concentric spirals, things to me that resonate, an antique periodic table of the elements, graphs of the cosine in trigonometry, the queen mab speech of Romeo and Juliet, the music of Bach, and finally the tessellations of MC Escher

Wilpena Pound.

For this northern latitude Wilpena Pound has good rainfall and a microclimate because of the surrounding hills. It was always a special place for Aboriginal people and a prized location for sheep pastoralists. At Cradock they average 250 mms annually, Hawker rises to 300 mm and Wilpena has 390 mms (15 inches in the old rainfall). Further north at Marree the average is just 136 mm a year. Wilpena Creek flows out of the Pound which covers 80 square kilometres (20,000 acres). It is 6 kms wide and 16 kms long and its highest surrounding peak is Mt Mary at 1,171 m or 3,842 feet. In 1840 Edward John Eyre and others explored parts of the Flinders Ranges but they did not discover Wilpena Pound. That was achieved by C Bagot in 1851. Bagot said in the press that there was only one ingress or egress to flat land with a permanent running creek suitable for depasturing 500 cattle. This plain was surrounded by steep rocky walls up to 1,000 feet high. The government responded by immediately sending Mr Burr of the Survey Office to the Pound for a trigonometrical survey in June 1851. Bagot gave it its Aboriginal name. The furthest north leasehold run in 1851 was at Kanyaka between Quorn and Hawker. The Wilpena run was also taken out in 1851 and originally covered 850 square miles but that was soon reduced into other leaseholds. Drs William and John Browne took over the Wilpena leasehold and by 1853 the pine slab homestead was built (demolished 1931) and shearing sheds and workers cottages soon followed. George Marchant got a 14 year lease of 85 square miles on 1 January 1855. In 1857 he employed a manager Charles Powell, whose father had planted the first mulberry tree at Kingscote in 1836, and he stayed at Wilpena station until 1882 but with various owners. By 1860 Dr William Browne held Wilpena run and he sold off the Arkaba section in 1863 before the big drought. By 1861 Henry Strong Price owned the leasehold which he tried to sell but could find no buyer. A report on Wilpena in 1865 says it covered 154 square miles and employed 19 married men and their wives, 24 single men and 41 children making a total of 101 people. Later in the 19th century Dr William Browne owned Wilpena again and the government resumed most of it in January 1880. Tourism came to Wilpena Pound in 1920 when the Wilpena Forest Reserve was created but the run was leased to graziers until 1945. At that time the Rasheed family established the chalet and all grazing in the Pound ceased. In 1970 the adjoining Orraparinna station was purchased by the government to create Flinders Ranges National Park. Finally in 1985 the government bought the leasehold to Wilpena station to add to the park. Its name was changed from Flinders National Park to Ikara Flinders National Park in 2016 thus incorporating, an Adnyamathanha word from the traditional land occupiers, into the title. The Adnyamathanha people and their sub clans have been in the area for around 15,000 years.

The Pound is a natural amphitheatre with Rawnsley Bluff at the southern end (he was the surveyor of runs in the 1850s). The Pound has a fascinating geomorphological structure. The landscape here was deeply folded with synclines and anticlines. Synclines are downward folds of earth layers with a trough at the bottom i.e. Wilpena Pound. Anticlines are the peaks of the layers but in the Flinders Ranges the anticlines have been eroded away over vast geological eras leaving rugged edges above the synclines or troughs. The trough of Wilpena Pound has a layer of quartzite, then other layers beneath that. The end of the anticline from the western side of the Pound is the Elder Range. The true shape of the formation reveals itself from the air.

 

The Windmill Tower:

 

The oldest convict-built structure surviving in Queensland, the windmill tower has accommodated a range of uses. Constructed in 1828 to process the wheat and corn crops of the Moreton Bay penal settlement, it had a treadmill attached for times when there was no wind but also as a tool for punishing convicts. The mill ceased grinding grain in 1845 and the treadmill was removed sometime before 1849. From 1855 the tower was reused as a signal station to communicate shipping news between the entrance of the Brisbane River and the town. Substantial renovations were made to it in 1861 including the installation of a time ball to assist in regulating clocks and watches. Twenty years later a cottage for the signalman was constructed to the immediate west of the tower, with a detached kitchen erected to the south two years after that. Both were later demolished. The windmill tower was used as a facility for early radio, telephony and television communications research from the 1920s and underwent substantial conservation work in the 1980s and 2009.

 

In May 1825, after eight months of occupation at Redcliffe, the contingent of convicts, soldiers, administrators and their families comprising the Moreton Bay penal settlement relocated to the site of present-day Brisbane's central business district. The growing settlement was to be self-sufficient in feeding its residents by cultivating corn (also known as maize) and wheat crops at the government farm, which were then processed into meal and flour by hand mills.[1] By 1827, with a substantial crop to process, the settlement storekeeper recommended a treadmill be erected to grind the crop into flour. Commandant Logan indicated at this time that such a devise at Brisbane town would be of service and also provide an avenue for the punishment of convicts.[2]

 

There is little evidence confirming details of the windmill tower's planning and construction. In July 1828, Peter Beauclerk Spicer, the Superintendent of Convicts at the time, recorded in his diary that convicts were 'clearing ground for foundations for the Mill' and proceeded to dig a circular trench that reached bedrock and had a circumference of approximately 9 metres.[3] Allan Cunningham noted soon after that construction was in progress. The mill was constructed on the highest point overlooking the settlement on what is now Wickham Terrace. By 31 October 1828 the first grain was being ground at the site by a mill gang; however it is supposed that this was done by a treadmill as the rotating cap and sails associated with the wind-powered operation of the mill were not brought to the site until November.[4] Circumstantial evidence suggests that the wind-powered grinding of grain did not begin until December.

 

There were two pairs of millstones inside the tower, each driven independently by the treadmill and sail mechanisms. The former was located outside the tower, a shaft connecting the treadwheel and the mill cogwheels inside. Two sketches from the early 1830s show the windmill tower and its sail stocks in place,[5] while an 1839 description depicts a tower built from stone and brick, comprising four floors, a treadmill and windmill. From 1829 the windmill tower was said to be continually requiring repair, possibly because its equipment was all made from locally-available timber rather than iron[6].

 

The treadmill was an important component of the mill, for use as punishment without trial, and for times when there was no wind but the amounts of grain sufficient to sustain the settlement still required processing. No plans exist of the Brisbane treadmill, however, the Office of the Colonial Architect produced a standard Design for Tread Mill Adapted for Country Districts Average Estimate £120.[7] Between 25 and 30 men worked at the mill at any one time. Sixteen operated the treadmill, although as there are no plans, it is uncertain whether it comprised a standard 16-place treadmill, or two 8-place sections connected to a common shaft. Each man would climb five steps to get onto the wheel, standing on the 9 inch wide treads and holding on to the rail. The men would then work as though ascending steps to operate the treadmill. Some undertook this task while in leg irons, while the more able used one hand to hold on and the other to draw sketches of people, animals and scenes on the boards of the mill. The men would work from sunrise to sunset with three hours rest in the middle of the day in summer, and two hours in winter.[8] [9] The first casualty of the treadmill, which produced the first official record of its existence, occurred in September 1829 when prisoner Michael Collins lost his life after being entangled in the operating mechanism. Maps of 1840s Brisbane feature a rectangular structure attached to the outside of the tower, Robert Dixon's in particular showing a 6 x 5 metre structure, probably the treadmill, located on ground that was to become Wickham Terrace.

 

In July 1841 the Brisbane tower was reputedly the site of a public execution of two Aboriginal men who had been convicted in Sydney of the murder of Assistant Surveyor Stapylton and one of his party near Mount Lindsay. They were returned to Moreton Bay and hanged with about 100 Aboriginal people present, however it may be that the execution took place elsewhere on what was known as Windmill Hill.[10]

 

Indicative of the prominence of its physical position, the tower served as one of the stations for the trigonometrical survey of the Moreton Bay district conducted by Robert Dixon, Granville Stapylton and James Warner from May 1839 in preparation for the area being opened to free settlement.[11]

 

In February 1836 the windmill tower was struck by lightning, causing severe damage throughout, including to the treadmill. A convict millwright was brought from Sydney in June for the repairs, which amounted to a major rebuild of the structure that was not completed until May 1837.[12] In April 1839, with the closure of the Moreton Bay penal settlement being planned, the windmill tower was one of the buildings recommended for transfer to the colony. This was approved in 1840-41 but it continued to sporadically process grain until 1845, when due to crop failure, a stagnant population and the availability of imported flour, it finally ceased being used. The penal settlement had officially closed in February 1842. The treadmill operated until 1845 and had been removed by October 1849[13].

 

The windmill tower in Brisbane is the oldest of its type left standing in Australia and further distinguished by having been built by convict labour. The earliest standing stone windmill towers extant around the country date from the 1830s and include: one built in 1837 in South Perth, Western Australia[14]; another built in the same year at Oatlands in Tasmania which operated until 1890[15]; and another built at Mount Gilead near Campbelltown in New South Wales in 1836[16]. Most were built to process grains into flour. Other surviving mill towers are the one built in 1842 by FR Nixon at Mount Barker in South Australia; Chapman's mill built around 1850 at Wonnerup in Western Australia[17], and another built at a similar time on an island in the Murray River near Yunderup in Western Australia[18]. None of the nineteen windmill towers that characterised the early settlement at Sydney have survived.[19] Technological developments, most particularly steam power which was more dependable than wind power or that generated by convict labour at a treadmill, rendered wind-driven mills largely redundant.

 

After the cessation of milling operations there were discussions about possible future use of Brisbane's windmill tower. In December 1849 the tower was put up for auction and bought by a government official who promptly sought tenders for removal of it and its machinery (the auction terms required it to be cleared away by three months after the sale).[20] Ownership of the place quickly reverted to the Crown because of a legal problem with the sale, but not before some dismantling had occurred.[21] In a January 1850 article the Moreton Bay Courier continued its appeal for the windmill not to be pulled down and secured by the town, arguing that aside from its landmark and picturesque qualities it was the ‘best fixed point for land measurement in the district'. In this vein the site was the most accessible viewing point for the picturesque landscape of Brisbane and its environs. Despite earlier calls to erase evidence of Brisbane's convict past, 'sentiment and pragmatism combined to override the detrimental taint of convictism' saving the tower from destruction. The sails were still in place in 1854 and appear in a painting of the windmill completed in 1855.[22]

 

By 1855 Brisbane was the leading Queensland port and it became important to establish signal stations to communicate shipping news between the entrance of the Brisbane River and the town, one of which was set up on Windmill Hill. This required modifications to the tower to include a semaphore station connected to the electric telegraph. Information on ships entering the river was converted to semaphore signals using flags hoisted on a mast erected on top of the tower. The renovations were undertaken by John Petrie in October 1861 to plans by colonial architect Charles Tiffin and included the removal of the windmill stocks or arms and wheels; the laying of floors on each storey; new doors and windows; a weatherproof floor on the top of the tower with an iron railing; a new winding staircase from bottom to top; repair of stone, brickwork and plastering; and the installation of a high flagstaff to fly signals.[23] The tower's renovation at this time also fitted it out as a public observatory and it became known by that term.[24] The following year it became the first home of the newly founded Queensland Museum; serving this purpose until 1868 when other accommodation was provided in the old convict barracks or parliamentary building on Queen Street.[25]

 

Petrie also installed a time ball on the tower to provide a reliable authority for regulating clocks and watches. It was dropped at one o'clock each day based on observations relayed by telegraph from Sydney. The time ball was replaced by a time gun in 1866, with an embankment and shed constructed to hold the gun in 1874. After 1882 the gun and shed were moved to the eastern section of the current reserve before the shed was demolished in 1908. The time gun proved useful to people as far away as Logan, Caboolture and Ipswich. The old gun was replaced in 1888 with another before a new electrically-controlled time ball was installed in 1894. This was associated with the legislated implementation of a single time throughout the colony, being designated as ten hours earlier than the mean time at Greenwich. Adjustments were made to the tower at this time to accommodate the new time ball. The roof was lowered and the flagstaff pared down.[26]

 

A cottage for the signalman was constructed in 1883 to the immediate west of the tower to plans prepared by Government Architect FDG Stanley and on part of the Waterworks reserve. Two years later a detached kitchen was also constructed behind it to the south of the tower. Use of the signal station was discontinued in 1921 by the state government, which then sought a new use for the structure and land. [27] Despite this the flagstaff remained in place until 1949. From January 1893 the Fire Brigade implemented a nightly observation post from a specially-constructed platform on top of the tower. This was used until around 1922.

 

The Commonwealth government assumed responsibility for the site in 1901 but control reverted to the state in 1908 when it was designated as an Observatory Reserve. In 1902 it had been connected to the Railway Telegraph Office at Roma Street so that the railways had the correct time for their operations. The evidence of historical photographs suggests that sometime between 1902 and 1912 the cabin at the top was increased in size.[28] The time ball remained in operation until 1930.

 

The site was placed under the trusteeship of the Brisbane City Council in 1922. The site of the cottage remained in the hands of the Waterworks Board and a boundary re-arrangement had to occur to allow its continued use in relation to the observatory. At this time the Queensland Institute of Radio Engineers began wireless radio and telephony research at the tower, and used the signalman's cottage to meet two nights a month. Apparatus to operate a wireless radio station was installed in 1926. The cottage was occupied on a more regular basis in order to reduce the risk of vandalism to the tower, but fell vacant. In 1926 the City Architect, AH Foster, proposed a plan for beautifying the observatory, which included removal of the cottage and adjacent sheds. The tender of Messrs Guyomar and Wright to remove the cottage, shed and outhouse for £60 was accepted.[29] At this time the stone and wrought iron wall along Wickham Terrace was erected. It was intended to add 'dignity to the historical reserve, and harmonise with the massive character of the Tower'.[30]

 

From 1924 Thomas Elliott installed equipment in the tower to undertake cutting-edge television research; he and Allen Campbell giving a demonstration from the site in 1934 which constituted Queensland's first television broadcast. It was considered by many at the time as the most outstanding achievement thus far in the history of television in Australia. They gained a license from the government and continued experimental broadcasting from the tower until about 1944.[31]

 

From 1945 the Brisbane City Council was considering suitable action to preserve the tower, which had become a popular visitor attraction. Some restoration work was carried out in 1950 on the advice of Frank Costello (then Officer in Charge of Planning and Building with the City Council), which included removal of old render and re-rendering the entire structure. It was at this time that the flagstaff was removed in preparation for making the open ground of the reserve 'a real park'. Certainly these conservation efforts considered the heritage value of the place as well as the public's use of it.

 

However by 1962 the windmill tower was again in poor condition. Floodlighting to enhance its appearance for tourists was undertaken for the first time during the Warana Festival five years later. In the early 1970s the Council and the National Trust of Queensland undertook detailed investigations regarding restoration and transfer of trusteeship from the council to the trust (the latter were abandoned in 1976). None of the original plans or any of the original windmill machinery parts could be located at that time. Based on these findings the National Trust formed the opinion that the building should be preserved in its present form and not reconstructed to its windmill form.

 

In 1982 City Council undertook some external maintenance work on the observation house or cabin, including replacement of deteriorated timber to the balcony and sills, and corrugated iron on the roof, and repair of the time ball and its mast (which was shortened by about 300 mm to remove some part affected by dry rot).[32]

 

In 1987 a consortium of companies involved in the construction of the Central Plaza office building offered to assist the Brisbane City Council with the conservation of the Windmill Tower. To inform this work a conservation study was undertaken by Allom Lovell Marquis-Kyle Architects, which also oversaw conservation work[33]. Preliminary archaeological investigations undertaken at this time identified the remains of the original flagstaff base which was reinstated.[34] The conserved Windmill Tower was opened by the Lord Mayor of Brisbane on 3 November 1988. A further archaeological investigation was carried out at the site in 1989-90 by a University of Queensland team, revealing clear stratigraphic layers datable to each of the key phases of use of the site.[35] In August 1993 further investigations of the fabric of the tower were undertaken to explore the extent of the footings and the nature of construction of the curb and cap frame. More conservation work was carried out in May 1996. [36]

 

In 2009 the Brisbane City Council received considerable funding to carry out restoration work of the windmill tower through the State Government's Q150 Connecting Brisbane project. It was intended that the structure be publically accessible to allow visitors to experience the view from its observation platform, a practice that has been commented on since the 1860s.[37] In 2008 - 2009 the Brisbane CBD Archaeological Plan assessed the area of the observatory reserve and a length of Wickham Terrace associated with it as having exceptional archaeological research potential because of the combination of its association with the penal settlement and the low level of ground disturbance that has occurred there since.[38]

 

The Tower Mill Hotel:

 

Spring Hill is Brisbane’s oldest suburb containing many of Brisbane’s oldest structures. Opposite the site of the Tower Mill Motel is the convict-built windmill tower dating from 1828 and nearby the town’s first purpose-built reservoirs dating from 1866.

 

Being close to the town centre, Spring Hill developed as the town developed with fashionable, more expensive houses on the ridgeline above Brisbane Town and cheaper housing on the lower slopes and gullies. As the town spread in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, newer suburbs further out attracted development and Spring Hill was, by the early twentieth century, crowded, a bit run-down and cheap. In the postwar era, as prosperity returned in the 1950s and 1960s, a wave of new development swept the city. Young professionals and artists were attracted to Spring Hill as it was close to the city centre and the suburb experienced somewhat of a revival and the beginnings of gentrification.

