark Jeffrey was the Settlement gravedigger. Jeffrey was transported for burglary and was one of the Port Arthur incorrigibles. He was given the job of grave digger and lived on Dead Island, his removal from the station being desirable owing to his turbulent disposition. He died in the Invalid Depot, New Town.

Next section was about Whaling. Greeners whaling gun and harpoon.

Lots of relics from the whaling days.

Another Tassie Devil.

Next section was all about the oldest merchant shipwreck called ‘Sydney Cove’. There was lots of artefacts and information about their cargo and things they have recovered from the wreck.

In the displays there were plaques explaining where sayings originated from like:

Loose Cannon – someone out of control, unpredictable.  Cannons are very heavy. In rough seas a loose cannon could be thrown about, causing great damage on the deck.

At a rate of knots – moving very fast. A ship’s speed was measured by rolling a line knotted at regular intervals into the sea. The number of knots passed in half a minute, measured using a sandglass, indicated the ship’s speed.

Chew the Fat – talk endlessly. Salted meat was often hard and took considerable chewing before it could be swallowed.

Grog – alcohol (drink). In 1740 British Admiral Vernon (whose nickname was ‘Old Grogram’) ordered that the sailors’ daily ration of rum be diluted with water. The men called the mixture ‘grog’.

Clean Slate – to start over. Ship watch keepers recorded everything on a slate. If there were no problems during a watch, the slate could be wiped clean so the next watch started with a ‘clean slate’.

The Bitter End – keep going until the job is finished. The end of an anchor cable is fastened to the bitts (bollards) at the ship’s bow. If all the anchor cable is let out you have come to the ‘bitter end’.

Slush Fund – money kept for a rainy day. Slush was the fat skimmed from the surface of cooking liquid or scraped from empty salty meat casks. It was sold by the cook when the ship came into port for the benefit of himself and the crew.

Another section about the Tassie Tiger.

This adult female was collected before 1897. Where and when it was collected it unknown. This rare specimen is one of only a few in the world that shows a pouch. The condition of the pouch indicates that this female had four pouch young (joeys) when captured. What became of them is unknown.

Upstairs was a whole section about the Great War – Sacrifice and Shadows. Went into a room where they played an audio track which is a simplistic recreation of what an artillery barrage would have been like in the Great War. It is nothing compared to the real thing but it had our ears ringing.

Lots of interesting information. Didn’t know that tanks were originally called Landships.

Maxim MG08/15 light machine gun. This fully automatic machine gun was the standard German-made light machine gun introduced into the German military service toward the end of 1916. This one was captured on the Somme, possibly by men from the 40^th Battalion, and awarded to Tasmania after the war for public display.

Amazing photo of all the troops’ camps in Egypt.

Very sad reading about the illnesses, gassings and surgeries that the soldiers etc suffered during the war. Makes you really appreciate how lucky we are to live now.

Interesting info about one of the founders of QANTAS.

HMAS Sydney. Learning lots about our war history.

Lots of poppies pinned to the wall – It has been very interesting as it is the centenary this year and we have seen so much more about the Great War everywhere and on TV lately.

Finished in that pavilion so we headed outside. Steve found a water wheel.

Great science things to check out like this Whisper Dish. We were amazed how Steve could whisper into his dish and I could hear him so clearly across the other side of the area at my dish.

Steve could throw the tennis board at 61k/h, I could only do 42.

This whole area used to be the Railway Workshops so we went out to find the Blacksmith’s shop etc. This series of buildings were built between 1909 and 1937. The Blacksmith Shop remained in operation until the site closed in 1994.

Lots of other info about the other sheds.

I thought this was a smart way to move the trains from shed to shed.

We would be underwater according to this flood level sign.

Headed back inside to check out this model of Launceston Civic Square precinct which has been made out of Leggo bricks by Ken Draeger. It took approximately 700 hours over a year. Contains approx. 250,000 bricks, worth around $30,000. It is custom designed – no Lego kits or instructions and all genuine Lego bricks. Just created off Google Earth and 2000 photos.

This is the Post Office with its tower – he has done a fantastic job.

There were 3 cars on display.

Through a hallway with lots of old railway signs etc into the Railway Workshop. 

This is No. 2 of the Abt Railway used in Queenstown.

An old engine, flat bed and carriage.

The end room was the paint shed (we had read the info outside of it). They could turn this into an artwork.

Another section about how they added more sheds to house the Munitions factories during the war.

The railways were instrumental in the tourism growth in Tasmania.

More info about this workshop built in 1871.

The railway workshops often built their own machinery. This band saw, for example, was made here in 1887.

Corrugated iron roller – corrugated iron is one of the most common building materials. Sheets of iron were wound through this machine which puts the corrugations in the iron.

This sign reminds me of Dad’s business he had for a while.

Great banner hanging from the ceiling.

In the next shed was the Planetarium. Very interesting.

This is a suspension bridge simulator to show how our senses get affected – make Steve walk very wobbly as the outside pictures rolled around you. Took a video – we had fun in that.

This is the Phenomena Factory – we had a ball trying out all the things – even learning some science too.

Try this – just looking into the picture and the cogs will move slowly. I could see it easily but Steve couldn’t at all.

That was certainly a fantastic museum. Headed back across the old train tracks back to the truck. The tram was coming back to the station.

As we walked back to the car we found another flood level marker. We are walking up along the North Esk River which has now had high banks built up.

As we drove back across the bridge, the river was full again – the tide was in.

The sky was getting blacker so headed back to have lunch and hook up the van. Unfortunately the rain beat us back and we dashed into the van for lunch. 

The rain let up a little so hiding under the umbrella we packed up the van and then hit the road. I put in Malcolm and Kerry’s address into the GPS and off we went. We were on the main highway and I thought she was taking us on the back road around to Westbury so I ignored her and said stay on the highway. Have the 2^nd ‘recalculating’ I realised we were on the highway going south to Hobart – BIG OOPS. Turned off and then ended up on the minor road back to Perth then through Longford and back to the highway to Westbury!!! The rain had stopped at least – Steve is such a calm man, thank goodness!!!

Got a photo of this cute letterbox as we pulled over in Perth to let a heap of cars pass – it was school pickup time!!

Will have to come back and check out this windmill house.

Turned off just outside of Westbury and found the entrance to Malcolm and Kerry’s property, “Barunah”. They are chaff – grain & hay merchants. That is his great grandfather he had carved into the tree by the chap that did the ones in Legerwood and Scottsdale.

Malcolm was there and we parked the van up beside his ‘toy’ shed. It was spitting with rain so went inside for a cuppa and catchup. Their youngest daughter, Sophie, was home. Kerry came home later as she had been babysitting her new granddaughter. Great evening chatting over dinner with all homegrown vegetables. The rain came down quite hard then about 9pm the wind came up and blew all the clouds away. There were stars out when we headed back to the van to bed.

Rang Rick to see how Bill was going. Tracy texted with Grant’s update. So glad he is doing so well and hope he keeps improving each day.