Balls Head Coal Loader - Sydney Harbour

Visitors to Sydney often see only the places that are so well know and travel worn, it becomes rather boring. Yet there are so many places so close to these well worn tracks that to visit them is the peak of fascination.

One such place is right under our noses on the north side of Sydney Harbour called Balls Head. 

It is a headland that juts out into the harbour just north of Goat Island and facing the Sydney Harbour Bridge. 

Aside from magnificent views of the Bridge and Sydney skyline, Balls Head offers the visitor a wonderful parkland and easy bushwalks. 

One such walk is to the old Coal Loader - established in the 1920's as a transfer area for coal from bulk carriers and for transport via road. 

The wharf is in poor condition right now, and not accessible, but the walk around the loading area is easily accessible, including through one of the loading tunnels that was used to transfer coal from ship to rail. 

These tunnels are built under a raised platform, where the coal was stored, and poured through chutes down to waiting rail cars for loading onto the vessels. 

Balls Head Coal Loader 

Rail Tunnel

Bare Island NSW

Bare Island is just off the point at La Perouse in Sydney. A wonderful little spot steeped in history.
Crowds gather every weekend with most blissfully unaware of the significance of this piece of rock, sitting just metres off the shoreline.

Originally described by Captain James Cook, as a "small bare island", and being at the "back door" to Sydney Harbour,  it was the ideal location for a fortification from the fear of Russian invasion. The fort was completed in 1885, only to be decommissioned in 1902, after it was found to be redundant.
In 1912 it was turned into a retirement home for war veterans, until 1963, when it was decided to turn the fort into an historical museum.
The waters surrounding the island and to the shoreline are bristling with marine life, with easy access making it one of the most sought after dive spots in Sydney.

Joadja - Shale Oil Ghost Town

Nestled deep in the valley in the Southern Highlands of New South Wales lies the once thriving but now largely forgotten ghost town of Joadja.

During the years 1870 to 1911 this magnificent place was home to as many as 1200 people.

 Joadja was originally developed as a secondary industrial town (as opposed to primary industrial such as wool and gold), by the Australian Kerosene Oil and Mineral Company.

The township lived off the back of the large coal and shale deposits in the surrounding area, manufacturing candles, kerosene and even growing and distributing fruit to the markets in Sydney.

It was manned largely by Scottish immigrant labour, the majority of men seconded from Scotland were already experienced in shale oil extraction and their wages at 3 pounds per week were double what they were being paid back home.

Most of the equipment was also brought in from Scotland and the company even paid the workers passage to Australia, though it was deducted from their wages at about 5 shilling per week.

By the early 1900's American Oil companies began to infiltrate the Australian market with cheaper alternatives, helped along by the Government that removed import duties on kerosene and, by 1911 Joadja was shut down, succumbing to the ever increasing competition of imported goods.

In a hundred years, not much has changed...

Joadja is, to visit, an amazing place, it's now privately owned, however we were fortunate to be able to spend a day investigating the abandoned settlement thanks to the kindness and generosity of Val & Elisa who live onsite in the original Orchard Managers cottage built c1878.

The site itself is quite large, covering many acres of land, fortunately we were able to drive around the town using a map of bush tracks that Val kindly provided to us.

It is one of the most well preserved historic sites I've seen, in such original condition, you can almost feel yourself in the time, and some say, if you linger long enough in the ruins of the houses you may well feel another presence from that time.

Looking down from the Orchard Managers cottage at the head of the property you gaze over 60 acres of orchard ; pears, apples, cherries and blackberry still grow amongst the flats.

 Orchard Managers Cottage

Just off to the east is the School of Arts building c1886, from where you can see the ruins of  the railway bridge that spanned the creek. A narrow gauge railroad was constructed here by the company, all the way to Mittagong, some 35kms away to solve some of the transport problems of negotiating the steep trip into and out of the valley.

Once you cross the creek, further to the east is the main street of the town, originally called Brick Row, after the many brick houses built along it to accommodate the working managers. Each house had two rooms out the front with a washroom and privy toilet out the back at a 'respectable distance'.