 

The increased frequency and affordability of international travel also had an impact as Australia became a destination and new international style hotels were built. In Brisbane, the traditional corner hotels lacked the facilities and accommodation standards required by the growing modern tourist market. In the 1960s a number of new hotels were built, with the Tower Mill Motel being one of the first and an outstanding example of the new modern international style.

 

The site of the motel was previously occupied by a doctor’s surgery in-keeping with the development of Wickham Street over time as the location of private hospitals and specialist clinics. The site was purchased by Chacewater Pty Ltd who applied in November 1964 to build a seventy unit motel designed by architect, Stephen Trotter, estimated to cost £285,000.

 

Stephen Trotter was born in Brisbane in 1930 and trained in the offices of Mervyn Rylance and Fulton and Collin. He gained a Diploma of Architecture (Qld) in 1954 and became a registered architect in 1955. He started in practice as an associate of Fulton and Collin in 1958. His time with Mervyn Rylance, who specialized in Old English designs, instilled in Trotter a desire to design buildings that responded to the sub-tropical climate of Brisbane. In 1962 John Gillmour, Stephen Trotter and Graham Boys became partners in the firm. Influenced by the new international styles being constructed overseas and the new engineering technologies being developed after the war, Stephen Trotter successfully applied for a Royal Australian Institute of Architects (RAIA) Sisalkraft Scholarship in 1962. His application included the design of the Tower Mill Motel in his portfolio of works as an indication of his desire to study design responses to climatic conditions. Trotter’s whirlwind three-month tour of the world resulted in a study entitled “Cities in the Sun” which identified the elements of design relating to hot, dry; hot wet, warm wet and warm dry climates in the subcontinent, Persia, Oceania, South America, North America and Europe.

 

The Tower Mill Motel features a striking circular form, distinctive concrete sun-shading and a restaurant on the top floor. The circular form and roof detailing mirror the circular form and detailing of the diminutive historic windmill tower across the road. Embracing the new design technologies of the international style, the Tower Mill Motel features expressed concrete floor plates and columns and concrete awnings shading the full height glazed walls. It is completely different from the international style hotels being built in the city at this time which, although featuring curtain walls and full height glazing, generally adhered to a rectangular footprint and identical room layouts.

 

Stephen Trotter remained as a partner of Fulton, Collin, Boys, Gilmour and Trotter until 1999. During this period he taught architecture at the Queensland Institute of Technology (QIT now QUT), instilling an understanding of the importance of the environment and energy efficiency in building design to a generation of architecture students. As well as lecturing at QIT for nineteen years, Trotter was involved in the Queensland Chapter of the Australian Institute of Architects for a number of years. Trotter retired from Fulton Trotter in 1999, however his sons Mark and Paul are now directors. Stephen Trotter also made an outstanding contribution to the University of Queensland residential college, International House, for over sixty years and he was made a Fellow in November 2011. Stephen Trotter passed away on 30 July 2015, aged 84.

 

The Tower Mill Motel was completed in 1964 and went on to become a destination for overseas visitors.

 

The outstanding innovative design of the Tower Mill Motel, not only is a unique example of a 1960s cyclindrical building that is sensitively designed to respond to the site and climate. The hotel was subdivided for 107 strata titled units in December 2002 with some being sold into private ownership and some being retained for use as hotel rooms. A recent change in ownership has seen the purchase of a number of private units to facilitate the return of the whole building to use as a hotel.

 

Source: Queensland Heritage Register & Brisbane City Council Heritage Register.

mwmgraphics.blogspot.fr/2013/03/logo-exploration-spherica...

Playing with Sine and Cosine functions.

Really, it's just a picture of teabags. Not of me teabagging you (which, for those who don't know, can be a common occurrence in multiplayer videogames these days -- you get shot in the face, and then your foe comes and squats up and down on said face while you lay supine, waiting to respawn; hence, the enemy is virtually teabagging you).

 

This is a Tazo ginger green tea.

 

For those who don't know, green tea actually has a stomach-upsetting side effect. For the longest time, I thought I was allergic. I'd drink green tea, and my guts would get all woozy. Then my head would follow. I'd feel queasy for a half-hour, maybe an hour, then it'd go away. And I'd stare ruefully at the green tea, and I eventually gave up drinking it.

 

Except, duh. I found out this is not at all an uncommon side effect. In fact, drinking green tea on an upset stomach might have you yarfing (that's a technical, medical term, "yarfing") in record time. Some people say it's the caffiene, which doesn't seem right because coffee doesn't necessarily make people sick on an empty stomach -- so, I'm going to go ahead and guess that it's the polyphenols that are doing it.

 

You can either drink green tea after having some food, or, if that's not possible, have a variety that includes mint or ginger -- both of these will help to settle the stomach, ideally preventing the Yarf Syndrome (sometimes known in medical circles as "The Technicolor Yawn").

 

Otherwise, green tea's generally pretty good for you. Its caffiene metabolizes differently from coffee, so you don't get as jacked up. It helps inhibit cancer growth. It gives you superpowers, allows you to punch cars into the atmosphere. It improves sexy-time performance. It allows you to see into the future. It lets you do 10 minutes of error-free trigonometry. It gets you drunk. It gets you crunk. It punches dragons. Green tea is great stuff.

Fibonacci spiral (golden ratio) at work.

—

Apple iPhone XS Max.

Wernher von Braun (1912–1977) was one of the most important rocket developers and champions of space exploration during the period between the 1930s and the 1970s. As a youth he became enamored with the possibilities of space exploration by reading the science fiction of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells, and from the science fact writings of Hermann Oberth, whose 1923 classic study, Die Rakete zu den Planetenräumen (By Rocket to Space), prompted young von Braun to master calculus and trigonometry so he could understand the physics of rocketry. From his teenage years, von Braun had held a keen interest in space flight, becoming involved in the German rocket society, Verein fur Raumschiffarht (VfR), as early as 1929. As a means of furthering his desire to build large and capable rockets, in 1932 he went to work for the German army to develop ballistic missiles. While engaged in this work, von Braun received a Ph.D. in physics on July 27, 1934.

 

Von Braun is well known as the leader of what has been called the “rocket team” which developed the V–2 ballistic missile for the Nazis during World War II. The V–2s were manufactured at a forced labor factory called Mittelwerk. Scholars are still reassessing his role in these controversial activities. Before the Allied capture of the V–2 rocket complex, von Braun engineered the surrender of 500 of his top rocket scientists, along with plans and test vehicles, to the Americans.

 

In 1960, his rocket development center near Huntsville, Alabama transferred from the Army to the newly established NASA and received a mandate to build the giant Saturn rockets. Accordingly, von Braun became director of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and the chief architect of the Saturn V launch vehicle, the superbooster that would propel Americans to the Moon.

 

Von Braun also became one of the most prominent spokesmen of space exploration in the United States during the 1950s. In 1970, NASA leadership asked von Braun to move to Washington, D.C., to head up the strategic planning effort for the agency. He left his home in Huntsville, Ala., but in 1972 he decided to retire from NASA and work for Fairchild Industries of Germantown, Md. He died in Alexandria, Va., on June 16, 1977. [Source: Marshall Space Flight Center at history.msfc.nasa.gov/vonbraun/bio.html]

 

Wilpena Pound.

For this northern latitude Wilpena Pound has good rainfall and a microclimate because of the surrounding hills. It was always a special place for Aboriginal people and a prized location for sheep pastoralists. At Cradock they average 250 mms annually, Hawker rises to 300 mm and Wilpena has 390 mms (15 inches in the old rainfall). Further north at Marree the average is just 136 mm a year. Wilpena Creek flows out of the Pound which covers 80 square kilometres (20,000 acres). It is 6 kms wide and 16 kms long and its highest surrounding peak is Mt Mary at 1,171 m or 3,842 feet. In 1840 Edward John Eyre and others explored parts of the Flinders Ranges but they did not discover Wilpena Pound. That was achieved by C Bagot in 1851. Bagot said in the press that there was only one ingress or egress to flat land with a permanent running creek suitable for depasturing 500 cattle. This plain was surrounded by steep rocky walls up to 1,000 feet high. The government responded by immediately sending Mr Burr of the Survey Office to the Pound for a trigonometrical survey in June 1851. Bagot gave it its Aboriginal name. The furthest north leasehold run in 1851 was at Kanyaka between Quorn and Hawker. The Wilpena run was also taken out in 1851 and originally covered 850 square miles but that was soon reduced into other leaseholds. Drs William and John Browne took over the Wilpena leasehold and by 1853 the pine slab homestead was built (demolished 1931) and shearing sheds and workers cottages soon followed. George Marchant got a 14 year lease of 85 square miles on 1 January 1855. In 1857 he employed a manager Charles Powell, whose father had planted the first mulberry tree at Kingscote in 1836, and he stayed at Wilpena station until 1882 but with various owners. By 1860 Dr William Browne held Wilpena run and he sold off the Arkaba section in 1863 before the big drought. By 1861 Henry Strong Price owned the leasehold which he tried to sell but could find no buyer. A report on Wilpena in 1865 says it covered 154 square miles and employed 19 married men and their wives, 24 single men and 41 children making a total of 101 people. Later in the 19th century Dr William Browne owned Wilpena again and the government resumed most of it in January 1880. Tourism came to Wilpena Pound in 1920 when the Wilpena Forest Reserve was created but the run was leased to graziers until 1945. At that time the Rasheed family established the chalet and all grazing in the Pound ceased. In 1970 the adjoining Orraparinna station was purchased by the government to create Flinders Ranges National Park. Finally in 1985 the government bought the leasehold to Wilpena station to add to the park. Its name was changed from Flinders National Park to Ikara Flinders National Park in 2016 thus incorporating, an Adnyamathanha word from the traditional land occupiers, into the title. The Adnyamathanha people and their sub clans have been in the area for around 15,000 years.

The Pound is a natural amphitheatre with Rawnsley Bluff at the southern end (he was the surveyor of runs in the 1850s). The Pound has a fascinating geomorphological structure. The landscape here was deeply folded with synclines and anticlines. Synclines are downward folds of earth layers with a trough at the bottom i.e. Wilpena Pound. Anticlines are the peaks of the layers but in the Flinders Ranges the anticlines have been eroded away over vast geological eras leaving rugged edges above the synclines or troughs. The trough of Wilpena Pound has a layer of quartzite, then other layers beneath that. The end of the anticline from the western side of the Pound is the Elder Range. The true shape of the formation reveals itself from the air.

 

Crack!

 

"Daddy, no!"

 

Leonard hit the ground hard. His cheek was set aflame, tiny droplets of red leaking from his lips. Lewis, his father, stood above him, his fist balled tightly.

 

"You shut the fuck up!" he yelled, his opposite hand pointing at Lisa, Leonard's sister. The girl sat crying, a fainter red mark on her cheek. "When I'm done with this little fucker, you're getting punished."

 

Leonard jolted up, ramming his small fist into his father's stomach. "Don't touch her!" he yelled, tears running down his swelling face. "If you do… I'll kill you!"

 

"Why you miserable…"

 

Crack. Crack. Crack.

 

Hours passed after Lewis' rampage. Leonard had suffered multiple injuries from the man; a black eye, a busted lip, and paintball-like bruises riddling his stomach. Lisa had taken far less of the attack, only receiving a small bruise on her cheek.

 

The girl was currently curled up next to him, her cheeks stained with tears. Leonard had calmed her down enough after the incident, singing her to sleep.

 

He couldn't sleep, however. His eyes needed to stay open at all times. He never knew if he'd need to be awake to save his sister from the maniac, so he kept awake, no matter how tired he truly was.

 

-^-

 

"I'm not playing around, Lisa," Lewis yelled, jolting up from the dinner table. "You're gonna go to that boy and apologize, you understand me? Whatever the hell he wants, he's gonna get!"

 

"He was forcing himself on me!" Lisa snapped back. "I wasn't going to sit there and… and let him…"

 

"You sent him to the emergency room cause clawed his damn eyes out, you stupid bitch!" he said, walking towards Lisa. "You're lucky he's not pressing charges, as long as you do what he wants!"

 

Lisa cowered as Lewis stood over her. She had grown up and learned some self defense from Leonard… but she was still a fourteen year old girl.

 

Smack.

 

Her body dropped to the floor, the mark of her father's ring now imprinted on her red cheek.

 

"Daddy, please…"

 

"You wanna be a tough girl?" he asked, undoing his belt and folding it into a weapon. "Let's see how tough you really are."

 

Lisa raised her arms to block the hit, but the sound of the door opening caused both to freeze.

 

"What the hell?"

 

Leonard stood in the doorway dressed in his work uniform. He was small for a sixteen year old, but his eyes were burning with anger.

 

"What the hell!?" he repeated, dropping the toolbox he was carrying.

 

"I-I-I-Its fine, Leo," Lisa said, forcing a smile. She could see the rage in her brother… a rage that wouldn't end well for him. "I-I-I'm fine."

 

"You're finally back," Lewis said, side-eyeing Lisa. "Find anywhere that'll be an easy enough run?"

 

"What are you doing to my sister!?" Leonard asked, walking towards the two. "Well!?"

 

"Don't try and act tough, Leo," Lewis said, turning his full attention to Leonard. "A fine, wealthy gentleman wanted to take your sister here somewhere nice. This bitch had the audacity to claw his damn eyes out!"

 

Leonard's head snapped to Lisa, a worried expression appearing on his face. "Blaine?" he asked, Lisa nodding her head lightly. "That son of a… I'm going to kill that sick bastard."

 

"The hell is wrong with you?" Lewis yelled, pointing the belt at Leonard. "That bastard's rich! Your sister passed up the opportunity of a lifetime!"

 

"He was trying to r-ra…" Lisa said, shuddering at the word.

 

"Put the damn belt down, now," Leonard said, Lisa shaking her head violently for him to stop.

 

"Oh, ho ho, Leo," Lewis chuckled. "I thought you'd finally gotten the lesson through your dense ass skull that you aren't shit."

 

"Try me."

 

Lewis charged forward, the belt ready to crash down against Leonard.

 

"Daddy, no!"

 

Bang!

 

Lisa's eyes widened, her hands shooting to her mouth.

 

Leonard stood firm, his right hand extended and holding a revolver. Lewis had stopped in his tracks, a trail of crimson running down from the center of his chest.

 

"L-L-Leo..." Lewis said, his voice trailing off as blood began to deep from the corners of his mouth.

 

"I told you…" Leonard started, staring at Lewis' body as it toppled over, "I'd kill you."

 

-^-

 

"There was a call reporting a gunshot from your home, Leonard," Detective Joe West said, sitting across from Leonard in the CCPD Interrogation Room. "Your father was dead when we got there, your sister with a bruised cheek, and you with a 357 in your hand. It isn't too hard to put together what happened."

 

"Congratulations, detective," Leonard said, clapping his hands, rattling the cuffs around his wrists, "you can do your jobs."

 

Joe's mouth curved into a frown. "I understand that… topics like these can be difficult to go about… especially with a stranger," he sighed, leaning forward in his chair, "but I want to make it clear, I'm going to do everything I can to help you. No child should have to go through what you have been.

 

"I was able to get your sister into a good home," Joe said, finally gaining Leonard's attention. "The charges pressed on her for attacking Travis Blaine weren't easy to work around, but she's in good hands."

 

"Who are they?" Leonard asked, sitting up fully in his chair. "What do they do? What neighborhood are th-"

 

"Hey, it's okay, relax," Joe said, placing a family photo on the table. "She'll be moved in with the Bivolo family. They're good people, they own a nice book store downtown. They even have a son her age."

 

Leonard's shoulders relaxed, leaning back in the seat. "That's… that's good," he said, eyes shifting down to the photo. "You'll make sure Blaine doesn't try anything?"

 

"I don't think he'd ever try anything again," Joe said, with a slight chuckle. "Not unless he's looking to be a pirate."

 

"Funny…" Leonard responded, a slight smile appearing on his face."Thank you, detective…"

  

"I wouldn't ever want one of my boys to go through what either of you are," Joe said, placing the photo back into the folder. "I'm gonna help you any way I can. I promise."

 

-^-

 

"Leonard Snart, meet your cellmate," the officer said, pushing the 16 year old forward. "Play nice… or don't."

 

As the cell door slammed behind him, Leonard watched as the person on the top bunk shifted, hopping down in a swift motion. The boy stood about 5 inches taller than Leonard, his mass much larger to go with it. He had short, nearly buzzed brown hair and light burn marks running along his exposed forearms.

 

"Names Michael, friends call me Mick," he said, eyeing Leonard down. "You look young to be in here."

 

"That's because I'm not supposed to be," Leonard responded, not intimidated by his cellmate's stature. "You look like you're pretty young yourself, Mick."

 

"Thought I said my friends call me that," Mick said, his eyes narrowing.

 

"Thought we'd be friends," Leonard responded, walking past Mick and sitting down onto the bottom bunk. "If not… well that would make the next couple years a lot more irritating."

 

Mick grunted, leaning back against the wall with his arms crossed. "So, what got you in here? Like I said, you look pretty damn young."

