Day 56: Bringing Coals To Newcastle

 


"Bringing Coals To Newcastle" is a British idiom meaning doing something superfluous. It's used as Newcastle was the coal capital of Northern England, so taking coals to Newcastle was a pointless act. The same is true of Newcastle, Australia - it's the country's coal capital and is the world's largest coal exporting harbour (all 143m tonnes). Most of that coal ends up in China and Japan, ultimately as atmospheric pollutants. 


The first European stumbled upon Newcastle in 1797, less than ten years after the Sydney landing of the First Fleet. Lt. John Shortland accidentally found the harbour when in search of a bunch of convicts who had commandeered a small boat, and escaped towards the north. There is no record of if he found the escapees, but he did find a fine deep water harbour and coal so abundant it was lying on the ground. An initial attempt was made to establish a settlement in 1801, which failed. A few years later, the Brits set up a secondary penal colony town in Newcastle (sense a theme?) and used the convicts to mine the coal and cut timber. The town, named initially Kingstown, was renamed Newcastle in honour (?) of the English town and began to thrive. By 1818, commerce was so good that conditions for the convicts were the best in the British Empire.

Newcastle remained a penal settlement until 1822 when it was opened to farming. After removing the last convicts in 1823, the town was freed from the penal law's infamous influence. It became a typical Australian pioneer settlement, and a steady flow of free settlers poured into the hinterlands and expanded north and west.

Nowadays, although primarily a port, Newcastle has a thriving tourism industry, thanks to some massive, sweeping beaches and the local wine and cheese businesses. 


The other big Newcastle highlight was Allison's opportunity to meet up with her old high school and college friend, Pam Masser. Pam drove three hours to spend the days with us. It was great seeing her after 30+ years!


Next up is Townsville, after two days of cruising north up the Eastern Australia Coast.

Comments

Post a Comment

Please leave a comment (and let us know who you are!!)

Popular posts from this blog

Day 141: Ponta Delgada - Ambling Through The Azores

Image
  Today, we visited the Azores, another set of islands in the Atlantic Ocean. They’re a group of nine volcanic islands about 850 miles west of Portugal, set in a 2-5-2 formation. To prove we’re truly heading home, they are about 1200 miles southeast of Newfoundland. We actually have to travel east-south-east to reach Bermuda, our next port of call. Allison went shopping and I took a walking tour of downtown Ponta Delgada - the unofficial capital and largest city. Considering they’re literally stuck in the middle of nowhere, the islands are impressive. Most have at least 3000 ft peaks and Pico Island maxes out at 7700 feet - the highest point in Portugal. When measured from the sea floor, the mountains in the Azores are some of the largest on Earth. The volcanoes are still active, averaging one event every 30 years. The large major blowup was 1957, so we’re overdue. Fortunately, nothing happened during our visit, although everywhere you look, there are cinder cones and volcanic remn...
Read more

Preparation And Logistics

Image
  There's actually a lot of work and preparation required before we leave.  Aside from the packing (multiple climates and dress codes), the two major items are passports/visas and prescription  drugs. First-world problems but definitely time-consuming. In order to take the trip, we need ten blank pages in our passports to account for all the entry and exit stamps. We also have to get visas for India (longest form ever), New Zealand (fairly easy), Australia (through a really cool phone app), and, in a few weeks, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and finally, Nepal. We've also created multiple paper and electronic copies of everything - just in case! The second major issue was getting a 5 month supply of prescription drugs. Nothing about the American healthcare system is easy. For those of you outside the country, prescription drugs come in 30 or 90-day supply with no exceptions. Except .. we needed more than 90 days. Engineer-brain John did some research and created a flowchart of how...
Read more

Day 241 - Four Lessons and Life-Changing Events

Image
  You can't sail around the world without it impacting your view of the world. So here are my top four from the trip. I never truly realized the horrendous impact that European Colonialism had on the world from the mid-1400s until well into the last century. The devastation and cultural destruction was massive. It seems the Spanish and Portuguese were the worst, the Danes, Dutch and Germans the best, and the French and Brits were somewhere in the middle. It's way different seeing it in real life than reading about it in a history book. And yes - my forefathers contributed on a huge scale. There was a time when the sun never set on the British Empire. 
Read more