 House on Brick Row

The name of the street was changed to Carrington Row after the then Governor of NSW, Lord Carrington took a 'leisurely stroll' on one of his many visits to Joadja.

Further again to the east following the creek, you come across a large clearing, called nursery flats, an area that was used for family picnics and kids playground.

Back tracking along Carrington Row and up to the north is the old Pub, boarding house and stables, if you keep going north at this point you will eventually join the road to Wombeyan Caves.

Significantly, the Pub was built right in the middle of the town, with easy access by the managers residing on Carrington 'Brick' Row in the east, and the workers who lived on Stringy Bark Row in the far west of the town.

Stringy Bark Row was so named because the houses were made of slab bark rather than the flashy bricks allowed the managers.

Again, in a hundred years, not much has changed in our society.

To the northwest are the old Retorts, now on the World Heritage List, these masterpieces of design lay in two rows about 100 yards long, and were used to fire the shale to 400 degrees, releasing oil saturated vapours that were then piped to a water cooled condenser unit. The raw shale oil was then piped down to the refinery area and distilled into kerosene.

 Old Retorts

The smell of kerosene at the Retorts is still in the air even after a hundred years of abandonment. It is a ghostly reminder of a time gone by as you walk among the ruins.

The Refinery area is just to the south of the Retorts and immediately to the east of the workers houses on Stringy Bark Row.

Standing on the refinery area today you can just imagine the conditions in the nearby houses, the whole area is black with ash, coal dust and burnt coal. Nothing like the nice oak, elm and sycamore trees lining Carrington Row.

From the Refinery you can cross the creek at the western most end, which brings you back around the western boundary of the vast orchard, and to the Mine Managers residence.

It was here Lord Carrington stayed and, standing on the front steps remarked to the Mine Manager on the beauty of the orchard and the 'splendid views to the valley below'.

Just to the south of the Mine Managers residence is the bottom of  "The Incline".

It's a steep hill where the original railway track into the town was built to haul goods up the mountain for transport to Sydney and to bring travellers in to town.

 With a grade of 1 in 2 and 600feet in length, it's said many a traveller had repented his sins on the trip down the hill in the carriage.

Standing at the bottom and looking up, you can see why.

 The Incline

Before the Incline railway was built the only way into town was by pack horse and cart down the mountainside near where the road to Mittagong is today.

You could also walk in via the old Chinaman's Track, a steep path near The Incline, suitable only for foot traffic.

It's said the Chinese travellers would pass this way with their baskets on poles to sell their goods to the towns people.

At the time, Town and Country Journal described it as follows :

"Chinaman's track is only for foot travel and has a turnstile to stop animals from passing.  The road zig zags  in every direction down the mountain and at each point the artist or poet would find a charming picture and food for his poetic imagination".

Just outside the main township is the School, built in 1883, which accommodated over 100 children. As it was some distance from the town (about a mile) children had to cross the often fast flowing creek reach it.

There were only a few ways to cross the creek, the railway bridge, creek bed stepping stones or fallen trees. Children were not able to use the railway bridge as the sleepers were over a foot apart, leaving no option but to chance the slippery stones or unstable trees.

The NSW Government eventually provided funding for a footbridge, but it was still not close enough to the school and children continued to risk their lives crossing the swollen creek.

At least two children were killed when the creek was flooded and they slipped off the logs.

Further out along the road to Mittagong is the cemetery, which is also on private property, however the public have 'right of passage'. Unfortunately it is quite difficult to find, not really viewable from the road, and given my penchant for such things (not), we didn't stop there.

However from the records I have read, it seems Joadja was spared the tyranny of disease that so riddled other communities such as nearby Berrima and Bowral.

It's isolation is reported to have protected the community form outbreaks of cholera, diphtheria, typhoid and influenza that affected other settlements.

Nevertheless the standard of medical care in the settlement was less than desirable, with the general view of the people being to "get better or pass on"...

We finished our tour of Joadja back where we started, at the old Orchard Managers residence, and I took the opportunity to snap a shot of Val and Elisa sitting on the front porch in the same manner as the original owners 100 years earlier.

 Val & Elisa

People say the town is haunted now, a ghost town, relics of the past untouched for a century.