 

Leonard nodded, laying back on the hard bed. "You're right, I'm only sixteen," he confirmed, staring at the top bunk's underside. "Shot my old man… bastard had it coming, but murder's still murder."

 

"Hm, guess the justice system failed both of us then?" he responded, leaning his head back against the wall. "Got what the doctors call Pyromania, pretty insatiable. I tried to keep it in check, I'd make small campfire's when I could, just trying to watch the flames… wasn't ever enough."

 

"You end up burning something?" Leonard asked, turning his head to look at Mick. "Or someone?"

 

"Not intentionally…" Mick mumbled, his head hanging. "It's… fuzzy, I don't even remember what I did… I just remember sitting outside on my dad's truck bed… I remember how the fire fought the wood and danced with the air… until nothing but ash was left."

 

"You'd think Pyromania would get you sent to a psych ward, not Iron Heights. Guess you're right about the justice system," Leonard said, sitting up from the bed. "I take it your…"

 

"Seventeen… burning your family alive doesn't really sit too well with them, freak obsession or not," he said, sliding down the wall to sit on the floor. "Killing your dad… seems like something that could've been worked with though."

 

"It… was supposed to… there was a detective from the CCPD who was planning to help me through this, get me parole, even," Leonard explained. "I only learned this morning that his wife was murdered a week ago…"

 

"So the bastard left you high and dry?"

 

"I don't blame him," Leonard answered, looking at the small photo of him and his sister he held. "He mentioned he had kids… I commend him for putting those he cares about first in his life. I'd do the same. Every. Single. Time."

 

"Snart."

 

Leonard blinked, looking up from the glass, ball shaped object in his hand.

 

"Find anything useful?" Mick asked, leaning on the doorway of the backroom. "Colors and I found a couple pistols, but that's it."

 

"Actually," Leonard started, placing the glass object down and picking up a folder. "I think I have… the Weather Wizard."

 

"Mardon?" Mick asked, walking into the room and looking over Leonard's shoulder. "He didn't leave a backup of that stick, did he?"

 

"No… but these schematics he left are more than simple enough to read," Leonard said, flipping through the folder. "I can't rebuild the weather wand, I don't think Mardon had enough equipment for any backups… but I might be able to use these and create something just as good."

 

Mick snatched the folder, quickly flipping through the pages. "Simple to read…" he said, tossing the folder back to Leonard. "The first page is nothing but trigonometry. Need anything from me and Bivolo?"

 

"Actually… those guns you found might be useful."

 

"Got it."

 

Leonard looked back at the schematics, picking up a marker from the box and pulling the cap off with his mouth.

 

"Well then, let's get started."

 

Building Montage Song Link (because that's what would be the next section of this :P)

 

-^-

 

Roy stepped into the backroom that Leonard had been in for the past eight hours. Mick had gone in and out of the room throughout the day, but had been told to leave each time. Leonard had finished now, calling Mick and himself into the room.

 

"So… you made firearms?" Roy asked, looking at the two weapons on the workbench. "I think you may have… miscounted how many of us there are."

 

"Not exactly," Leonard said, picking up the smaller weapon, handing it to Mick. "Try it out."

 

Mick looked at the weapon in his hand, then to the makeshift dummy across the room. "What's the canister for?"

 

"Just shoot the gun, Mick."

 

Mick narrowed his eyes, pointing the gun towards the target. As he pulled the trigger, a funnel of flames fired from the weapon's muzzle. Mick's narrowed eyes widened, his finger leaving the trigger, watching as the dummy was set ablaze.

 

Roy stared in awe, not noticing Leonard pick up the other gun, firing a blue beam at the dummy, freezing it solid. "That's… an ice ray? And a pocket flamethrower?" Roy asked, looking between the two weapons.

 

"Mardon's schematics are brilliant," Leonard said, taking the flamethrower from Mick and placing both weapons back on the bench. "It wasn't easy, but I was able to convert his temperature technology into a cold gun and a flamethrower."

 

"Leonard, that's incredible!" Roy exclaimed, a frown stretching across his face quickly after his praise. "Your creativity is astonishing… but, what about me?"

 

Leonard smirked, walking around the room to a few stands with black cloth strung over them. "These weapons obviously play with temperature, luckily," he began, pulling off the sheets, "Mardon created a suit for himself to withstand said temperatures. He left behind the materials he used, so I did a little sewing."

 

Mick walked up to the all black suit with neon highlights, his eyes narrowing at the design. "You want me dressing up like a firefighter?"

 

"The bases he used for his costume seemed to be bunker suits," Leonard explained, walking over to the baby blue suit. "figured the aesthetic worked well enough for you, Mick."

 

"So you care about aesthetics now?"

 

"Times are changing, Mick. In a city with people like The Flash and Weather Wizard, a trio of bank robbers won't cut it." Leonard grabbed the flamethrower once more, handing it to Mick. "So it's up to you; you want the suit and flamethrower, Heatwave?"

 

Mick smirked, taking the gun from Leonard's hand.

 

"Leonard, what. About. Me," Roy said, standing with his arms crossed and staring at the exchange the two had.

 

"Don't worry, Roy," Leonard reassured, pulling off the final sheet. Roy tilted his head, staring at the onesie on display. "You'll be using those special powers."

 

"What?" He asked, stepping back. "Leonard, I'd advise you not to make jokes like that."

 

"There weren't enough parts here to make a third gun, so it was tough," he began, taking off a black gauntlet from the suit, "but the temperature and weather schematics were able to help me make these. Conductors that can filter your powers, all while surviving the heat of lightning, force of windstorms, and the cold of blizzards."

 

Roy opened his mouth, but was too shocked to speak. His eyes locked onto the gauntlet as he exhaled loudly. "A-are you sure?"

 

"Am I ever not?"

 

"Okay… but what now?" Mick said, flicking his helmet's visor up and down. "What's the plan, Snart?"

 

Leonard smiled, picking up his cold gun and firing it at the dummy once more. "Now? We end the Flash."

 

NEXT TIME: A New Year's Eve Brawl, Flash vs The Rogues!

Domes underlying structure is going to consist of 32 rafters layouted around circle's circumference at 11.25 degrees. Single rafter has 4 segments angled at 22.5 degrees each. This will allow to use 16 of the them to connect the roof panels/tiles and the rest to connect trims that will hide any panels' irregularities. Overall it took me several days and some trigonometry fun to figure this out but it seems legit without any stresses or bending.

Kapstadt - Tafelberg

 

seen from Victoria & Alfred Waterfront

 

gesehen von der Victoria & Alfred Waterfront

 

Table Mountain (Khoikhoi: Hoerikwaggo, Afrikaans: Tafelberg) is a flat-topped mountain forming a prominent landmark overlooking the city of Cape Town in South Africa, and is featured in the Flag of Cape Town and other local government insignia It is a significant tourist attraction, with many visitors using the cableway or hiking to the top. The mountain forms part of the Table Mountain National Park.

 

The main feature of Table Mountain is the level plateau approximately 3 kilometres (2 mi) from side to side, edged by impressive cliffs. The plateau, flanked by Devil's Peak to the east and by Lion's Head to the west, forms a dramatic backdrop to Cape Town. This broad sweep of mountainous heights, together with Signal Hill, forms the natural amphitheatre of the City Bowl and Table Bay harbour. The highest point on Table Mountain is towards the eastern end of the plateau and is marked by Maclear's Beacon, a stone cairn built in 1865 by Sir Thomas Maclear for trigonometrical survey. It is 1,086 metres (3,563 ft) above sea level, about 19 metres (62 ft) higher than the cable station at the western end of the plateau.

 

The cliffs of the main plateau are split by Platteklip Gorge ("Flat Stone Gorge"), which provides an easy and direct ascent to the summit and was the route taken by António de Saldanha on the first recorded ascent of the mountain in 1503.

 

The flat top of the mountain is often covered by orographic clouds, formed when a south-easterly wind is directed up the mountain's slopes into colder air, where the moisture condenses to form the so-called "table cloth" of cloud. Legend attributes this phenomenon to a smoking contest between the Devil and a local pirate called Van Hunks. When the table cloth is seen, it symbolizes the contest.

 

Table Mountain is at the northern end of a sandstone mountain range that forms the spine of the Cape Peninsula. To the south of the main plateau is a lower part of the range called the Back Table. On the Atlantic coast of the peninsula, the range is known as the Twelve Apostles. The range continues southwards to Cape Point.

 

(Wikipedia)

 

The Victoria & Alfred (V&A) Waterfront in Cape Town is situated on the Atlantic shore, Table Bay Harbour, the City of Cape Town and Table Mountain. Adrian van der Vyver designed the complex.

 

Situated in South Africa’s oldest working harbor, the 123 hectares (300 acres) area has been developed for mixed-use, with both residential and commercial real estate.

 

The Waterfront attracts more than 23 million visitors a year.

 

Prince Alfred, second son of Queen Victoria, visited the Cape Colony harbour in 1860 as a sixteen-year-old Royal Navy Midshipman on HMS Euryalus. He made a big splash with the colonials on this first-ever visit by a member of the Royal Family. The first basin of the new Navy Yard was named after him and the second after his mother.

 

The complex houses over 450 retail outlets, including fashion, homeware and curios, to jewelry, leather goods and audio-visual equipment. The V&A Waterfront is also still a working harbour and fishing boats bring in fresh fish, and larger container ships are towed in by tugboats.

 

The Waterfront has seen development in its new Silo district, which currently houses the new headquarters of Allan Gray Investment Management at Silo 1 and apartments at Silo 2. The project was completed in 2017 with the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa, a Virgin Active gym and a hotel in the works.

 

Features in the waterfront:

 

Chavonnes Battery

Nelson Mandela Gateway to Robben Island

Nobel Square

Two Oceans Aquarium

Breakwater Lodge (University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business)

Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa

 

(Wikipedia)

 

Der Tafelberg (englisch: Table Mountain) im südafrikanischen Kapstadt liegt im nördlichen Teil einer Bergkette auf der circa 52 km langen und bis zu 16 km breiten Kap-Halbinsel, an deren Südende sich das Kap der Guten Hoffnung befindet. Er prägt die Silhouette Kapstadts. Der höchste Punkt des Tafelberges ist Maclear’s Beacon (Maclears Signalfeuer) am nordöstlichen Ende des Felsplateaus mit 1087 m. Der Tafelberg umfasst eine Gesamtfläche von rund 6500 Hektar.

 

(Wikipedia)

 

Die Victoria & Alfred Waterfront (kurz: V&A Waterfront) ist eine Waterfront, bestehend aus einem restaurierten Werft- und Hafenviertel rund um die beiden historischen Becken des Hafens von Kapstadt in Südafrika.

 

Die beiden Becken in der Tafelbucht des Atlantischen Ozeans wurden 1870 und 1905 in Betrieb genommen und erhielten ihre Namen zu Ehren der britischen Königin Victoria und ihres zweiten Sohnes, Prinz Alfred, der anlässlich einer Reise durch die britischen Kolonien 1860 den Grundstein für die über einen Kilometer lange Wellenbrecher-Mauer vor den Hafenbecken gelegt hatte.

 

1990 lagen nach einem weitgehenden Boykott des Hafens während der Zeit der Apartheid weite Hafenbezirke brach. In Zusammenarbeit mit örtlichen Investoren begann die Stadtverwaltung, eine neue Infrastruktur zu erstellen. In kurzer Zeit wurden die alten Gebäude restauriert und nahmen ein Einkaufszentrum, kleine Museen und Raritätenläden, eine Brauerei und zahlreiche gastronomische Einrichtungen in sich auf. Darüber hinaus wurden stilistisch angepasste Hotels, exklusive Appartement- und Bürohäuser neu errichtet sowie große Parkplätze, ein Yachthafen und ein kleines Amphitheater angelegt. Schon 1995 gab es mehr als 15 Millionen Besucher aus aller Welt. Im Dezember 2003 wurde der Nobel Square mit Skulpturen der vier südafrikanischen Friedensnobelpreisträger eingeweiht.

 

Mitte 2006 entschieden sich die Inhaber der Waterfront, Transnet und die unternehmenseigenen Altersvorsorgefonds, zu verkaufen. Ein Konsortium aus verschiedenen Unternehmen, mit Hauptanteilseigner aus Dubai, kauften sie für 7,04 Milliarden Rand (rund 700 Millionen Euro zur Zeit des Verkaufs). Insgesamt hatten sich neun Bewerber für den Kauf qualifiziert, es wurde aber zu Gunsten des L&R (London & Regional) Consortiums entschieden, da seine Anteilseigner bereits Erfahrungen mit ähnlichen Projekten wie dem The Palm, The World und der Dubai Waterfront in Dubai hatten.

 

Da in Südafrika das Black Economic Empowerment bei jeder Übernahme beachtet werden muss, wurde bei der Zusammensetzung des Eigentümerkonsortiums auf die Mitgliedschaft schwarzer Personen und Unternehmen in schwarzer Hand gesetzt. Insgesamt stellt es sich wie folgt zusammen: Istithmar PJSC, ein internationales Immobilienunternehmen, London & Regional Group Holdings, und 23,1 Prozent gehen an schwarze Eigentümer und weitere zwei Prozent kommen den schwarzen Angestellten der Waterfront zugute.

 

Im Land wurde der Verkauf kritisiert, da die Waterfront als die Prestigeimmobilie Südafrikas gilt und an ausländische Investoren verkauft wurde.

 

Nach weniger als fünf Jahren wurde sie am 14. Februar 2011 wiederum verkauft. Sie ging für 9,7 Milliarden Rand (rund 980 Millionen Euro zur Zeit des Verkaufs) zu gleichen Teilen an die südafrikanische Investmentgesellschaft Growthpoint und die staatliche Pensionsgesellschaft Public Investment Corporation (PIC) über.

 

2014 begann die Umgestaltung eines Silogebäudes, das am 22. September 2017 als Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa eröffnet wurde.

 

Es gibt vielfältige Freizeit- und Unterhaltungsmöglichkeiten in einer Atmosphäre zwischen Straßenmusikanten, Laienschauspielern, Segelyachten, ein- und auslaufenden Ausflugs- und Fischerbooten sowie Frachtschiffen in dem weiterhin betriebenen Seehafen, in dem auch Werftarbeiten ausgeführt werden. Zu den Angeboten zählt das Two Oceans Aquarium. Es werden Helikopter-Rundflüge über die Stadt und über die Kap-Halbinsel angeboten.

 

(Wikipedia)

Cross polarisation using a laptop screen as a polarised light source. I couldn't resist the title!

Morton campus Richard Rose Academy, Carlisle, 13th September 2014. FED 50 with expired Truprint FG+ 200 (36exp) shot at box speed. Lab C41 processed and scanned

Wilpena Pound.

For this northern latitude Wilpena Pound has good rainfall and a microclimate because of the surrounding hills. It was always a special place for Aboriginal people and a prized location for sheep pastoralists. At Cradock they average 250 mms annually, Hawker rises to 300 mm and Wilpena has 390 mms (15 inches in the old rainfall). Further north at Marree the average is just 136 mm a year. Wilpena Creek flows out of the Pound which covers 80 square kilometres (20,000 acres). It is 6 kms wide and 16 kms long and its highest surrounding peak is Mt Mary at 1,171 m or 3,842 feet. In 1840 Edward John Eyre and others explored parts of the Flinders Ranges but they did not discover Wilpena Pound. That was achieved by C Bagot in 1851. Bagot said in the press that there was only one ingress or egress to flat land with a permanent running creek suitable for depasturing 500 cattle. This plain was surrounded by steep rocky walls up to 1,000 feet high. The government responded by immediately sending Mr Burr of the Survey Office to the Pound for a trigonometrical survey in June 1851. Bagot gave it its Aboriginal name. The furthest north leasehold run in 1851 was at Kanyaka between Quorn and Hawker. The Wilpena run was also taken out in 1851 and originally covered 850 square miles but that was soon reduced into other leaseholds. Drs William and John Browne took over the Wilpena leasehold and by 1853 the pine slab homestead was built (demolished 1931) and shearing sheds and workers cottages soon followed. George Marchant got a 14 year lease of 85 square miles on 1 January 1855. In 1857 he employed a manager Charles Powell, whose father had planted the first mulberry tree at Kingscote in 1836, and he stayed at Wilpena station until 1882 but with various owners. By 1860 Dr William Browne held Wilpena run and he sold off the Arkaba section in 1863 before the big drought. By 1861 Henry Strong Price owned the leasehold which he tried to sell but could find no buyer. A report on Wilpena in 1865 says it covered 154 square miles and employed 19 married men and their wives, 24 single men and 41 children making a total of 101 people. Later in the 19th century Dr William Browne owned Wilpena again and the government resumed most of it in January 1880. Tourism came to Wilpena Pound in 1920 when the Wilpena Forest Reserve was created but the run was leased to graziers until 1945. At that time the Rasheed family established the chalet and all grazing in the Pound ceased. In 1970 the adjoining Orraparinna station was purchased by the government to create Flinders Ranges National Park. Finally in 1985 the government bought the leasehold to Wilpena station to add to the park. Its name was changed from Flinders National Park to Ikara Flinders National Park in 2016 thus incorporating, an Adnyamathanha word from the traditional land occupiers, into the title. The Adnyamathanha people and their sub clans have been in the area for around 15,000 years.

