One Year to Give: The Land of the Leaning Trees

Geraldton and district, experiences many south westerly winds - the trees obviously feel it!

The Lowndes/Panazzo vehicle

The highlight of our stay in Geraldton was visiting the foreshore on Friday afternoon when the competitors of the Australasian Safari pulled in for a public appearance, prior to the commencement of the event tomorrow, for a week of tough racing through some rugged WA country, finishing at Kalgoorlie in a week's time. The 'drawcard' for the majority of the public was the appearance of Craig Lowndes - who will be driving a Holden Colorado (on the outside, anyway!?). He won the 4WD section of the race last year.

"Go Coco"! Took this photo for all co-travellers, who stayed
at this place in Cairns. (We didn't)! These guys, were sponsoring
two vehicles - they must be making too much money!!

David Schwarz, from Lobethal - go SA!! (Good friend/riding colleague of Andy Caldecott's)

Jed getting the all important autograph
from Craig Lowndes

Cyril Despres - French rider, who won Dakar
in 2010 and 2nd place this year

Not quite game to hop on Despres' bike - No5

We hung around the foreshore for a while checking out all things motor sport, until I was afraid someone would think I was some type of "groupie" or other! Not to mention, there was a strong South Easterly blowing by and we were all frozen.

The kids have summed up Geraldton with some "parent - enforced" literacy:

Geraldton, by Jed

Grain ships on the horizon

Exciting lively town

Racing Australasian safari

Amazing pastoral history

Leaning tree

Deep water port

Tugs helping the ships in to the port

Ocean is rough and wavy

Naval memorial to HMAS Sydney

Memorial to those lost on the HMAS Sydney II, in 1941

Dome shape constructed of 645 seagulls,
representing 645 live's lost.

Name and rank of all those lost on HMAS Sydney II, engraved
into local stone, as well as the details of the engagement with
the German ship, the Kormoran - as much as they know.

Bronze sculpture of the "Waiting Woman",
symbolic of the womenfolk willing the
men to come back from service at sea.

Geraldton is the place to be

Ships are waiting out at sea

Tugs bring them in to fill with grain

And wait until they are full again

Watch the surfers catch the wave

The cold ocean waters they brave

On their boards they stand very still

Manoeuvring around as we watch from the hill.

Tourists come and go everyday

Looking for a place to stay

Then they go and look around

To see what sites can be found.

By Lily

Plenty of reefs and rocks around this stretch of coastline. Point Moore
Lighthouse pinpoints some of the danger these days, but not before there
were many, many shipwrecks.

The Abrolhos Islands, claimed a number of Dutch ships in the 1600's, as they made their way to the Dutch East Indies. There is a fantastic exhibit regarding shipwrecks at the Geraldton Museum, particularly of the infamous Batavia Shipwreck, and the story of the resulting mutiny led by the original 3rd-in-charge. (What a 'scumbag'!) However, he was eventually made to face the music. They were wrecked on the Abrolhos Islands which were fairly barren, and lacked fresh water. Some 49 people, on a "puny" longboat, decided to go for help, sailing on to Indonesia. This took them 6 weeks and all of these, including some women and children survived. How they managed to survive with minimal supplies, space and in the waves of the indian Ocean is amazing. Some of the remainder made it to another island, where conditions were better and were able to warn the rescuers of the intended mutinous action when they returned. The culprits were consequently, dealt with in various ways. I think the leader was minus a hand or two, for his punishment! A couple of 'young buck' mutineers were set down on the mainland to "sink or swim", and no one knows exactly what happened to them. But there were some reports of white men living with aboriginal communities. Who knows? The wreck of the Batavia has been found and some remarkable marine archealogical research has been done.

The Western Australia Museum is responsible for the preservation and research of any shipwreck sites etc on the WA coast.

Reconstruction of Batavia's stern and the
stone portico, with materials from the wreck.

The Batavia was thought to be carrying stone pieces designed for a portico for a fort, for the East India trading Company, in Indonesia. Recovery of some of the wreck artifacts, and old documents has enabled them to do the "jigsaw" puzzle and construct what the portico would have been like. Very clever!

Tugs piloting ship into port -ready to be filled with grain or
mineral sands

Tugs in port

Couple of ships berthed for filling

Port at Geraldton

Greenough

We took the 20 minute drive south, to a town/locality called Greenough (rhymes with 'cough'). One of the tourist attractions is a street, of about a dozen old stone buildings, preserved by the National Trust. These were built through the early 1800's, as this area developed as an important WA pastoral area. Very well achieved and interesting look at the times that people lived in then.

Huhmm! Saint ...

The "cells" - what a good idea!? There were 4 cells for white people and one for aborigines, with a rail, that they were chained to!

The Convent

School house, as it says on the road. All names were printed like this.
Really well set out.

Another interesting thing we saw was the exhibitions at the Geraldton Art Gallery. There was a selection of work from the portfolios of local Year 12's - creativity and talent amazing! And the other display was from the inmates, mostly indigenous, at the local prison. There has been a program set up, to pay a teacher, and supply quality materials for the inmates to enhance their rehabilitation with creative expression and a building of self esteem as they create some fantastic art pieces. This year's theme is "Let the Country Come In". Boy, did this include some powerful indigenous art, with the accompanying 'blurb' describing their inspiration, focussing on their traditional lands. Stories of family massacres, dreaming stories, families being separated, whitemen's mistreatment and some just beautiful representations of the natural phenomenon in those lands.

And lastly...