It may be true ... though for us, it was hauntingly beautiful. We'll be back there again.

Joadja Contacts :

Val and Elisa conduct tours of the town by appointment only .

Contact - (02) 48785129.

Thanks also to Leonie Knapman and her wonderful book, "Joadja Creek" without which much of my understanding of this fascinating place would be but nought !

Burraga Dam

A nice spot on the road to Rockley west of Oberon, NSW..
Driving out this way you'd never think there was a dam just around the corner ..

Veteran Hall - Prospect NSW

The original home of explorer William Lawson, Veteran Hall is nothing more than ruins located within the area of Prospect Reservoir near Sydney.

This once great residence overlooked the valley through Parramatta to Sydney and the Blue Mountains, consisting of farm land and cattle grazing.
Now it is nothing more than vacant block overshadowed by the huge resource of Prospect Reservoir that supplies most of western Sydneys water.

Historic Stroud - And Prime Poo..

Travel from Sydney to Newcastle via the outback ! Well, kinda, Stroud is on the road to Newcastle, the one that isn't the freeway .. sure it adds an extra hour or two to the journey, but the scenery more than makes up for it ..and Stroud is, apparently, one of the only places you can buy Prime Horse Poo, obviously from better quality horses..

Right in the middle of the town is a rather large hill, aptly called Silo Hill. In 1841, seven 20ft deep silos were hand dug into the hill by convict labour, in order to store grain for protection against weevils.
The entrance to the silos are sealed except for one which has a grate you can lift and a ladder to climb down inside...spooky..

Canon with Silo Entrance:
There are also a couple of canons resting on Silo Hill, pointed at the town... these two canons were shipped from England in 1855 for the defence of Sydney Harbour during the Crimea War, they were then sent to Newcastle for the defence of the city and decommissioned in 1909.
Eventually they were shipped by boat down the Karuah River and hauled by dray to their present position on Silo Hill..

Kable Street Church - Windsor NSW

The life of Rev. Frederick C B Fairey, a Congregational Minister at Windsor from 1879 until 1881 and again from 1910 until 1912 was quite extraordinary. The Congregational Church in Windsor still stands on the northern side of Kable Street between Macquarie and George Streets, and up until Christmas 2004 was a furniture shop.
Apart from Rev. Fairey being a minister who preached his sermon from the pulpit every Sunday and who rode to pastoral visitation on his horse, he also carried the word of the Lord to parishioners by rowing up the rivers of the colony and landing at various properties on the way.

In 1875 he was called to the Congregational Ministry in Victoria where he trained. He became the incumbent at various churches in Victoria, Tasmania and Queensland before being called to the Congregational Church at Windsor in 1879.
It was a time of evangelicism and he must have considered just being a minister and preaching to his congregation was not enough so he bought himself a Rob Roy canoe and had it shipped from Lambeth, London, to St Kilda where he was the minister. With this canoe he envisaged that during his annual holiday he could visit settlers on the rivers and coasts of the colony. He felt that many of the people would seldom be able to hear the Gospel preached or see the face of a Christian minister.
The canoe, which he named Evangelist was sea-worthy, built of oak, mahogany and cedar and was 12 feet in length. He seems to have planned his canoe well because it had an enclosed bulkhead where he kept his clothing, food, water and equipment. It was also fitted with a sail and with an ingenious little cooking stove. The little vessel was a life boat having two air chambers that always kept it afloat. The canoe, which was large enough for Rev. Fairey to sleep in if necessary, had both single and double oars and he was able to operate the rudder with his feet whilst rowing.
During his ministry at Windsor he would row or sail depending on the weather up or down the Hawkesbury River, pulling his canoe in where he saw a farmhouse. People always treated him kindly and they would ride to advise any neighbours that a minister of religion had come to preach.
The Congregational Manse, where Fred Fairey lived, was on the corner of Macquarie Street and Kable Street, so lots of boys were needed to drag the canoe up the hill from the river.