The Pound is a natural amphitheatre with Rawnsley Bluff at the southern end (he was the surveyor of runs in the 1850s). The Pound has a fascinating geomorphological structure. The landscape here was deeply folded with synclines and anticlines. Synclines are downward folds of earth layers with a trough at the bottom i.e. Wilpena Pound. Anticlines are the peaks of the layers but in the Flinders Ranges the anticlines have been eroded away over vast geological eras leaving rugged edges above the synclines or troughs. The trough of Wilpena Pound has a layer of quartzite, then other layers beneath that. The end of the anticline from the western side of the Pound is the Elder Range. The true shape of the formation reveals itself from the air.

 

The oldest convict-built structure surviving in Queensland, the windmill tower has accommodated a range of uses. Constructed in 1828 to process the wheat and corn crops of the Moreton Bay penal settlement, it had a treadmill attached for times when there was no wind but also as a tool for punishing convicts. The mill ceased grinding grain in 1845 and the treadmill was removed sometime before 1849. From 1855 the tower was reused as a signal station to communicate shipping news between the entrance of the Brisbane River and the town. Substantial renovations were made to it in 1861 including the installation of a time ball to assist in regulating clocks and watches. Twenty years later a cottage for the signalman was constructed to the immediate west of the tower, with a detached kitchen erected to the south two years after that. Both were later demolished. The windmill tower was used as a facility for early radio, telephony and television communications research from the 1920s and underwent substantial conservation work in the 1980s and 2009.

 

In May 1825, after eight months of occupation at Redcliffe, the contingent of convicts, soldiers, administrators and their families comprising the Moreton Bay penal settlement relocated to the site of present-day Brisbane's central business district. The growing settlement was to be self-sufficient in feeding its residents by cultivating corn (also known as maize) and wheat crops at the government farm, which were then processed into meal and flour by hand mills.[1] By 1827, with a substantial crop to process, the settlement storekeeper recommended a treadmill be erected to grind the crop into flour. Commandant Logan indicated at this time that such a devise at Brisbane town would be of service and also provide an avenue for the punishment of convicts.[2]

 

There is little evidence confirming details of the windmill tower's planning and construction. In July 1828, Peter Beauclerk Spicer, the Superintendent of Convicts at the time, recorded in his diary that convicts were 'clearing ground for foundations for the Mill' and proceeded to dig a circular trench that reached bedrock and had a circumference of approximately 9 metres.[3] Allan Cunningham noted soon after that construction was in progress. The mill was constructed on the highest point overlooking the settlement on what is now Wickham Terrace. By 31 October 1828 the first grain was being ground at the site by a mill gang; however it is supposed that this was done by a treadmill as the rotating cap and sails associated with the wind-powered operation of the mill were not brought to the site until November.[4] Circumstantial evidence suggests that the wind-powered grinding of grain did not begin until December.

 

There were two pairs of millstones inside the tower, each driven independently by the treadmill and sail mechanisms. The former was located outside the tower, a shaft connecting the treadwheel and the mill cogwheels inside. Two sketches from the early 1830s show the windmill tower and its sail stocks in place,[5] while an 1839 description depicts a tower built from stone and brick, comprising four floors, a treadmill and windmill. From 1829 the windmill tower was said to be continually requiring repair, possibly because its equipment was all made from locally-available timber rather than iron[6].

 

The treadmill was an important component of the mill, for use as punishment without trial, and for times when there was no wind but the amounts of grain sufficient to sustain the settlement still required processing. No plans exist of the Brisbane treadmill, however, the Office of the Colonial Architect produced a standard Design for Tread Mill Adapted for Country Districts Average Estimate £120.[7] Between 25 and 30 men worked at the mill at any one time. Sixteen operated the treadmill, although as there are no plans, it is uncertain whether it comprised a standard 16-place treadmill, or two 8-place sections connected to a common shaft. Each man would climb five steps to get onto the wheel, standing on the 9 inch wide treads and holding on to the rail. The men would then work as though ascending steps to operate the treadmill. Some undertook this task while in leg irons, while the more able used one hand to hold on and the other to draw sketches of people, animals and scenes on the boards of the mill. The men would work from sunrise to sunset with three hours rest in the middle of the day in summer, and two hours in winter.[8] [9] The first casualty of the treadmill, which produced the first official record of its existence, occurred in September 1829 when prisoner Michael Collins lost his life after being entangled in the operating mechanism. Maps of 1840s Brisbane feature a rectangular structure attached to the outside of the tower, Robert Dixon's in particular showing a 6 x 5 metre structure, probably the treadmill, located on ground that was to become Wickham Terrace.

 

In July 1841 the Brisbane tower was reputedly the site of a public execution of two Aboriginal men who had been convicted in Sydney of the murder of Assistant Surveyor Stapylton and one of his party near Mount Lindsay. They were returned to Moreton Bay and hanged with about 100 Aboriginal people present, however it may be that the execution took place elsewhere on what was known as Windmill Hill.[10]

 

Indicative of the prominence of its physical position, the tower served as one of the stations for the trigonometrical survey of the Moreton Bay district conducted by Robert Dixon, Granville Stapylton and James Warner from May 1839 in preparation for the area being opened to free settlement.[11]

 

In February 1836 the windmill tower was struck by lightning, causing severe damage throughout, including to the treadmill. A convict millwright was brought from Sydney in June for the repairs, which amounted to a major rebuild of the structure that was not completed until May 1837.[12] In April 1839, with the closure of the Moreton Bay penal settlement being planned, the windmill tower was one of the buildings recommended for transfer to the colony. This was approved in 1840-41 but it continued to sporadically process grain until 1845, when due to crop failure, a stagnant population and the availability of imported flour, it finally ceased being used. The penal settlement had officially closed in February 1842. The treadmill operated until 1845 and had been removed by October 1849[13].

 

The windmill tower in Brisbane is the oldest of its type left standing in Australia and further distinguished by having been built by convict labour. The earliest standing stone windmill towers extant around the country date from the 1830s and include: one built in 1837 in South Perth, Western Australia[14]; another built in the same year at Oatlands in Tasmania which operated until 1890[15]; and another built at Mount Gilead near Campbelltown in New South Wales in 1836[16]. Most were built to process grains into flour. Other surviving mill towers are the one built in 1842 by FR Nixon at Mount Barker in South Australia; Chapman's mill built around 1850 at Wonnerup in Western Australia[17], and another built at a similar time on an island in the Murray River near Yunderup in Western Australia[18]. None of the nineteen windmill towers that characterised the early settlement at Sydney have survived.[19] Technological developments, most particularly steam power which was more dependable than wind power or that generated by convict labour at a treadmill, rendered wind-driven mills largely redundant.

 

After the cessation of milling operations there were discussions about possible future use of Brisbane's windmill tower. In December 1849 the tower was put up for auction and bought by a government official who promptly sought tenders for removal of it and its machinery (the auction terms required it to be cleared away by three months after the sale).[20] Ownership of the place quickly reverted to the Crown because of a legal problem with the sale, but not before some dismantling had occurred.[21] In a January 1850 article the Moreton Bay Courier continued its appeal for the windmill not to be pulled down and secured by the town, arguing that aside from its landmark and picturesque qualities it was the ‘best fixed point for land measurement in the district'. In this vein the site was the most accessible viewing point for the picturesque landscape of Brisbane and its environs. Despite earlier calls to erase evidence of Brisbane's convict past, 'sentiment and pragmatism combined to override the detrimental taint of convictism' saving the tower from destruction. The sails were still in place in 1854 and appear in a painting of the windmill completed in 1855.[22]

 

By 1855 Brisbane was the leading Queensland port and it became important to establish signal stations to communicate shipping news between the entrance of the Brisbane River and the town, one of which was set up on Windmill Hill. This required modifications to the tower to include a semaphore station connected to the electric telegraph. Information on ships entering the river was converted to semaphore signals using flags hoisted on a mast erected on top of the tower. The renovations were undertaken by John Petrie in October 1861 to plans by colonial architect Charles Tiffin and included the removal of the windmill stocks or arms and wheels; the laying of floors on each storey; new doors and windows; a weatherproof floor on the top of the tower with an iron railing; a new winding staircase from bottom to top; repair of stone, brickwork and plastering; and the installation of a high flagstaff to fly signals.[23] The tower's renovation at this time also fitted it out as a public observatory and it became known by that term.[24] The following year it became the first home of the newly founded Queensland Museum; serving this purpose until 1868 when other accommodation was provided in the old convict barracks or parliamentary building on Queen Street.[25]

 

Petrie also installed a time ball on the tower to provide a reliable authority for regulating clocks and watches. It was dropped at one o'clock each day based on observations relayed by telegraph from Sydney. The time ball was replaced by a time gun in 1866, with an embankment and shed constructed to hold the gun in 1874. After 1882 the gun and shed were moved to the eastern section of the current reserve before the shed was demolished in 1908. The time gun proved useful to people as far away as Logan, Caboolture and Ipswich. The old gun was replaced in 1888 with another before a new electrically-controlled time ball was installed in 1894. This was associated with the legislated implementation of a single time throughout the colony, being designated as ten hours earlier than the mean time at Greenwich. Adjustments were made to the tower at this time to accommodate the new time ball. The roof was lowered and the flagstaff pared down.[26]

 

A cottage for the signalman was constructed in 1883 to the immediate west of the tower to plans prepared by Government Architect FDG Stanley and on part of the Waterworks reserve. Two years later a detached kitchen was also constructed behind it to the south of the tower. Use of the signal station was discontinued in 1921 by the state government, which then sought a new use for the structure and land. [27] Despite this the flagstaff remained in place until 1949. From January 1893 the Fire Brigade implemented a nightly observation post from a specially-constructed platform on top of the tower. This was used until around 1922.

 

The Commonwealth government assumed responsibility for the site in 1901 but control reverted to the state in 1908 when it was designated as an Observatory Reserve. In 1902 it had been connected to the Railway Telegraph Office at Roma Street so that the railways had the correct time for their operations. The evidence of historical photographs suggests that sometime between 1902 and 1912 the cabin at the top was increased in size.[28] The time ball remained in operation until 1930.

 

The site was placed under the trusteeship of the Brisbane City Council in 1922. The site of the cottage remained in the hands of the Waterworks Board and a boundary re-arrangement had to occur to allow its continued use in relation to the observatory. At this time the Queensland Institute of Radio Engineers began wireless radio and telephony research at the tower, and used the signalman's cottage to meet two nights a month. Apparatus to operate a wireless radio station was installed in 1926. The cottage was occupied on a more regular basis in order to reduce the risk of vandalism to the tower, but fell vacant. In 1926 the City Architect, AH Foster, proposed a plan for beautifying the observatory, which included removal of the cottage and adjacent sheds. The tender of Messrs Guyomar and Wright to remove the cottage, shed and outhouse for £60 was accepted.[29] At this time the stone and wrought iron wall along Wickham Terrace was erected. It was intended to add 'dignity to the historical reserve, and harmonise with the massive character of the Tower'.[30]

 

From 1924 Thomas Elliott installed equipment in the tower to undertake cutting-edge television research; he and Allen Campbell giving a demonstration from the site in 1934 which constituted Queensland's first television broadcast. It was considered by many at the time as the most outstanding achievement thus far in the history of television in Australia. They gained a license from the government and continued experimental broadcasting from the tower until about 1944.[31]

 

From 1945 the Brisbane City Council was considering suitable action to preserve the tower, which had become a popular visitor attraction. Some restoration work was carried out in 1950 on the advice of Frank Costello (then Officer in Charge of Planning and Building with the City Council), which included removal of old render and re-rendering the entire structure. It was at this time that the flagstaff was removed in preparation for making the open ground of the reserve 'a real park'. Certainly these conservation efforts considered the heritage value of the place as well as the public's use of it.

 

However by 1962 the windmill tower was again in poor condition. Floodlighting to enhance its appearance for tourists was undertaken for the first time during the Warana Festival five years later. In the early 1970s the Council and the National Trust of Queensland undertook detailed investigations regarding restoration and transfer of trusteeship from the council to the trust (the latter were abandoned in 1976). None of the original plans or any of the original windmill machinery parts could be located at that time. Based on these findings the National Trust formed the opinion that the building should be preserved in its present form and not reconstructed to its windmill form.

 

In 1982 City Council undertook some external maintenance work on the observation house or cabin, including replacement of deteriorated timber to the balcony and sills, and corrugated iron on the roof, and repair of the time ball and its mast (which was shortened by about 300 mm to remove some part affected by dry rot).[32]

 

In 1987 a consortium of companies involved in the construction of the Central Plaza office building offered to assist the Brisbane City Council with the conservation of the Windmill Tower. To inform this work a conservation study was undertaken by Allom Lovell Marquis-Kyle Architects, which also oversaw conservation work[33]. Preliminary archaeological investigations undertaken at this time identified the remains of the original flagstaff base which was reinstated.[34] The conserved Windmill Tower was opened by the Lord Mayor of Brisbane on 3 November 1988. A further archaeological investigation was carried out at the site in 1989-90 by a University of Queensland team, revealing clear stratigraphic layers datable to each of the key phases of use of the site.[35] In August 1993 further investigations of the fabric of the tower were undertaken to explore the extent of the footings and the nature of construction of the curb and cap frame. More conservation work was carried out in May 1996.

 

In 2009 the Brisbane City Council received considerable funding to carry out restoration work of the windmill tower through the State Government's Q150 Connecting Brisbane project. It was intended that the structure be publically accessible to allow visitors to experience the view from its observation platform, a practice that has been commented on since the 1860s. In 2008 - 2009 the Brisbane CBD Archaeological Plan assessed the area of the observatory reserve and a length of Wickham Terrace associated with it as having exceptional archaeological research potential because of the combination of its association with the penal settlement and the low level of ground disturbance that has occurred there since.

 

Source: Queensland Heritage Register.

Table Mountain is a flat-topped mountain forming a prominent landmark overlooking the city of Cape Town in South Africa, and is featured in the Flag of Cape Town and other local government insignia.It is a significant tourist attraction, with many visitors using the cableway or hiking to the top. The mountain forms part of the Table Mountain National Park.

 

The main feature of Table Mountain is the level plateau approximately 3 kilometres (2 mi) from side to side, edged by impressive cliffs. The plateau, flanked by Devil's Peak to the east and by Lion's Head to the west, forms a dramatic backdrop to Cape Town. This broad sweep of mountainous heights, together with Signal Hill, forms the natural amphitheatre of the City Bowl and Table Bay harbour. The highest point on Table Mountain is towards the eastern end of the plateau and is marked by Maclear's Beacon, a stone cairn built in 1865 by Sir Thomas Maclear for trigonometrical survey. It is 1,086 metres (3,563 ft) above sea level, about 19 metres (62 ft) higher than the cable station at the western end of the plateau.

 

The cliffs of the main plateau are split by Platteklip Gorge ("Flat Stone Gorge"), which provides an easy and direct ascent to the summit and was the route taken by António de Saldanha on the first recorded ascent of the mountain in 1503.

 

The flat top of the mountain is often covered by orographic clouds, formed when a south-easterly wind is directed up the mountain's slopes into colder air, where the moisture condenses to form the so-called "table cloth" of cloud. Legend attributes this phenomenon to a smoking contest between the Devil and a local pirate called Van Hunks.When the table cloth is seen, it symbolizes the contest.

 

Table Mountain is at the northern end of a sandstone mountain range that forms the spine of the Cape Peninsula. To the south of the main plateau is a lower part of the range called the Back Table. On the Atlantic coast of the peninsula, the range is known as the Twelve Apostles. The range continues southwards to Cape Point.

First things first. I'm NOT bragging that this image is a perfect 10. I'm celebrating the fact that it took ten times to the altar to come away with the bride (the moon) standing behind the groom (the Pigeon Point Lighthouse). Mind you they are actually separated by a boatload of atmosphere and 238,857 miles - part of the reason they don't get together very often.

 

The other reason is that the moon is cranky. It goes through monthly cycles, is tilted 5 degrees off kilter and is eccentric to boot. All things you must know to get them together respectfully.

 

There is a bit of science, a bit of trigonometry, and for this particular location a healthy bit of meteorological luck required for everything to come together.

 

My 9 prior attempts over the last 3.5 years were litterally fogged, clouded, and rained out. But not this time!

 

I've been teaching a Webinar on how to get this marriage.

 

I blush when I read what people write about the webinar - and they come from all over. Texas, New Hampshire, California, Virginia, Maryland, Washington...

 

"Steven is very knowledgeable about the subject and presented the material in a manner that was easy to follow and understand."

 

"Steven provided us with a wealth of information to get us to start crunching numbers to figure out the best date, time, and place to catch the moon to take interesting photos as well as tips and techniques to use to capture them. He was quite engaging and provided us with more than a handful of tools to get us started. For all the wonderful nitty gritty details, I recommend that you check out one of his webinars"

 

"If you want to understand more about photographing the moon, this IS the meet-up to attend. I've shot the moon before but this will help eliminate a lot of the "just got lucky" shots. "

 

"The Web Seminar was awesome. The seminar is well structured with lots of examples. We got lots of good and detailed information from the speaker. Steven was very clear, patient and funny during the lecture. He is very knowledgeable and I am glad he is willing to share his notes with us. Thank you Steven"

 

About this shot It is a SINGLE shot. Minimal processing (straighten, sharpen, frame). I didn't even attempt to correct the chromatic aberration around the moon.

