Less than an hour after the previous ship sailed another is sailing to Asia.  It is low in the water as it is full of coal.  At the same time the next ship is moving into the harbour, it is high out of the water as it is empty. Doh. Several tug boats gather nearby to see it into the port.

A helicopter is barely visible landing on the deck to pick up the pilot who took the ship out of the harbour.  Another pilot is already aboard the incoming ship.

In no time, the latest ship and tugs are in the harbour and almost in the channel to the coal loading docks where a whole line of ships are filling up with loads of black fossil fuel.

Beaut day on the water or in the air to view a city spread out before you. Climate change and  fossil fuel is implicated when we read that July was the warmest July on record.  In photo a coal ship is leaving the port followed by what is believed to be a small dredge.  The dredge makes a lot of round trips each day.
Once free of the port the ships seem to go south towards us before they soon turn north to flee to the wider world with their dark cargo of fossil fuel. Farewell. Somewhere at that point a chopper retrieves the pilot.  The port has been leased to Chinese interests.  Hard to believe.
In the foreground amid the constructions is a hairy bend on the new temporary race circuit. 

Eco blog

As if beached marine life. Female and male life savers lined up to sprint to their rubber duckie, jumped aboard to join the crew, full throttle out to a set-up off-shore where they enacted a rescue, I'm guessing, then raced back to the shore.  The photo does not convey the fast pace.

  Looming on the horizon are two of the coal ships that queue for coal from the Port of Newcastle, the fossil fuel city.
 The post-coal era will come but not soon enough. Progress. Westpac Bank announced it will not finance coal developments which is greeted both with applause and with outrage.
  Current tales in Newcastle are about upheavals in preparation for the super-car races of note,   meaning certain roads works have closed the roads and residential areas are very cross at finding themselves on a speed way. The east precinct is vintage style, where high rise or modernisation is probably banned - apart from super-car events!
  A new light rail to serve the long lean main street is about to start installation.  Apartments are spring up in the western precinct and change is accelerating in inner city Newcastle.      

Endeavour River, Cooktown.
Two months earlier, June 1770, explorer, Cook, limped into the sheltered waters. The isolation was rather extreme in the event of shipwreck yet a whole nation of indigenous people was near.
About 6 August 1770 the Endeavour left after repair work and sailed north to Indonesia on the return to England.
The recorded details are tragic, it was no love boat. 
The township is below hidden from view.

Early morn ferry leaves Brookland Brooklyn. That is Brookland Brooklyn on the Hawkesbury.

Here is the submarine Archerfish.  Nobbys in the background. Is the flag at half mast?

Visit of U S submarine Archerfish in 1964.  The wharf would be high above the sub. State Dockyard Newcastle is opposite.

we are sailing...we are sailing...over..
Rhapsody of the Sea leaving Sydney just over a week ago. Monday it turns up in Newcastle.

It turns out, Rhapsody has been confused with Radiance...I think...how could I...

Mirambeena, the ferry to Bruny Island.
Recently, the crossing was the butt of a joke on Q & A.

Recently, I have done the impossible and published retrospectively so to speak. A bit of redundancy is built into blogspot.

In Hobart. .............
From Wikipedia:

The icebreaker Astrolabe is a French research vessel. Among its duties are bring personnel and supplies to the Dumont d'Urville research station in Antarctica.^{[4][5][6][7][1] [2]} The vessel has been making regular voyages between Hobart and the Dumont D’Urville research station for fifteen years.
The vessel has also traversed the Northeast passage.^[8] The European Space Agency reports a 1992 traverse "was the first civilian expedition through the NSR since the Russian revolution." Astrolabe was escorted on her transit by Russian icebreakers.
The vessel is frequently serviced in the Tasmanian shipyard Southern Marine Shiplift in Launceston.^[9] The yard's maximum ship displacement is 2150 Tonnes.^[10]
Astrolabe is among the smallest research vessels working in Antarctic waters.


Below:  What's that blocking the street? The shouting and clanging? The REAL National Broadband Network (Labor infrastructure) is underway in Hobart.

The latest Rainbow Warrior, a Greenpeace ship, is in the Port. The masts leave something to be desired, usefulness must be the criteria.
More importantly, Greenpeace is adding weight to the anti coal terminal campaign.

Parts of the harbour are out of bounds. It was much more casual in the past. This is looking thru the fence of a shipyard which is up for lease which is after years with the same old company. Nearby, a forlorne William 1V is high and dry.

Mucking around in boats on the Hunter River, Raymond Terrace.  A training exercise and State Emergency Service. An ever so chilly breeze was blowing over the river.
When did we get independence from England?  At Federation in 1900-1?  Can't say where we stand. I'd just as soon be a republic. With a leader that is appointed not elected.  This does not mean that the Queen is not appreciated or highly regarded but that we have moved on as a nation. Viva the republick.

Big things seen at the ''Foreshore' yesterday. And how come Alpha Century isn't loaded to the gunnels? 
Century? Another big thing. Alpha Centauri as I understand, is the closest star, really a binary star, the brightest in the Southern hemisphere yet visible in the nothern summer at latitudes like that of Galveston.  The star points to the Southern Cross.

It is entertaining to read Richard Glover's column in Spectrum  (SMH). Recently he was in full swing about how pubs and other little institutions become up-maket, the beach-side kiosk 'converted into an oyster and semillon bar', the municipal pool 'with a bull-necked manager who was a complete bastard'. Spot on.  How would Glover like the Hunter vineyards?

Examples of original old pubs are found in this district but no two country pubs are the same with evidence of a series of alterations and additions in handyman style.  Look hard for signs of a kitchen, a bistro, who takes the orders?  Where does this door lead?
Although I havn't read a notable book in its entirety for several years, why skim thru Spectrum?  The films and TV reviews for one. Food. This and that. Some pages lapse into strange sophisticated Sydney-city speak. Other writers are obtuse but offer a good opportunity to challenge the mind....one of these days....

South coast harbour and long line fishing gear.  Well, that's my guess - as to what this is.
Rightly or wrongly, images of snagged, drowned Albatross intrude.

What will Putin do?  Given enough rope and.....

Yesterdays ferry moors beside a small boat yard/museum.

Cape Darnley entering the Port. A schedule may include China, Korea, Japan and Eastern Australia.   Austral Asia Line has head office in Singapore and the fleet can be found around Asia, Melanesia and Australia.

This morning I was on a cruise shadowed by a pirate ship ....

Just joking!

Thanks Blogger/Google techies. Glad Friday 13th is over? 

Who shrunk the tug boat? Waratah and her two sisters Dorrigo and possibly Hexham are usually moored here. They are old, iron clad, and sort of unique and I know not what they do in the Port of Newcastle.

Santas about to join a walk for charity.

Water water everywhere... a salty quote.   The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner was on the syllabus in my school days.
No sooner had one coal ship (above) sailed and before the fish and chips were finished frying, the next ship arrived as shown yesterday and named Grafton - of all things. All the while the ferry terminal was hosed out