Blogs from Victoria, Australia, Oceania - page 8

Today we head home. First stop this morning is the Murtoa Stick Shed. We read that until the outbreak of World War 2 Australia typically exported around sixty percent of its wheat to Great Britain and Western Europe. The War thus caused a glut, and the Stick Shed was thrown up in only four months in late 1941 and early 1942 to store some of the excess. We watch a short video presentation before entering the structure. It’s jaw-droppingly massive - 265 metres long, 60 metres wide, and nearly twenty metres high at its highest point. The roof is supported entirely by 560 slender mountain ash poles, which are thought to have been salvaged from Victoria's infamous 1939 bushfires. According to the ever reliable Wikipedia it’s often claimed to be the largest “rustically built” structure on ... read more

Melbourne Art ‘Travellers’ 19th April http://www.heygo.com The Travellers celebrates Indigenous presence and the meeting of cultures through migration. It comprises ten large-scale sculptures, each approximately 7.5 metres tall and collectively incorporating 3.7 kilometres of stainless steel. Nine of the ten figures are motorised and at regular intervals move along the length of Sandridge Bridge, sited near a former Aboriginal meeting ground and near the landing point where many early migrants stepped ashore. Built in 1888, the bridge is the third to occupy this site, the original constructed in 1853. Each of the ten figures comprising the work represents a phase of arrival, as historian James Jupp has defined these. The figures, graphic and abstracted in form, are Gayip (Aboriginal period); First Settler (convict period); Melbourne Beauty (gold r... read more

We wake to the sound of raindrops. Mildura's technically in the desert, so this wasn't part of the plan. We drive along the riverbank past the same palatial houseboats that we saw in the half light last night, including one called "Mungo Creek Rehab". I suppose if you needed rehab of some sort there'd be plenty of worse places to do it. We stop for lunch at a cafe at the impressive and relatively new Mildura Marina, which is also lined with wall to wall houseboats. The Marina's surrounded by mansions which look like they probably house the local well-to-dos. No expense has been spared. The two palatial manors closest to the cafe have solar panels on their rooves. That wouldn't normally be worthy of comment, but what makes these ones stand out is that they're ... read more

It's Mother's Day, but there are no sleep-ins or breakfasts-in-bed for Issy. Our not so kind hosts (refer previous entry) need us to move apartments this morning. We’ve been told we have to be out of this apartment by 10am on pain of death, but apparently we can't get into the second one, several kilometres away, until 2pm. So it seems we‘ll be temporarily homeless. Our hosts keep sending us emails asking us for feedback. I would have thought we gave them more than enough last night, but they're clearly gluttons for punishment. I salivate as I think about what I'm going to put in the review. Soon after we’ve moved out they ring us to tell us that they've again (?) gone out of their way to help us, and have arranged for us to ... read more

Saturday mornings are apparently family mornings at Fiona's so we head there to share in the chaos and to meet her two grandchildren. Issy's always been a sucker for babies, so I suspect Fiona's daughter Sarah may struggle to reclaim seven week old Henri-Etta from my beloved's firm grasp. Two year old Jerry has recently discovered the not so subtle art of high-fiving. I'm not quite sure why his hands aren't stinging; those belonging to anyone else in his general vicinity certainly are. Today we head north-west from Swan Hill to Mildura, and hope to take in some silo art along the way to break up the journey. We read that silo art started in Western Australia’s wheat belt in 2015, and there are now 48 sites across the country, with many more in the pipeline. ... read more