 

© Copyright 2012, Steven Christenson

StarCircleAcademy.com

 

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All rights reserved. Curious what "all rights reserved means?" it means that without written permission you may not: copy, transmit, modify, use, print or display this image in any context other than as it appears in Flickr.

Wilpena Pound.

For this northern latitude Wilpena Pound has good rainfall and a microclimate because of the surrounding hills. It was always a special place for Aboriginal people and a prized location for sheep pastoralists. At Cradock they average 250 mms annually, Hawker rises to 300 mm and Wilpena has 390 mms (15 inches in the old rainfall). Further north at Marree the average is just 136 mm a year. Wilpena Creek flows out of the Pound which covers 80 square kilometres (20,000 acres). It is 6 kms wide and 16 kms long and its highest surrounding peak is Mt Mary at 1,171 m or 3,842 feet. In 1840 Edward John Eyre and others explored parts of the Flinders Ranges but they did not discover Wilpena Pound. That was achieved by C Bagot in 1851. Bagot said in the press that there was only one ingress or egress to flat land with a permanent running creek suitable for depasturing 500 cattle. This plain was surrounded by steep rocky walls up to 1,000 feet high. The government responded by immediately sending Mr Burr of the Survey Office to the Pound for a trigonometrical survey in June 1851. Bagot gave it its Aboriginal name. The furthest north leasehold run in 1851 was at Kanyaka between Quorn and Hawker. The Wilpena run was also taken out in 1851 and originally covered 850 square miles but that was soon reduced into other leaseholds. Drs William and John Browne took over the Wilpena leasehold and by 1853 the pine slab homestead was built (demolished 1931) and shearing sheds and workers cottages soon followed. George Marchant got a 14 year lease of 85 square miles on 1 January 1855. In 1857 he employed a manager Charles Powell, whose father had planted the first mulberry tree at Kingscote in 1836, and he stayed at Wilpena station until 1882 but with various owners. By 1860 Dr William Browne held Wilpena run and he sold off the Arkaba section in 1863 before the big drought. By 1861 Henry Strong Price owned the leasehold which he tried to sell but could find no buyer. A report on Wilpena in 1865 says it covered 154 square miles and employed 19 married men and their wives, 24 single men and 41 children making a total of 101 people. Later in the 19th century Dr William Browne owned Wilpena again and the government resumed most of it in January 1880. Tourism came to Wilpena Pound in 1920 when the Wilpena Forest Reserve was created but the run was leased to graziers until 1945. At that time the Rasheed family established the chalet and all grazing in the Pound ceased. In 1970 the adjoining Orraparinna station was purchased by the government to create Flinders Ranges National Park. Finally in 1985 the government bought the leasehold to Wilpena station to add to the park. Its name was changed from Flinders National Park to Ikara Flinders National Park in 2016 thus incorporating, an Adnyamathanha word from the traditional land occupiers, into the title. The Adnyamathanha people and their sub clans have been in the area for around 15,000 years.

The Pound is a natural amphitheatre with Rawnsley Bluff at the southern end (he was the surveyor of runs in the 1850s). The Pound has a fascinating geomorphological structure. The landscape here was deeply folded with synclines and anticlines. Synclines are downward folds of earth layers with a trough at the bottom i.e. Wilpena Pound. Anticlines are the peaks of the layers but in the Flinders Ranges the anticlines have been eroded away over vast geological eras leaving rugged edges above the synclines or troughs. The trough of Wilpena Pound has a layer of quartzite, then other layers beneath that. The end of the anticline from the western side of the Pound is the Elder Range. The true shape of the formation reveals itself from the air.

 

Playing with Sine and Cosine functions.

Shot with a point n shoot back in 2008

  

The name K2 is derived from the notation used by the Great Trigonometric Survey. Thomas Montgomerie made the first survey of the Karakoram from Mount Haramukh, some 210 km (130 miles) to the south, and sketched the two most prominent peaks, labelling them K1 and K2.

 

The policy of the Great Trigonometric Survey was to use local names for mountains wherever possible and K1 was found to be known locally as Masherbrum. K2, however, appeared not to have acquired a local name, possibly due to its remoteness.

 

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plus three in comments.

 

thank you so so much abbi for such a sweet testimonial. thank you so much girl, i love you!

 

my first half decent picture of fireworks :'D

 

hey guys! how are you all?

so yes ive been gone for 4 weeks straight without a warning..

im so sorry. D:

 

so

so

so

so

oh

so

sorry.

 

take me back? :3

 

i miss you all so much and i miss everyone and everything on here. aahh such a world of inspiration this website is.

 

i love you all.

 

just an update on anything and everything-

-marching season ended last week, which basically also meant my life in school ended. haha jk. but seriously..

 

-our marching band competition was great :D we got like 40th out of 53rd i think.. haha.. likeaboss.

 

-homecoming was the greatest. oh god. ihop at midnight? i think yes.

 

-half way done with with first semester of school :D time flies fastttttt maaann.

 

-ITS GETTIN COOLD AS CHIZ.

 

-halloween on monday? who is freaking pumped. tell me what youre gonna be!!! im gonna be part of a mini mariachi band with my amigo :) hehe we were originally gonna be mario and luigi, but the little boy costumes were too small for us fatties. + i didnt want to spend $20 more for adult costumes so i was like screw it, mini merachi band it is.

 

-saw the three muskateers yesterday with my friends! it was overall a good movie but pretty cheesy, i recommend it :) and plus it has logan lerman in it. eheheheeheee. (shae. ;D)

 

-MARIO KART PARTY TODAY. cant you just tell im the coolest person ever...

  

-alright so i recently got the highest grade on a math test ive ever gotten before. xD 98% on my geometry test.. :'D and we're starting our trigonometry unit. holygeezus.

 

i hope you guys are doing great great great and wonderful because i know i am! try not to die for those of you who are in school.. you can do it :)

 

TELL ME WHAT YOU GUYS ARE GONNA BE FOR HALLOWEEEEEN! I WANNA KNOW I WANNA KNOW

 

EXPLORED. oh goodness thank you all so so much <3

 

-

  

if you join ill love you forever:D

Happiness.Is.You. / © All rights reserved

One for the Trig Monuments project, the Ordnance Survey trigonometry monument atop Hampshire's Butser Hill that I captured an a drive back from site on summer's evening.

[FR version above / EN version below]

 

Mesdames et messieurs, les Dentelles du Cygne ! (V3)

 

Cette nébuleuse est le rémanent d'une supernova, une explosion cataclysmique signant la fin de vie d'une étoile et parfois le début d'une autre (les supernovæ finissent soir par l'explosion complète de l'étoile, soit par l'éjection des couches supérieures de l'étoile, le reste s'effondrant sous sa propre masse et finissant en naine blanche, étoile à neutron ou trou noir). Cette supernova a du se produire il y a environ une dizaine de milliers d'années et se trouve à 1440 années lumières. Autrement dit, si elle a explosé il y a 10000 ans exactement, votre ancêtre d'il y a 8560 ans (10000-1440) en est encore à tailler des pointes de flèche en silex un peu moches (mésolithique) tandis qu'en Chine ils sont au néolithique. A la même époque, la mer monte, passant d'un niveau de -15m à -3m (par rapport au niveau actuel) et la Manche se forme. Bref, à ce moment là, dégustant un des derniers mammouths au coin du feu, il assiste à un formidable spectacle céleste, éblouissant, même en pleine nuit : la supernova dont on observe les traces maintenant.

Les astronomes qui aiment bien découper les objets célestes en petits bouts, principalement pour distinguer les parties bien visibles des extensions faiblement lumineuses, distinguent la grande dentelle, la plus lumineuse à gauche, et la petite dentelle, à droite. Oui, je sais, c'est paradoxal car la grande dentelle est la plus petite sur l'image et la petite est la plus grande ; une histoire de luminosité probablement ... La grande dentelle est composée de NGC 6992 (la partie la plus brillante) et de NGC 6995 (la partie qui rebique), ainsi qu'IC 1340, les extensions faiblement lumineuses de la petite dentelle. La petite dentelle est composée de NGC 6990 (quasiment toute la petite dentelle) et de 2 petites parties en haut, NGC 6979 et NGC 6974. Les Dentelles du Cygne ne sont pas visible à l'œil nu et à peine aux jumelles avec un très bon ciel si vous savez où les chercher (je l'ai fait le soir même et c'est parce que je savais quoi chercher que je les ai identifiées aux jumelles, sinon c'est vraiment difficile), mais la petite dentelle est collée à une étoile visible (magnitude 4.2) par un très bon ciel, 52 cygni (la 52ème étoile de la constellation du cygne), ce qui permet en se servant également de l'étoile Aljanah (epsilon cygni), une étoile très brillante, de localiser la nébuleuse, de pointer dessus (ce que j'ai fait avec un viseur point rouge sur mon appareil photo) et de cadrer la photo.

Sur cette photo, il y a également d'autres étoiles de la constellation du cygne qui sont identifiées comme 41, 48, 49 cygni, ainsi que 2 étoiles de la constellation du petit renard (vulpecula en latin ; renard = vulpes), 26 et 27 vulpeculi.

De plus, on observe sans peine à droite de l'image un amas ouvert, NGC 6940, âgé de 720 millions d'années et situé à 2500 années lumière de nous. Ses dimensions apparentes étant de 25' d'arc (1 seconde d'arc = 1/60 degré), je vous laisse faire le calcul de sa dimension réelle, un peu de trigonométrie ne peut pas vous faire de mal !

Enfin, toujours sur cette image, j'ai attrapé une galaxie qui, certes, apparaît toute petite vu la faible focale employée ici, NGC 7013. Ne cherchez pas sur l'image non annotée, sauf si vous vous ennuyez à mort. C'est un point vaguement nébuleux et allongé verticalement tout en bas de l'image, au premier quart gauche de celle-ci. C'est une galaxie dont la classification la situe entre les galaxies spirales et lenticulaires. Elle est distante d'environ 40 millions d'années lumières et fait 43680 années lumières de diamètre. En comparaison, la notre (la voie lactée) en fait environ 120000. Là où je suis assez content, c'est d'arriver à la faire sortir sur cette photo car sa magnitude est de 12.4 (donc assez faible).

Pour vous aider à vous y retrouver dans tout ça, je vous encourage à aller jeter un oeil à l'image annotée sur astrometry.net : nova.astrometry.net/annotated_full/6780553

 

Bon, parlons techno maintenant. Pour cette reprise de mes sessions astro, j'y suis allé tranquille ; j'ai fonctionné à l'objectif seulement ; pas de telescope. Donc, ce sont 416 photos de 45 secondes de pose unitaire (espacées de 5 secondes), iso 800, prises au Canon 1200D DP-Photomax + objectif Samyang 135 mm f/2 ouvert à f/2.8 (très ouvert donc, ce qui me vaut un léger halo sur les étoiles non centrées, les brillantes principalement), prises entre 22h34 (samedi 30/07/22) et 4h09 (dimanche 31 donc), que j'ai triées pour ne conserver que les 315 meilleures, cumulant ainsi 3h56 de signal. Le suivi était assuré par une monture Star Adventurer 2i.

Tout le pré-traitement jusqu'à l'empilement des images a été fait sous Siril 1.3 en utilisant 35/35/35 DOF.

Pour le post-traitement, la photo a subit une réduction d'étoiles. J'ai commencé par faire une starless (virer les étoiles) en utilisant StarNet V2. J'ai ensuite fait tout le reste sous Gimp : masque d'étoiles, recombinaison des images nébuleuse seule + étoiles seules, travail sur le niveau de noir / balance des blancs, ... Cette version est un retraitement complet effectué à partir des photos d'origine.

  

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Ladies and gentlemen, the Cygnus Loop (V3)

 

This nebula is the remnant of a supernova, a cataclysmic explosion that ends a star's life and sometimes sounds the birth of another one. Supernovae indeed end either with the complete explosion of the star, or with the ejection of the layers of the star, the remains collapsing under their own mass and ending up as a white dwarf, neutron star or black hole.

This supernova must have occurred about ten thousand years ago and is located 1440 light years away. In other words, if it exploded exactly 10,000 years ago, your ancestor from 8,560 years ago (10,000-1440) was carving ugly flint arrowheads (Mesolithic) while in China Neolithic yet started. At the same time, the seas were rising, going from a level of -15m to -3m (compared to the current level) and the Channel formed. At that moment, tasting one of the last mammoths by the fireside, your ancestor witnessed a formidable celestial spectacle, dazzling, even in the middle of the night: the supernova whose traces we now observe.

Astronomers who often cut celestial objects into small pieces, distinguish the bright visible parts from the weakly luminous extensions. The brightest part on the left is called the Western veil, and the weaker part, on the right, is called the Eastern veil. The Eastern veil is composed of NGC 6992 (the brightest part of the Eastern veil) and NGC 6995 (the part that bends), as well as IC 1340, the weakly luminous extensions of the Eastern veil. The Western veil is composed of NGC 6990 (almost all the western part of the nebula) and 2 small parts at the top, NGC 6979 and NGC 6974. The Cygnus loop is not visible to the naked eye and barely to binoculars with a very good skies ... if you know where the nebula stays of course. The Western veil is stuck to a star that can be observed under good skies (magnitude 4.2), 52 cygni (the 52nd star of Cygnus constellation). If you also locate the star Aljanah (epsilon cygni), a very bright star, you will be able to locate the nebula that stands between the two.

 

In this photo there are also other stars in the Cygnus constellation which are identified as 41, 48, 49 cygni, as well as 2 stars in the constellation of the Little Fox (vulpecula in Latin; fox = vulpes), 26 and 27 vulpeculi.

Moreover, we easily observe on the right of the image an open cluster, NGC 6940, 720 million years old and located 2500 light years from us. Its apparent dimensions being 25' of arc (1 second of arc = 1/60 degree), I let you do the calculation of its real dimensions, a bit of trigonometry can't hurt you!

Finally, I caught a galaxy which, admittedly, appears very small given the low focal length used here, NGC 7013. Don't try to look for it on the non-annotated image, unless you are bored to death. It is a vaguely nebulous and vertically elongated point at the very bottom of the image, in the first left quarter. It is a galaxy classified between spiral and lenticular galaxies. It is about 40 million light years away and 43680 light years diameter. In comparison, ours (the Milky Way) is about 120,000 LY. I'm quite happy is to get it because its magnitude is 12.4 (therefore quite low : 86000 times less brighter than Vega).

To help you figure it all, may I encourage you to take a look at the annotated image on astrometry.net: nova.astrometry.net/annotated_full/6780553

  

Let's talk tech now. I took 416 photos of 45 seconds of exposure (5 seconds between each), iso 800, taken with a Canon 1200D filter partially removed + Samyang 135 mm f/2 lens opened to f/2.8 (very open, therefore, which produced a slight halo on the non-centered stars, mainly the bright ones). Photos were taken between 10:34 p.m. (Saturday 07/30/22) and 4:09 a.m. (Sunday 31 therefore). I kept only the best 315 ones, thus accumulating 3:56 signal. Tracking was provided by a Star Adventurer 2i mount.

All pre-processing up to image stacking was done in Siril 1.3 using 35/35/35 DOF.

For post-processing, the photo underwent star reduction. I started by doing a starless (turning the stars) using StarNet V2. Post-treatment was done with Gimp: star mask, recombination of nebula images only + stars alone, ...

This version is a new treatment from scratch from original data.

Windsor (/ˈwɪnzər/) is a town and unparished area in the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead in Berkshire, England. It is widely known as the site of Windsor Castle, one of the official residences of the British Royal Family.

 

The town is situated 23 miles (37 km) west of Charing Cross, London. It is immediately south of the River Thames, which forms its boundary with Eton. The village of Old Windsor, just over 2 miles (3 km) to the south, predates what is now called Windsor by around 300 years; in the past Windsor was formally referred to as New Windsor to distinguish the two.

 

The early history of the site is unknown, although it was almost certainly settled some years before 1070 when William the Conquerorhad a timber motte and bailey castle constructed.[2] The focus of royal interest at that time was not the castle, however, but a small riverside settlement about 3 miles (5 km) downstream, possibly established from the 7th century.

 

Windsor, or Windlesora as it was called in the 11th century, is first mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. The name originates from old English Windles-ore, or 'winch by the riverside'. The settlement had used an earlier name, but this is unknown. From about the 8th century, high status people started to visit the site occasionally, and possibly this included royalty. From the 11th century the site's link with king Edward the Confessor is documented, but again, information about his use of the place is scant. After the Conquest of 1066 royal use of the site increased, probably because it offered good access to woodlands and opportunities for hunting – a sport which also practised military skills. By the late 12th century, and the relocation of the royal household to an enlarged castle in 1110, the site was renamed Old Windsor.

