Saturday, April 5, 2014

Sepia Saturday: Pinnacle Point


The Phelan's holiday to Tasmania in 1937, mentioned several times on this blog, has provided yet another photo for the Sepia Saturday themed posts. This week the theme photo shows men at a height but seemingly unaware of the dangerous position they are in.

Well the Phelans weren't in danger but they were at a height. This photo was taken from the top of Mt Wellington above Hobart in Tasmania, at a spot called Pinnacle Point. The views from there are spectacular because it's a very beautiful harbour. Their car must have been chugging a bit on its way to the top! The mountain is 1271 metres (4179 ft) high and the 7 km road had only just been built. It was opened in January 1937 and had been a government project during the depression years to provide work for unemployed men. Prior to that the only way up was by foot. (Charles Darwin climbed it in 1836.) I wonder if the graffiti on the rocks in the foreground is still there. 

View of Hobart from Pinnacle Point on Mt Wellington, 1937
This is a recent photo from about the same spot. Note that the city has now spread to the other side of the bay. For most of its life the city didn't have a decent bridge across the Derwent River so it wasn't until after the Tasman Bridge was built in the 1960s that residents started to populate the eastern side.

Hobart as it is now. 
If it's danger you want you can see all manner of more dangerous activities over on the Sepia Saturday webpage.

12 comments:

  1. Why is it that idiots and imbeciles everywhere must deface rocks, cliffs abd road cuttings with carved graffiti? Once there, it's so difficult to remove without damaging the rocks further. I haven't visited Tasmania, but hopefully will get there one day.

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    1. You're right. Vandals are the exception to the old saw: It takes all kinds. We could get along quite well without vandals.

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  2. A beautiful place for a view. I tend to forget that things like bridges and roads haven't been there forever.

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  3. Hi Lorraine, your link from SS isn't working.
    I love Tassie - another danger angle - we were holidaying in Tassie when the ship hit the bridge and knocked down the span. We were due to be on it the very next day!

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  4. What a view! And it was neat switching back & forth between the old & new pictures to see the changes. Glad you got the glitch fixed so we could see your post!

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  5. What a view! And I enjoyed switching back & forth between the old & new pix to see the changes. Glad you got the glitch fixed so we could see your post. :))

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  6. I wonder what the path is like to get to Pinnacle Point.

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  7. A tremendous view. That's somewhere I would like to go.

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  8. A very interesting spin on the idea of perspective from a height. I too liked seeing the contrast that 3/4 of a century can bring. It's not surprising that urban areas are now larger, but it is startling to see how small the forests were in the 1930s.

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  9. Loved the two views. A lucky find!

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  10. I've been up Mt Wellington before and it is a great view, but can be very cold even in summer. We didn't go up when we were down there last January because it was very windy, and would have been worst up at that height. In fact our Hobart friends told us about some other friends who had gone up there recently and when they opened the car door it was blown off its hinges!

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I love to read your comments. Thankyou for your interest.

Lorraine

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