WINDSOR'S " RUM SMUGGLERS' TUNNEL"

R. M. Arndell, in his book Pioneers of Portland Head, first published in 1976, recounted that a rumour of an 8ft. x 10ft. brick tunnel was built from the river to Andrew Thompson's store to deliver the casks of "illicitly brewed" rum from Thompson's and Solomon Wiseman's still on Scotland Island into the stores cellars. Arndell reported a similar tunnel which led from another hotel opposite the foot of Baker Street, on the south side of Macquarie Street, to South Creek.

Tales of such tunnels seem to abound for there is also reputed the be a tunnel linking the Macquarie Arms Inn, previously known as the Brighton Arms, at Pitt Town to the Bird in Hand Inn, according to some members of the Johnston family. It should be remembered that the Bird in Hand was actually on the opposite side of Bathurst Street to the hotel currently bearing that name, which was actually the Maid of Australia. The exact location of the supposed tunnel, and its purpose, remain a mystery.

Tales of the "Rum Smugglers' Tunnel" can be traced back to the early days of the Hawkesbury.

Thompson, aided and joined by John Howe, must have had very large stores, and also had a very large turnover in stores stock. Thompson himself appears to have conducted the sales of and manufacture of spirits, especially rum and whisky. Andrew Thompson was known to have a distillery for rum at Scotland Island, at the mouth of the Hawkesbury. There is no doubt whatever in the writer's mind that the large bricked 8 x 10 conduit or tunnel leading from where Thompson's store site was to the river, parts of which can still be seen by an observant eye was constructed specially to draw up the barrels containing the rum which was illicitly manufactured on a wholesale scale, Thompson's vessels bringing the grog to the foot of Thompson Square, near the old Windsor wharf. An old Hawkesbury native, by name William Smith, has said to the writer, that when he was a boy in the "twenties" of the last century, he distinctly remembers the long, shingled structures that used to go down to the river bank from where the remains of Thompson's large store once stood. The time of which he spoke would be the "twenties". We can now quite understand the reason for the construction of the underground brick tunnel, which most people erroneously think was a drain to carry away waste water from the old gaol..

Brooklyn NSW

A tired old sea port, gateway to Dangar Island, and home of the famous Brooklyn Railway Bridge, the one that was built by the Americans from, well... Brooklyn, hence the name of the town. (It fell down after twelve years and was rebuilt by Aussies, but that's another story).
This little village on the shores of the Hawkesbury River north of Sydney is about as run down as an old tyre, and I think the locals want to keep it that way. There has been little or really no development in the area, but it still manages to pull a crowd of mostly boaties every weekend who gather on the launching ramps with their tinnies and cruisers alike.
There is, however, one thing that Brooklyn is not widely known for. One of the greatest war stories ever told, one that has attracted controversy for more than eighty years.
The shooting down of the Red Baron...
Manfred Von Richthofen - the famous German Flying Ace of WW1, was shot down on 21st April 1918, by Gunner Robert Buie of the Australian 53rd battery over the Somme in France. Or so they say at Brooklyn, and that fact is testified on the headstone in the local cemetery.
Debate about this has raged since that fateful day in 1918, with the Canadians, English and even the New Zealanders getting in the credit. The official line from the British High Command was that a Canadian RAF pilot 'shot down the Baron' however there is enough evidence to dispute the fact that the final shot could not have come from the air, it must have been a ground shot.
Only two gunners were in position to have fired the fatal bullet. Gunner Buie and Gunner Popkin of the 24th Machine Gun Company.
The dispute still rages to this day, but the final words rest on Gunner Buie's headstone. Brooklyn's hero.

Hawks Nest - Paradise found...

Long time friends Dave & Dianne invited us for a blissful weekend at their Hawks Nest retreat, a lovely three bedroom unit built right on the location of the original "hawks nest" .. a tree that for years contained the nest of .. well.. a hawk !
The tree is no longer there, but the view from the front room is none the less spectacular.
We spent a lazy two days eating, drinking and bike riding around this little haven .. just wonderful..
The pelicans seem to have a great time here, perching themselves on just about every pole they can find, however, the local council has added some deterrent spikes on the light poles on the famous singing bridge, to try to stop them from sitting up there and "bombing" passing cars underneath !