 

Windsor Castle is noted in the Domesday Bookunder the entry for Clewer, the neighbouring manor to Windsor. Although this might seem strange, it occurred because plans for the castle had changed since 1070, and more land had been acquired in Clewer on which to site a castle town. This plan was not actioned until the early 12th century. By 1110, meetings of the Great Council, which had previously taken place at Windlesora, were noted as taking place at the Castle – referred to as New Windsor, probably to indicate that it was a two ward castle/borough complex, similar to other early castle designs, such as Denbigh. Henry I – according to one chronicle – had rebuilt it, and this followed the Norman kings' actions at other royal sites, such as Westminster, where larger and more magnificent accommodation was thought necessary for the new dynasty. King Henry married his second wife at Windsor Castle in 1121, after the White Ship disaster. The settlement at Old Windsor largely transferred to New Windsor during the 12th century, although substantial planning and setting out of the new town (including the parish church, marketplace, bridge, hermitage and leper hospital) did not take place until c. 1170, under Henry II, following the civil war of Stephen's reign. At about the same time, the present upper ward of the castle was rebuilt in stone. Windsor Bridge is the earliest bridge on the Thames between Staines and Reading, built at a time when bridge building was rare; it was first documented in 1191, but had probably been built, according to the Pipe rolls, in 1173. It played an important part in the national road system, linking London with Reading and Winchester, but also, by diverting traffic into the new town, it underpinned the success of its fledgling economy.

 

The town of New Windsor, as an ancient demesne of the Crown, was a privileged settlement from the start, apparently having the rights of a 'free borough', for which other towns had to pay substantial fees to the king. It had a merchant guild (known by the 14th century as the Fraternity or brotherhood of the Holy Trinity) from the early 13th century and, under royal patronage, was made the chief town of the county in 1277, as part of its grant of royal borough status by Edward I's charter. Somewhat unusually, this charter gave no new rights or privileges to Windsor but probably codified the rights which it had enjoyed for many years. Windsor's position as chief town of Berkshire was short-lived, however, as people found it difficult to reach. Wallingford took over this position in the early 14th century. As a self-governing town Windsor enjoyed a number of freedoms unavailable to other towns, including the right to hold its own borough court, the right of membership (or 'freedom') and some financial independence. The town accounts of the 16th century survive in part, although most of the once substantial borough archive dating back to the 12th century was destroyed, probably in the late 17th century.

 

The early history of the site is unknown, although it was almost certainly settled some years before 1070 when William the Conquerorhad a timber motte and bailey castle constructed.[2] The focus of royal interest at that time was not the castle, however, but a small riverside settlement about 3 miles (5 km) downstream, possibly established from the 7th century.

 

Windsor, or Windlesora as it was called in the 11th century, is first mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. The name originates from old English Windles-ore, or 'winch by the riverside'. The settlement had used an earlier name, but this is unknown. From about the 8th century, high status people started to visit the site occasionally, and possibly this included royalty. From the 11th century the site's link with king Edward the Confessor is documented, but again, information about his use of the place is scant. After the Conquest of 1066 royal use of the site increased, probably because it offered good access to woodlands and opportunities for hunting – a sport which also practised military skills. By the late 12th century, and the relocation of the royal household to an enlarged castle in 1110, the site was renamed Old Windsor.

 

Windsor Castle is noted in the Domesday Bookunder the entry for Clewer, the neighbouring manor to Windsor. Although this might seem strange, it occurred because plans for the castle had changed since 1070, and more land had been acquired in Clewer on which to site a castle town. This plan was not actioned until the early 12th century. By 1110, meetings of the Great Council, which had previously taken place at Windlesora, were noted as taking place at the Castle – referred to as New Windsor, probably to indicate that it was a two ward castle/borough complex, similar to other early castle designs, such as Denbigh. Henry I – according to one chronicle – had rebuilt it, and this followed the Norman kings' actions at other royal sites, such as Westminster, where larger and more magnificent accommodation was thought necessary for the new dynasty. King Henry married his second wife at Windsor Castle in 1121, after the White Ship disaster. The settlement at Old Windsor largely transferred to New Windsor during the 12th century, although substantial planning and setting out of the new town (including the parish church, marketplace, bridge, hermitage and leper hospital) did not take place until c. 1170, under Henry II, following the civil war of Stephen's reign. At about the same time, the present upper ward of the castle was rebuilt in stone. Windsor Bridge is the earliest bridge on the Thames between Staines and Reading, built at a time when bridge building was rare; it was first documented in 1191, but had probably been built, according to the Pipe rolls, in 1173. It played an important part in the national road system, linking London with Reading and Winchester, but also, by diverting traffic into the new town, it underpinned the success of its fledgling economy.

 

The town of New Windsor, as an ancient demesne of the Crown, was a privileged settlement from the start, apparently having the rights of a 'free borough', for which other towns had to pay substantial fees to the king. It had a merchant guild (known by the 14th century as the Fraternity or brotherhood of the Holy Trinity) from the early 13th century and, under royal patronage, was made the chief town of the county in 1277, as part of its grant of royal borough status by Edward I's charter. Somewhat unusually, this charter gave no new rights or privileges to Windsor but probably codified the rights which it had enjoyed for many years. Windsor's position as chief town of Berkshire was short-lived, however, as people found it difficult to reach. Wallingford took over this position in the early 14th century. As a self-governing town Windsor enjoyed a number of freedoms unavailable to other towns, including the right to hold its own borough court, the right of membership (or 'freedom') and some financial independence. The town accounts of the 16th century survive in part, although most of the once substantial borough archive dating back to the 12th century was destroyed, probably in the late 17th century.

  

The Last Supper by Franz de Cleyn in the West Gallery of Windsor parish church of St John The Baptist.[3]

New Windsor was a nationally significant town in the Middle Ages, certainly one of the fifty wealthiest towns in the country by 1332. Its prosperity came from its close association with the royal household. The repeated investment in the castle brought London merchants (goldsmiths, vintners, spicers and mercers) to the town in the late 13th century and provided much employment for townsmen. The development of the castle under Edward III, between 1350–68, was the largest secular building project in England of the Middle Ages, and many Windsor people worked on this project, again bringing great wealth to the town. Although the Black Death in 1348 had reduced some towns' populations by up to 50%, in Windsor the building projects of Edward III brought money to the town, and possibly its population doubled: this was a 'boom' time for the local economy. People came to the town from every part of the country, and from continental Europe. The poet Geoffrey Chaucerheld the honorific post of 'Clerk of the Works' at Windsor Castle in 1391.

 

The development of the castle continued in the late 15th century with the rebuilding of St George's Chapel. With this Windsor became a major pilgrimage destination, particularly for Londoners. Pilgrims came to touch the royal shrine of the murdered Henry VI, the fragment of the True Cross and other important relics. Visits to the chapel were probably combined with a visit to the important nearby Marian shrine and college at Eton, founded by Henry VI in 1440, and dedicated to the Assumption; which is now better known as Eton College. Pilgrims came with substantial sums to spend. From perhaps two or three named inns in the late 15th century, some 30 can be identified a century later. The town again grew in wealth. For London pilgrims, Windsor was probably – but briefly – of greater importance than Canterbury and the shrine of the City's patron Saint Thomas Becket. With the closures of the Reformation, however, Windsor's pilgrim traffic died out. Henry VIII was buried in St George's Chapel in 1547, next to Jane Seymour, the mother of his only legitimate son, Edward (Edward VI). Henry, the founder of the Church of England, may have wanted to benefit from the stream of Catholic pilgrims coming to the town. His will gives that impression.

 

The town began to stagnate about ten years after the Reformation. The castle was considered old-fashioned and shrines to the dead were thought to be superstitious. The early modern period formed a stark contrast to the medieval history of the town. Most accounts of Windsor in the 16th and 17th centuries talk of its poverty, badly made streets and poor housing. Shakespeare's play The Merry Wives of Windsor is set in Windsor and contains many references to parts of the town and the surrounding countryside. Shakespeare must have walked the town's streets, near the castle and river, much as people still do. The play may have been written in the Garter Inn, opposite the Castle, but this was destroyed by fire in the late 17th century. The long-standing – and famous – courtesan of king Charles II, Nell Gwyn, was given a house on St Albans Street: Burford House (now part of the Royal Mews). Her residence in this house, as far as it is possible to tell, was brief. Only one of her letters addressed from Burford House survives: it was probably intended as a legacy for her illegitimate son, the Earl of Burford, later the Duke of St Albans.

 

Windsor was garrisoned by Colonel Venn during the English Civil War. Later it became the home of the New Model Army when Venn had left the castle in 1645. Despite its royal dependence, like many commercial centres, Windsor was a Parliamentarian town. Charles Iwas buried without ceremony in St George's Chapel after his execution at Whitehall in 1649. The present Guildhall, built in 1680–91, replaced an earlier market house that had been built on the same site around 1580, as well as the old guildhall, which faced the castle and had been built around 1350. The contraction in the number of old public buildings speaks of a town 'clearing the decks', ready for a renewed period of prosperity with Charles II's return to the Castle. But his successors did not use the place, and as the town was short of money, the planned new civic buildings did not appear. The town continued in poverty until the mid 19th century.

 

In 1652 the largest house in Windsor Great Park was built on land which Oliver Cromwell had appropriated from the Crown. Now known as Cumberland Lodge after the Duke of Cumberland's residence there in the mid 18th century, the house was variously known as Byfield House, New Lodge, Ranger's Lodge, Windsor Lodge and Great Lodge.

 

In 1778, there was a resumption of the royal presence, with George III at the Queen's Lodge and, from 1804, at the castle. This started a period of new development in Windsor, with the building of two army barracks. However the associated large numbers of soldiers led to a major prostitution problem by 1830, in a town where the number of streets had little changed since 1530. In the 18th c. the town traded with London selling the Windsor Chair which was actually made in Buckinghamshire.

 

A number of fine houses were built in this period, including Hadleigh House on Sheet Street, which was built in 1793 by the then Mayor of Windsor, William Thomas. In 1811 it was the home of John O'Reilly, the apothecary-surgeon to George III.

 

Windsor Castle was the westernmost sighting-point for the Anglo-French Survey (1784–1790), which measured the precise distance between the Royal Greenwich Observatory and the Paris Observatory by trigonometry. Windsor was used because of its relative proximity to the base-line of the survey at Hounslow Heath.

 

The substantial redevelopment of the castle in the subsequent decade and Queen Victoria's residence from 1840, as well as the coming of two railways in 1849, signalled the most dramatic changes in the town's history. These events catapulted the town from a sleepy medieval has-been to the centre of empire – many European crowned heads of state came to Windsor to visit the Queen throughout the rest of the 19th century. Unfortunately, excessive redevelopment and 'refurbishment' of Windsor's medieval fabric at this time resulted in widespread destruction of the old town, including the demolition of the old parish church of St John the Baptist in 1820. The original had been built around 1135.

 

Most of the current town's streets date from the mid to late 19th century.[5] However the main street, Peascod Street (pronunciation: /ˈpɛskɒd/) is very ancient, predating the castle by many years, and probably of Saxon origin. It formed part of the 10th-century parish structure in east Berkshire[citation needed] and is first referred to as Peascroftstret in c. 1170. The 1000-year-old royal Castle, although the largest and longest-occupied in Europe, is a recent development in comparison. "New Windsor" was officially renamed "Windsor" in 1974.

 

is accessible from Junction 6 of the M4 and from Slough via a 3 mile long dual carriageway. Bus services in the town are mostly provided by First Berkshire & The Thames Valley, although a park-and-rideservice and one local route are operated by Courtney Coaches.

 

Windsor has two railway stations. Windsor & Eton Central railway station has a shuttle service to Slough. Windsor & Eton Riverside station provides a service to London Waterloo. Both stations were time in the 19th century, as the two train companies which owned the lines both wanted to carry Queen Victoria to Windsor, with the first line opened gaining the privilege.[8] From 1883 to 1885, the London Underground's District line's westbound service ran as far as Windsor.

 

Windsor has frequent bus services to/from London Heathrow Airport, Victoria Coach Station in central London and Legoland Windsor Resort.

  

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windsor,_Berkshire

  

cause i'm thinking of you.

you showed me how to live like i do.

if it wasn't for you, i would never be who i am.

 

orientation tomorrow. ick. here are the classes i'm taking:

trigonometry, earth science, US history, english 11, religion 11, painting, vocal technique and phys. ed. (i don't take a language, in case you were wondering.)

what are yours? i'm curious about the curriculum of other schools!

 

#fact 51: i watch full house more than any normal person should. if you follow me on twitter, you probably already knew that. ;)

De rekenliniaal is een analoog wiskundig instrument waarmee men berekeningen kan uitvoeren.

 

The slide rule, also known colloquially in the United States as a slipstick, is a mechanical analog computer. The slide rule is used primarily for multiplication and division, and also for functions such as roots, logarithms and trigonometry.

 

Symbols usually represent objects and give clues to abstract or supernatural events and the opinions or concepts of historical cultures. They are products of collective thinking and are the shortest way to describe something.

 

In the opinion of Carl Gustav Jung, symbols are not a sign of the ordinary; they are images of an invisible spirit and have a meaning far beyond themselves. When words are inadequate symbols provide there own language of communication.

 

Although symbols are perceivable, sometimes there true meaning is not visible.

 

The best way to express the intangible, invisible, fantastic, imaginative and emotional elements is by using symbols. For thousands of years it was believed, that symbols were sacred and pointed to specific situations and specific energies.

 

Christ taught by symbols and parables. The mysterious knowledge of the Druids was embodied in signs and symbols. The Mysteries were a series of symbols.

 

By developing symbolic languages, information was protected and not disclosed, thus preventing the misuse or degeneration of the information. For example, Archaic schools saw secrets and mysteries in symbols and used them, as a language of communication and these symbols remain unchanged today.

 

The compass describes circles, and deals with spherical trigonometry, the science of the spheres and heavens. The square therefore is a symbol of what concerns the earth and the body; the compass of what concerns the heavens and the soul.

 

The Cross has been a sacred symbol from earliest antiquity.. It is found upon all the enduring monuments of the world; in Egypt, Assyria, India, Persia and on the Buddhist Towers of Ireland. Pointing to the four quarters of the world it was the symbol of universal Nature.

 

The Temple of Solomon presented a symbolic image of the Universe; and resembled in its arrangements and furniture, all the temples of the ancient nations that practiced the Mysteries.

 

In our thinking we make use of a great variety of symbol-systems: linguistic, mathematical, pictorial, musical, ritualistic.

 

Symbols can bring people together and unite them for a cause. Nevertheless, symbols can divide and hurt. When complex conflicts escalate to the point of organized violence, the “us versus them” dynamic of confrontation can easily develop an autonomous dynamism.

 

What may well have begun as a simple dispute over resources or governance becomes a clash of identities; symbols of collective identity and belonging become banners of war.

 

We transform symbols and images projected by others into reservoirs for our own fear, loathing, and insecurity; we transform our own group’s symbols into instruments of self-justification, through which we bless our own sense of righteous indignation and grievance. Thus do we become enmeshed in a clash of symbols.

 

Wilpena Pound.

For this northern latitude Wilpena Pound has good rainfall and a microclimate because of the surrounding hills. It was always a special place for Aboriginal people and a prized location for sheep pastoralists. At Cradock they average 250 mms annually, Hawker rises to 300 mm and Wilpena has 390 mms (15 inches in the old rainfall). Further north at Marree the average is just 136 mm a year. Wilpena Creek flows out of the Pound which covers 80 square kilometres (20,000 acres). It is 6 kms wide and 16 kms long and its highest surrounding peak is Mt Mary at 1,171 m or 3,842 feet. In 1840 Edward John Eyre and others explored parts of the Flinders Ranges but they did not discover Wilpena Pound. That was achieved by C Bagot in 1851. Bagot said in the press that there was only one ingress or egress to flat land with a permanent running creek suitable for depasturing 500 cattle. This plain was surrounded by steep rocky walls up to 1,000 feet high. The government responded by immediately sending Mr Burr of the Survey Office to the Pound for a trigonometrical survey in June 1851. Bagot gave it its Aboriginal name. The furthest north leasehold run in 1851 was at Kanyaka between Quorn and Hawker. The Wilpena run was also taken out in 1851 and originally covered 850 square miles but that was soon reduced into other leaseholds. Drs William and John Browne took over the Wilpena leasehold and by 1853 the pine slab homestead was built (demolished 1931) and shearing sheds and workers cottages soon followed. George Marchant got a 14 year lease of 85 square miles on 1 January 1855. In 1857 he employed a manager Charles Powell, whose father had planted the first mulberry tree at Kingscote in 1836, and he stayed at Wilpena station until 1882 but with various owners. By 1860 Dr William Browne held Wilpena run and he sold off the Arkaba section in 1863 before the big drought. By 1861 Henry Strong Price owned the leasehold which he tried to sell but could find no buyer. A report on Wilpena in 1865 says it covered 154 square miles and employed 19 married men and their wives, 24 single men and 41 children making a total of 101 people. Later in the 19th century Dr William Browne owned Wilpena again and the government resumed most of it in January 1880. Tourism came to Wilpena Pound in 1920 when the Wilpena Forest Reserve was created but the run was leased to graziers until 1945. At that time the Rasheed family established the chalet and all grazing in the Pound ceased. In 1970 the adjoining Orraparinna station was purchased by the government to create Flinders Ranges National Park. Finally in 1985 the government bought the leasehold to Wilpena station to add to the park. Its name was changed from Flinders National Park to Ikara Flinders National Park in 2016 thus incorporating, an Adnyamathanha word from the traditional land occupiers, into the title. The Adnyamathanha people and their sub clans have been in the area for around 15,000 years.

