December 6,
Well I left Hobart today and headed South to Kettering. We dropped by a Kayak place and tomorrow we will rent a pair and go sea kayaking for the day, should be interesting. The rest of the day we went for a drive and ended up in a little town called Cygnet, with a population of 500-1000 residents. We stopped and picked up a roast from a local butcher and then spent about 45 minutes just talking, that is something I love about staying in the small towns, everyone likes to talk and chat as long as they aren't busy, lets you learn a bit more about the area and it's people. Around 9 I went for a short walk through the town, it was short because there isn't much town, but it still has all the essentials a small town needs. Main street has a hotel, a pair of bars, a butchers shop, town hall, library, grocery store, museum, a couple other little shops, and a war memorial. I have been running into these little memorials all over the place, city's like Sydney and Melbourne build these massive monoliths, which are bear down on you, but I find that the small towns have more thought put into the little statues and figures they build. Cygnet has a little monument flanked by a artillery gun and a mortar launcher. In this little place in New South Wales there was this really cool central grassed area in between it's main road that had a monument with all the names of those who went to war from their town, and had a special tribute to 1 person in each of the separate forces, (Naval, Army, Air force). I remember the tribute to the person in the air force was to a fighter ace who died in the battle of Britian, while shooting down an enemy bomber he was so close he was hit by pieces of the exploding bomber he was attacking. There was a miniature replica of a Spitfire, with a picture of him beside it. By far my favorite war memorial was in Legerwood Tasmania. We were heading over this dirt road towards the waterfall canyon when we went through this little town of like 250 people, when my eyes forced me to halt the car and get out to look at these. Here is a little back story, In 1919 the Residents of Legerwood planted a tree for every soldier who went off to the great war and died. In 2007 the trees were inspected and the residents were informed that they were considered unsafe and would have to be removed. The locals were devastated, they loved their trees, and the memory of those they represented, which is when a white knight with a chainsaw rolled into town. He had an idea, he would carve the trees into statues of those who had fallen, giving new life to the trees. And so he created these. I think I took more pictures here than anywhere else,
I love these, by far a highlight of Tasmania. Anyway, I like how all of the small towns take pride in those who have fallen, just like they mark their day of remembrance, not on November 11 like us, but rather on Anzac day, which is the day the Australian forces landed at Gallipolli, the day they died, failed and died, but they are proud of that failure, as I heard many of them say "It was not British blood that ran at Gallipilli, it was Australian. For those of you who don't understand what happened at Gallipilli, it is best you look it up. We Canadians won our independence after our success as Vimy Ridge, they Australians got their independence when the British generals sent them to die at Gallipili. Well that is all for tonight, hopefully will get this up soon.
Well I left Hobart today and headed South to Kettering. We dropped by a Kayak place and tomorrow we will rent a pair and go sea kayaking for the day, should be interesting. The rest of the day we went for a drive and ended up in a little town called Cygnet, with a population of 500-1000 residents. We stopped and picked up a roast from a local butcher and then spent about 45 minutes just talking, that is something I love about staying in the small towns, everyone likes to talk and chat as long as they aren't busy, lets you learn a bit more about the area and it's people. Around 9 I went for a short walk through the town, it was short because there isn't much town, but it still has all the essentials a small town needs. Main street has a hotel, a pair of bars, a butchers shop, town hall, library, grocery store, museum, a couple other little shops, and a war memorial. I have been running into these little memorials all over the place, city's like Sydney and Melbourne build these massive monoliths, which are bear down on you, but I find that the small towns have more thought put into the little statues and figures they build. Cygnet has a little monument flanked by a artillery gun and a mortar launcher. In this little place in New South Wales there was this really cool central grassed area in between it's main road that had a monument with all the names of those who went to war from their town, and had a special tribute to 1 person in each of the separate forces, (Naval, Army, Air force). I remember the tribute to the person in the air force was to a fighter ace who died in the battle of Britian, while shooting down an enemy bomber he was so close he was hit by pieces of the exploding bomber he was attacking. There was a miniature replica of a Spitfire, with a picture of him beside it. By far my favorite war memorial was in Legerwood Tasmania. We were heading over this dirt road towards the waterfall canyon when we went through this little town of like 250 people, when my eyes forced me to halt the car and get out to look at these. Here is a little back story, In 1919 the Residents of Legerwood planted a tree for every soldier who went off to the great war and died. In 2007 the trees were inspected and the residents were informed that they were considered unsafe and would have to be removed. The locals were devastated, they loved their trees, and the memory of those they represented, which is when a white knight with a chainsaw rolled into town. He had an idea, he would carve the trees into statues of those who had fallen, giving new life to the trees. And so he created these. I think I took more pictures here than anywhere else,
I love these, by far a highlight of Tasmania. Anyway, I like how all of the small towns take pride in those who have fallen, just like they mark their day of remembrance, not on November 11 like us, but rather on Anzac day, which is the day the Australian forces landed at Gallipolli, the day they died, failed and died, but they are proud of that failure, as I heard many of them say "It was not British blood that ran at Gallipilli, it was Australian. For those of you who don't understand what happened at Gallipilli, it is best you look it up. We Canadians won our independence after our success as Vimy Ridge, they Australians got their independence when the British generals sent them to die at Gallipili. Well that is all for tonight, hopefully will get this up soon.
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