The Pound is a natural amphitheatre with Rawnsley Bluff at the southern end (he was the surveyor of runs in the 1850s). The Pound has a fascinating geomorphological structure. The landscape here was deeply folded with synclines and anticlines. Synclines are downward folds of earth layers with a trough at the bottom i.e. Wilpena Pound. Anticlines are the peaks of the layers but in the Flinders Ranges the anticlines have been eroded away over vast geological eras leaving rugged edges above the synclines or troughs. The trough of Wilpena Pound has a layer of quartzite, then other layers beneath that. The end of the anticline from the western side of the Pound is the Elder Range. The true shape of the formation reveals itself from the air.

 

Darke Peak, South Australia

 

The town takes its name from the explorer John Charles Darke, who was injured in a spear attack by Indigenous people while he was climbing nearby Waddikee Rock on 24 October 1844. Waddikee Rock is a sacred site of the Barngarla people.[10] He died the next day and was buried at the foot of the Rock.[11] Governor Grey expressed a wish that some landform in the region of the grave should be named to honour him. In 1865 surveyor Thomas Evans who was performing a trigonometrical survey of the Gawler Ranges and named the 1,564 ft (477 m) high mount, 'Darke's Peak'.[12]

 

In 1909, another surveyor, W.G. Evans, reported that he had found bones in a grave and was satisfied they were the remains of Darke. Darke's grave and monument are located on the western side of the range, still standing as a memorial to the first European who explored this area. The memorial was erected by the SA Government in 1910.[11]

 

The township of Darke Peak was originally proclaimed Carappee in 1914. The town was renamed in 1940 after the peak that bears John Charles Darke's name as further honour to the explorer. A school opened in the town in 1917.[13]

  

Copyright © Tim Engle 2011

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I should probably have made this a DOI entry (maybe i'll re-visit it later) but for now i like it as it is, so i can concentrate on all the lines and angles (i think that might be why i made a B+W version too)

Mars' tiny moon Deimos in the skies over Arabia Terra, imaged by Viking Orbiter 1 on January 2, 1978. This image was made possible by the spacecraft's highly elongated orbit, which took it well above Deimos' orbital altitude of 23,500 km. Image sets like this helped track the long-term orbital motion of Deimos, as the exact location of the spacecraft was known at all times, allowing Deimos' position to be calculated through trigonometry.

 

This was a single-color observation, with imaging data only collected using red light. I have artificially colorized this image using a process to estimate Mars' appearance in blue and green light from the spectral properties of the light and dark and materials.

 

Image Credit: NASA / JPL / USGS / Aster Cowart

View On Black

  

Do you belive in good or bad luck 'omens'? If so, here's one for you. This is a photograph of Venus transiting our sun. The transit event occurs in pairs a little more than a century apart. The last time it happened in our lifetimes was 2004, just before the Tsunami in Indonesia. It won't happen again for something like 105 1/2 years from now.

  

So why am I posting this image? For one, I think it's kind of interesting when things like this happen. But the real reason was because it took a lot of effort to learn how to safely take a picture of the sun with a digital SLR. There are a few excellent resources (below) that will help you if you want to take a picture of the sun in the future (like in 2017 when we have a full solar eclipse here in the midwest...) Best spot to view the eclipse in the world (Hopkinsville, Kentucky). Major cities like Des Moines, Chicago, Kansas City, etc will all be in the 90th percentile for "quality" of view.

  

The Story of the transit in ancient times

Since there are dozens of better images of this event than mine, I thought it would be interesting to share the story of the early astronomers who tried to witness this event. Some of them are quite tragic... The first person ever to record the phenomenon was a young astronomer called Jeremiah Horrocks in Much Hoole, England. In November 1639 he used a tiny telescope to view the event.

  

Horrocks died of unknown causes two years later at 22. Later, Edmond Halley (yeah, that guy 'Halley' of Halley Comet fame) took charge of documenting this phenomenon. In 1716, Halley called on nations to join forces and record the event from different positions around the world.

 

Halley figured out that the transit from different spots would give astronomers comparative figures to calculate the distance between the Earth and the Sun using trigonometry. This was the first time accurate data could be obtained for the event.

 

My favorite story happened a half-century later in 1761. French astronomer Guillaume Le Gentil went to India in answer to Halley’s call, but showed up late due to bad weather. He lived in India eight years until the next one in 1769, but missed that, too, because of poor weather. To add insult to injury, when he returned home Le Gentil found out that he had been declared "dead" by his wife who actually remarried and spent all of his money with her new husband... nice!

  

Whether you are superstitious or not, do not look at the sun with the naked eye.

Either use special solar viewing glasses (make sure they come with a CE safety mark) or use a telescope to safely project the image on to a screen.

  

More Information

Good thread on "welding glass" as a ND Filter

    

Excellent article about today's transit

    

NASA's live and extended coverage of the event

    

I shot this with a Canon 100-400L plus 2x teleconverter mounted on a 7d. It was all held in place with a Vanguard Tripod.

    

Quick point of scale... Venus is 23.7million miles away (at its closest point) and the Sun is about 150 million miles from earth on average. Venus is 0.9488 the size of Earth. These two figures give you an idea of how massive the sun is compared to Earth / Venus (and how far away everything is as well).

    

Set-up

I mounted the gear on a tripod and used gaffer's tape to attach a #14 shade welder's glass to the lens hood. If you do this - make sure you use the right welding glass. You also need to make sure absolutely no light can get in behind the welding glass. It will create relfections and distoritons.

    

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Large Size on Black at: 'My neck hurts, he mutters, quickly realizing a critical trigonometry miscalculation' On Black

From Stuck In Customs www.stuckincustoms.com

Wilpena Pound.

For this northern latitude Wilpena Pound has good rainfall and a microclimate because of the surrounding hills. It was always a special place for Aboriginal people and a prized location for sheep pastoralists. At Cradock they average 250 mms annually, Hawker rises to 300 mm and Wilpena has 390 mms (15 inches in the old rainfall). Further north at Marree the average is just 136 mm a year. Wilpena Creek flows out of the Pound which covers 80 square kilometres (20,000 acres). It is 6 kms wide and 16 kms long and its highest surrounding peak is Mt Mary at 1,171 m or 3,842 feet. In 1840 Edward John Eyre and others explored parts of the Flinders Ranges but they did not discover Wilpena Pound. That was achieved by C Bagot in 1851. Bagot said in the press that there was only one ingress or egress to flat land with a permanent running creek suitable for depasturing 500 cattle. This plain was surrounded by steep rocky walls up to 1,000 feet high. The government responded by immediately sending Mr Burr of the Survey Office to the Pound for a trigonometrical survey in June 1851. Bagot gave it its Aboriginal name. The furthest north leasehold run in 1851 was at Kanyaka between Quorn and Hawker. The Wilpena run was also taken out in 1851 and originally covered 850 square miles but that was soon reduced into other leaseholds. Drs William and John Browne took over the Wilpena leasehold and by 1853 the pine slab homestead was built (demolished 1931) and shearing sheds and workers cottages soon followed. George Marchant got a 14 year lease of 85 square miles on 1 January 1855. In 1857 he employed a manager Charles Powell, whose father had planted the first mulberry tree at Kingscote in 1836, and he stayed at Wilpena station until 1882 but with various owners. By 1860 Dr William Browne held Wilpena run and he sold off the Arkaba section in 1863 before the big drought. By 1861 Henry Strong Price owned the leasehold which he tried to sell but could find no buyer. A report on Wilpena in 1865 says it covered 154 square miles and employed 19 married men and their wives, 24 single men and 41 children making a total of 101 people. Later in the 19th century Dr William Browne owned Wilpena again and the government resumed most of it in January 1880. Tourism came to Wilpena Pound in 1920 when the Wilpena Forest Reserve was created but the run was leased to graziers until 1945. At that time the Rasheed family established the chalet and all grazing in the Pound ceased. In 1970 the adjoining Orraparinna station was purchased by the government to create Flinders Ranges National Park. Finally in 1985 the government bought the leasehold to Wilpena station to add to the park. Its name was changed from Flinders National Park to Ikara Flinders National Park in 2016 thus incorporating, an Adnyamathanha word from the traditional land occupiers, into the title. The Adnyamathanha people and their sub clans have been in the area for around 15,000 years.

The Pound is a natural amphitheatre with Rawnsley Bluff at the southern end (he was the surveyor of runs in the 1850s). The Pound has a fascinating geomorphological structure. The landscape here was deeply folded with synclines and anticlines. Synclines are downward folds of earth layers with a trough at the bottom i.e. Wilpena Pound. Anticlines are the peaks of the layers but in the Flinders Ranges the anticlines have been eroded away over vast geological eras leaving rugged edges above the synclines or troughs. The trough of Wilpena Pound has a layer of quartzite, then other layers beneath that. The end of the anticline from the western side of the Pound is the Elder Range. The true shape of the formation reveals itself from the air.

  

Kangchenjunga (Nepali: कञ्चनजङ्घा; Hindi: कंचनजंघा; Sikkimese: ཁང་ཅེན་ཛོཾག་), also spelled Kanchenjunga, is the third highest mountain in the world, and lies partly in Nepal and partly in Sikkim, India.[3] It rises with an elevation of 8,586 m (28,169 ft) in a section of the Himalayas called Kangchenjunga Himal that is limited in the west by the Tamur River, in the north by the Lhonak Chu and Jongsang La, and in the east by the Teesta River.[1]

 

Mount Kangchenjunga lies about 125 km (78 mi) east-south-east of Mount Everest.[4] It is the second highest mountain of the Himalayas. Three of the five peaks – Main, Central and South – are on the border between North Sikkim and Nepal.[5] Two peaks are in Nepal's Taplejung District.[6]

 

Kangchenjunga Main is the highest mountain in India, and the easternmost of the mountains higher than 8,000 m (26,000 ft). It is called Five Treasures of Snow after its five high peaks, and has always been worshipped by the people of Darjeeling and Sikkim.[7]

 

Until 1852, Kangchenjunga was assumed to be the highest mountain in the world, but calculations based on various readings and measurements made by the Great Trigonometrical Survey of India in 1849 came to the conclusion that Mount Everest, known as Peak XV at the time, was the highest. Allowing for further verification of all calculations, it was officially announced in 1856 that Kangchenjunga is the third highest mountain in the world.[8]

 

Kangchenjunga was first climbed on 25 May 1955 by Joe Brown and George Band, who were part of a British expedition. They stopped short of the summit as per the promise given to the Chogyal that the top of the mountain would remain inviolate. Every climber or climbing group that has reached the summit has followed this tradition.[7] Other members of this expedition included John Angelo Jackson and Tom Mackinon.[9]

  

geometry

Warm yellow shot back from the times where snow was not an issue and the burning august sun painted shadows on a basket ball field in Hamburg Hafencity...

Leica M6 TTL 2.0/35mm Summicron (I)

Fuji Superia 200 (C-41)

Epson 700 (scan from negative)

Windsor (/ˈwɪnzər/) is a town and unparished area in the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead in Berkshire, England. It is widely known as the site of Windsor Castle, one of the official residences of the British Royal Family.

 

The town is situated 23 miles (37 km) west of Charing Cross, London. It is immediately south of the River Thames, which forms its boundary with Eton. The village of Old Windsor, just over 2 miles (3 km) to the south, predates what is now called Windsor by around 300 years; in the past Windsor was formally referred to as New Windsor to distinguish the two.

 

The early history of the site is unknown, although it was almost certainly settled some years before 1070 when William the Conquerorhad a timber motte and bailey castle constructed.[2] The focus of royal interest at that time was not the castle, however, but a small riverside settlement about 3 miles (5 km) downstream, possibly established from the 7th century.

 

Windsor, or Windlesora as it was called in the 11th century, is first mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. The name originates from old English Windles-ore, or 'winch by the riverside'. The settlement had used an earlier name, but this is unknown. From about the 8th century, high status people started to visit the site occasionally, and possibly this included royalty. From the 11th century the site's link with king Edward the Confessor is documented, but again, information about his use of the place is scant. After the Conquest of 1066 royal use of the site increased, probably because it offered good access to woodlands and opportunities for hunting – a sport which also practised military skills. By the late 12th century, and the relocation of the royal household to an enlarged castle in 1110, the site was renamed Old Windsor.

 

Windsor Castle is noted in the Domesday Bookunder the entry for Clewer, the neighbouring manor to Windsor. Although this might seem strange, it occurred because plans for the castle had changed since 1070, and more land had been acquired in Clewer on which to site a castle town. This plan was not actioned until the early 12th century. By 1110, meetings of the Great Council, which had previously taken place at Windlesora, were noted as taking place at the Castle – referred to as New Windsor, probably to indicate that it was a two ward castle/borough complex, similar to other early castle designs, such as Denbigh. Henry I – according to one chronicle – had rebuilt it, and this followed the Norman kings' actions at other royal sites, such as Westminster, where larger and more magnificent accommodation was thought necessary for the new dynasty. King Henry married his second wife at Windsor Castle in 1121, after the White Ship disaster. The settlement at Old Windsor largely transferred to New Windsor during the 12th century, although substantial planning and setting out of the new town (including the parish church, marketplace, bridge, hermitage and leper hospital) did not take place until c. 1170, under Henry II, following the civil war of Stephen's reign. At about the same time, the present upper ward of the castle was rebuilt in stone. Windsor Bridge is the earliest bridge on the Thames between Staines and Reading, built at a time when bridge building was rare; it was first documented in 1191, but had probably been built, according to the Pipe rolls, in 1173. It played an important part in the national road system, linking London with Reading and Winchester, but also, by diverting traffic into the new town, it underpinned the success of its fledgling economy.

 

The town of New Windsor, as an ancient demesne of the Crown, was a privileged settlement from the start, apparently having the rights of a 'free borough', for which other towns had to pay substantial fees to the king. It had a merchant guild (known by the 14th century as the Fraternity or brotherhood of the Holy Trinity) from the early 13th century and, under royal patronage, was made the chief town of the county in 1277, as part of its grant of royal borough status by Edward I's charter. Somewhat unusually, this charter gave no new rights or privileges to Windsor but probably codified the rights which it had enjoyed for many years. Windsor's position as chief town of Berkshire was short-lived, however, as people found it difficult to reach. Wallingford took over this position in the early 14th century. As a self-governing town Windsor enjoyed a number of freedoms unavailable to other towns, including the right to hold its own borough court, the right of membership (or 'freedom') and some financial independence. The town accounts of the 16th century survive in part, although most of the once substantial borough archive dating back to the 12th century was destroyed, probably in the late 17th century.

 

The early history of the site is unknown, although it was almost certainly settled some years before 1070 when William the Conquerorhad a timber motte and bailey castle constructed.[2] The focus of royal interest at that time was not the castle, however, but a small riverside settlement about 3 miles (5 km) downstream, possibly established from the 7th century.

 

Windsor, or Windlesora as it was called in the 11th century, is first mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. The name originates from old English Windles-ore, or 'winch by the riverside'. The settlement had used an earlier name, but this is unknown. From about the 8th century, high status people started to visit the site occasionally, and possibly this included royalty. From the 11th century the site's link with king Edward the Confessor is documented, but again, information about his use of the place is scant. After the Conquest of 1066 royal use of the site increased, probably because it offered good access to woodlands and opportunities for hunting – a sport which also practised military skills. By the late 12th century, and the relocation of the royal household to an enlarged castle in 1110, the site was renamed Old Windsor.

 

Windsor Castle is noted in the Domesday Bookunder the entry for Clewer, the neighbouring manor to Windsor. Although this might seem strange, it occurred because plans for the castle had changed since 1070, and more land had been acquired in Clewer on which to site a castle town. This plan was not actioned until the early 12th century. By 1110, meetings of the Great Council, which had previously taken place at Windlesora, were noted as taking place at the Castle – referred to as New Windsor, probably to indicate that it was a two ward castle/borough complex, similar to other early castle designs, such as Denbigh. Henry I – according to one chronicle – had rebuilt it, and this followed the Norman kings' actions at other royal sites, such as Westminster, where larger and more magnificent accommodation was thought necessary for the new dynasty. King Henry married his second wife at Windsor Castle in 1121, after the White Ship disaster. The settlement at Old Windsor largely transferred to New Windsor during the 12th century, although substantial planning and setting out of the new town (including the parish church, marketplace, bridge, hermitage and leper hospital) did not take place until c. 1170, under Henry II, following the civil war of Stephen's reign. At about the same time, the present upper ward of the castle was rebuilt in stone. Windsor Bridge is the earliest bridge on the Thames between Staines and Reading, built at a time when bridge building was rare; it was first documented in 1191, but had probably been built, according to the Pipe rolls, in 1173. It played an important part in the national road system, linking London with Reading and Winchester, but also, by diverting traffic into the new town, it underpinned the success of its fledgling economy.

 

The town of New Windsor, as an ancient demesne of the Crown, was a privileged settlement from the start, apparently having the rights of a 'free borough', for which other towns had to pay substantial fees to the king. It had a merchant guild (known by the 14th century as the Fraternity or brotherhood of the Holy Trinity) from the early 13th century and, under royal patronage, was made the chief town of the county in 1277, as part of its grant of royal borough status by Edward I's charter. Somewhat unusually, this charter gave no new rights or privileges to Windsor but probably codified the rights which it had enjoyed for many years. Windsor's position as chief town of Berkshire was short-lived, however, as people found it difficult to reach. Wallingford took over this position in the early 14th century. As a self-governing town Windsor enjoyed a number of freedoms unavailable to other towns, including the right to hold its own borough court, the right of membership (or 'freedom') and some financial independence. The town accounts of the 16th century survive in part, although most of the once substantial borough archive dating back to the 12th century was destroyed, probably in the late 17th century.

  

The Last Supper by Franz de Cleyn in the West Gallery of Windsor parish church of St John The Baptist.[3]

New Windsor was a nationally significant town in the Middle Ages, certainly one of the fifty wealthiest towns in the country by 1332. Its prosperity came from its close association with the royal household. The repeated investment in the castle brought London merchants (goldsmiths, vintners, spicers and mercers) to the town in the late 13th century and provided much employment for townsmen. The development of the castle under Edward III, between 1350–68, was the largest secular building project in England of the Middle Ages, and many Windsor people worked on this project, again bringing great wealth to the town. Although the Black Death in 1348 had reduced some towns' populations by up to 50%, in Windsor the building projects of Edward III brought money to the town, and possibly its population doubled: this was a 'boom' time for the local economy. People came to the town from every part of the country, and from continental Europe. The poet Geoffrey Chaucerheld the honorific post of 'Clerk of the Works' at Windsor Castle in 1391.

 

The development of the castle continued in the late 15th century with the rebuilding of St George's Chapel. With this Windsor became a major pilgrimage destination, particularly for Londoners. Pilgrims came to touch the royal shrine of the murdered Henry VI, the fragment of the True Cross and other important relics. Visits to the chapel were probably combined with a visit to the important nearby Marian shrine and college at Eton, founded by Henry VI in 1440, and dedicated to the Assumption; which is now better known as Eton College. Pilgrims came with substantial sums to spend. From perhaps two or three named inns in the late 15th century, some 30 can be identified a century later. The town again grew in wealth. For London pilgrims, Windsor was probably – but briefly – of greater importance than Canterbury and the shrine of the City's patron Saint Thomas Becket. With the closures of the Reformation, however, Windsor's pilgrim traffic died out. Henry VIII was buried in St George's Chapel in 1547, next to Jane Seymour, the mother of his only legitimate son, Edward (Edward VI). Henry, the founder of the Church of England, may have wanted to benefit from the stream of Catholic pilgrims coming to the town. His will gives that impression.

 

The town began to stagnate about ten years after the Reformation. The castle was considered old-fashioned and shrines to the dead were thought to be superstitious. The early modern period formed a stark contrast to the medieval history of the town. Most accounts of Windsor in the 16th and 17th centuries talk of its poverty, badly made streets and poor housing. Shakespeare's play The Merry Wives of Windsor is set in Windsor and contains many references to parts of the town and the surrounding countryside. Shakespeare must have walked the town's streets, near the castle and river, much as people still do. The play may have been written in the Garter Inn, opposite the Castle, but this was destroyed by fire in the late 17th century. The long-standing – and famous – courtesan of king Charles II, Nell Gwyn, was given a house on St Albans Street: Burford House (now part of the Royal Mews). Her residence in this house, as far as it is possible to tell, was brief. Only one of her letters addressed from Burford House survives: it was probably intended as a legacy for her illegitimate son, the Earl of Burford, later the Duke of St Albans.

 

Windsor was garrisoned by Colonel Venn during the English Civil War. Later it became the home of the New Model Army when Venn had left the castle in 1645. Despite its royal dependence, like many commercial centres, Windsor was a Parliamentarian town. Charles Iwas buried without ceremony in St George's Chapel after his execution at Whitehall in 1649. The present Guildhall, built in 1680–91, replaced an earlier market house that had been built on the same site around 1580, as well as the old guildhall, which faced the castle and had been built around 1350. The contraction in the number of old public buildings speaks of a town 'clearing the decks', ready for a renewed period of prosperity with Charles II's return to the Castle. But his successors did not use the place, and as the town was short of money, the planned new civic buildings did not appear. The town continued in poverty until the mid 19th century.

 

In 1652 the largest house in Windsor Great Park was built on land which Oliver Cromwell had appropriated from the Crown. Now known as Cumberland Lodge after the Duke of Cumberland's residence there in the mid 18th century, the house was variously known as Byfield House, New Lodge, Ranger's Lodge, Windsor Lodge and Great Lodge.

 

In 1778, there was a resumption of the royal presence, with George III at the Queen's Lodge and, from 1804, at the castle. This started a period of new development in Windsor, with the building of two army barracks. However the associated large numbers of soldiers led to a major prostitution problem by 1830, in a town where the number of streets had little changed since 1530. In the 18th c. the town traded with London selling the Windsor Chair which was actually made in Buckinghamshire.

 

A number of fine houses were built in this period, including Hadleigh House on Sheet Street, which was built in 1793 by the then Mayor of Windsor, William Thomas. In 1811 it was the home of John O'Reilly, the apothecary-surgeon to George III.

 

Windsor Castle was the westernmost sighting-point for the Anglo-French Survey (1784–1790), which measured the precise distance between the Royal Greenwich Observatory and the Paris Observatory by trigonometry. Windsor was used because of its relative proximity to the base-line of the survey at Hounslow Heath.

 

The substantial redevelopment of the castle in the subsequent decade and Queen Victoria's residence from 1840, as well as the coming of two railways in 1849, signalled the most dramatic changes in the town's history. These events catapulted the town from a sleepy medieval has-been to the centre of empire – many European crowned heads of state came to Windsor to visit the Queen throughout the rest of the 19th century. Unfortunately, excessive redevelopment and 'refurbishment' of Windsor's medieval fabric at this time resulted in widespread destruction of the old town, including the demolition of the old parish church of St John the Baptist in 1820. The original had been built around 1135.

 

Most of the current town's streets date from the mid to late 19th century.[5] However the main street, Peascod Street (pronunciation: /ˈpɛskɒd/) is very ancient, predating the castle by many years, and probably of Saxon origin. It formed part of the 10th-century parish structure in east Berkshire[citation needed] and is first referred to as Peascroftstret in c. 1170. The 1000-year-old royal Castle, although the largest and longest-occupied in Europe, is a recent development in comparison. "New Windsor" was officially renamed "Windsor" in 1974.

 

is accessible from Junction 6 of the M4 and from Slough via a 3 mile long dual carriageway. Bus services in the town are mostly provided by First Berkshire & The Thames Valley, although a park-and-rideservice and one local route are operated by Courtney Coaches.

 

Windsor has two railway stations. Windsor & Eton Central railway station has a shuttle service to Slough. Windsor & Eton Riverside station provides a service to London Waterloo. Both stations were time in the 19th century, as the two train companies which owned the lines both wanted to carry Queen Victoria to Windsor, with the first line opened gaining the privilege.[8] From 1883 to 1885, the London Underground's District line's westbound service ran as far as Windsor.

 

Windsor has frequent bus services to/from London Heathrow Airport, Victoria Coach Station in central London and Legoland Windsor Resort.

  

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windsor,_Berkshire

  

Rime ice clings to a trig beacon at Mt Holdsworth after a winter storm. At 1470 m, this is one of the higher, yet more accessible peaks in the Tararua Range. The beacon itself is about 4 m tall.

Pyramidal Forms Project

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Intellectual & conceptual:

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Narayanganj, Bangladesh.

  

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Far from the urban chaos....deep inside the rustic rhythm.

 

Captured from Boidder bazar, Narayanganj, Bangladesh.

  

All rights reserved worldwide. DO NOT use this image in any commercial, non-commercial or blogging purpose without my explicit permission. Otherwise, you'll face legal action for violating national or international copyright law.

 

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Wilpena Pound.

For this northern latitude Wilpena Pound has good rainfall and a microclimate because of the surrounding hills. It was always a special place for Aboriginal people and a prized location for sheep pastoralists. At Cradock they average 250 mms annually, Hawker rises to 300 mm and Wilpena has 390 mms (15 inches in the old rainfall). Further north at Marree the average is just 136 mm a year. Wilpena Creek flows out of the Pound which covers 80 square kilometres (20,000 acres). It is 6 kms wide and 16 kms long and its highest surrounding peak is Mt Mary at 1,171 m or 3,842 feet. In 1840 Edward John Eyre and others explored parts of the Flinders Ranges but they did not discover Wilpena Pound. That was achieved by C Bagot in 1851. Bagot said in the press that there was only one ingress or egress to flat land with a permanent running creek suitable for depasturing 500 cattle. This plain was surrounded by steep rocky walls up to 1,000 feet high. The government responded by immediately sending Mr Burr of the Survey Office to the Pound for a trigonometrical survey in June 1851. Bagot gave it its Aboriginal name. The furthest north leasehold run in 1851 was at Kanyaka between Quorn and Hawker. The Wilpena run was also taken out in 1851 and originally covered 850 square miles but that was soon reduced into other leaseholds. Drs William and John Browne took over the Wilpena leasehold and by 1853 the pine slab homestead was built (demolished 1931) and shearing sheds and workers cottages soon followed. George Marchant got a 14 year lease of 85 square miles on 1 January 1855. In 1857 he employed a manager Charles Powell, whose father had planted the first mulberry tree at Kingscote in 1836, and he stayed at Wilpena station until 1882 but with various owners. By 1860 Dr William Browne held Wilpena run and he sold off the Arkaba section in 1863 before the big drought. By 1861 Henry Strong Price owned the leasehold which he tried to sell but could find no buyer. A report on Wilpena in 1865 says it covered 154 square miles and employed 19 married men and their wives, 24 single men and 41 children making a total of 101 people. Later in the 19th century Dr William Browne owned Wilpena again and the government resumed most of it in January 1880. Tourism came to Wilpena Pound in 1920 when the Wilpena Forest Reserve was created but the run was leased to graziers until 1945. At that time the Rasheed family established the chalet and all grazing in the Pound ceased. In 1970 the adjoining Orraparinna station was purchased by the government to create Flinders Ranges National Park. Finally in 1985 the government bought the leasehold to Wilpena station to add to the park. Its name was changed from Flinders National Park to Ikara Flinders National Park in 2016 thus incorporating, an Adnyamathanha word from the traditional land occupiers, into the title. The Adnyamathanha people and their sub clans have been in the area for around 15,000 years.

The Pound is a natural amphitheatre with Rawnsley Bluff at the southern end (he was the surveyor of runs in the 1850s). The Pound has a fascinating geomorphological structure. The landscape here was deeply folded with synclines and anticlines. Synclines are downward folds of earth layers with a trough at the bottom i.e. Wilpena Pound. Anticlines are the peaks of the layers but in the Flinders Ranges the anticlines have been eroded away over vast geological eras leaving rugged edges above the synclines or troughs. The trough of Wilpena Pound has a layer of quartzite, then other layers beneath that. The end of the anticline from the western side of the Pound is the Elder Range. The true shape of the formation reveals itself from the air.

 

Calais (/ˈkæleɪ/ cal-ay, traditionally /ˈkælɨs/; French pronunciation: ​[kaˈlɛ]; Picard: Calés; Dutch: Kales) is a town and major ferry port in northern France in the department of Pas-de-Calais, of which it is a sub-prefecture. Although Calais is by far the largest city in Pas-de-Calais, the department's prefecture is its third-largest city of Arras. The population of the metropolitan area at the 2010 census was 126,395. Calais overlooks the Strait of Dover, the narrowest point in the English Channel, which is only 34 km (21 mi) wide here, and is the closest French town to England. The White Cliffs of Dover can easily be seen on a clear day from Calais. Calais is a major port for ferries between France and England, and since 1994, the Channel Tunnel has linked nearby Coquelles to Folkestone by rail.

 

Due to its position, Calais since the Middle Ages has been a major port and a very important centre for transport and trading with England. It was annexed by Edward III of England in 1347 and grew into a thriving centre for wool production. Calais was a territorial possession of England until its capture by France in 1558. The town came to be called the "brightest jewel in the English crown" owing to its great importance as the gateway for the tin, lead, lace and wool trades (or "staples"). In 1805 it was a staging area for Napoleon's troops for several months during his planned invasion of the United Kingdom. The town was virtually razed to the ground during World War II, when in May 1940, it was a strategic bombing target of the invading German forces who took the town during the Siege of Calais. During World War II, the Germans built massive bunkers along the coast in preparation for launching missiles on England.

 

The old part of the town, Calais proper (known as Calais-Nord), is situated on an artificial island surrounded by canals and harbours. The modern part of the town, St-Pierre, lies to the south and south-east. In the centre of the old town is the Place d'Armes, in which stands the Tour du Guet, or watch-tower, a structure built in the 13th century, which was used as a lighthouse until 1848 when a new lighthouse was built by the port. South east of the Place is the church of Notre-Dame, built during the English occupancy of Calais. It is arguably the only church built in the English perpendicular style in all of France. In this church former French President Charles de Gaulle married his wife Yvonne Vendroux. South of the Place and opposite the Parc St Pierre is the Hôtel-de-ville (the town hall), and the belfry from the 16th and early 17th centuries. Today, Calais is visited by more than 10 million annually. Aside from being a key transport hub, Calais is also a notable fishing port and a centre for fish marketing, and some 3,000 people are still employed in the lace industry for which the town is also famed.

 

History

Early history

Although the early history of habitation in the area is limited, the Romans called the settlement Caletum. Julius Caesar mustered 800 to 1,000 sailing boats, five legions and some 2,000 horses at Calais due to its strategic position to attack Britannia.[1] At some time prior to the 10th century, it would have been a fishing village on a sandy beach backed by pebbles and a creek,[2] with a natural harbour[3] located at the western edge of the early medieval estuary of the River Aa. As the pebble and sand ridge extended eastward from Calais, the haven behind it developed into fen, as the estuary progressively filled with silt and peat. Subsequently, canals were cut between Saint-Omer, the trading centre formerly at the head of the estuary, and three places to the west, centre and east on the newly formed coast: respectively Calais, Gravelines and Dunkirk.[4] Calais was improved by the Count of Flanders in 997 and fortified by the Count of Boulogne in 1224.[1][3]

 

The first document mentioning the existence of this community is the town charter granted by Mathieu d'Alsace in 1181 to Gerard de Guelders, Count of Boulogne; Calais thus became part of the county of Boulogne.[1][5] In 1189, Richard the Lionheart is documented to have landed at Calais on his journey to the Third Crusade.[1] In medieval times, the settlement was inhabited by people who spoke Dutch, and who called it Kales.[citation needed] It is mentioned in Welsh documents as Caled, in Irish documents as Calad and in Breton documents as Kaled.

 

English wool trade interests and King Edward III's claims to be heir to the Kingdom of France led to the Battle of Crécy between England and France in 1346,[6] followed by Edward's siege and capture of Calais in 1347.[7] Angered, the English king demanded reprisals against the town's citizens for holding out for so long and ordered that the town's population be killed en masse. He agreed, however, to spare them, on condition that six of the principal citizens would come to him, bareheaded and barefooted and with ropes around their necks, and give themselves up to death.[8] On their arrival he ordered their execution, but pardoned them when his queen, Philippa of Hainault, begged him to spare their lives.[9][10] This event is commemorated in The Burghers of Calais (Les Bourgeois de Calais), one of the most famous sculptures by Auguste Rodin, erected in the city in 1895.[11] Though sparing the lives of the delegation members, King Edward drove out most of the French inhabitants, and settled the town with English. The municipal charter of Calais, previously granted by the Countess of Artois, was reconfirmed by Edward that year (1347).[12]

  

In 1360 the Treaty of Brétigny assigned Guînes, Marck and Calais—collectively the "Pale of Calais"—to English rule in perpetuity, but this assignment was informally and only partially implemented.[13] On 9 February 1363 the town was made a staple port.[14] It had by 1372 become a parliamentary borough sending burgesses to the House of Commons of the Parliament of England.[15] It remained part of the Diocese of Thérouanne from 1379, keeping an ecclesiastical tie with France.[16]

 

The town came to be called the "brightest jewel in the English crown" owing to its great importance as the gateway for the tin, lead, cloth and wool trades (or "staples").[17] Its customs revenues amounted at times to a third of the English government's revenue, with wool being the most important element by far. Of its population of about 12,000 people, as many as 5,400 were recorded as having been connected with the wool trade. The governorship or Captaincy of Calais was a lucrative and highly prized public office; the famous Dick Whittington was simultaneously Lord Mayor of the City of London and Mayor of the Staple in 1407.[18]

  

Calais was regarded for many years as being an integral part of the Kingdom of England, with its representatives sitting in the English Parliament. The continued English hold on Calais however depended on expensively maintained fortifications, as the town lacked any natural defences. Maintaining Calais was a costly business that was frequently tested by the forces of France and the Duchy of Burgundy, with the Franco-Burgundian border running nearby.[19] The British historian Geoffrey Elton once remarked "Calais—expensive and useless—was better lost than kept".[20] The duration of the English hold over Calais was, to a large extent, the result of the feud between Burgundy and France, under which both sides coveted the town, but preferred to see it in the hands of the English rather than their domestic rivals. The stalemate was broken by the victory of the French crown over Burgundy following Joan of Arc's final battle in the Siege of Compiègne in 1430, and the later incorporation of the duchy into France.[21]

 

16th century

In 1532, English king Henry VIII visited Calais and his men calculated that the town had about 2400 beds and stabling to keep some 2000 horses.[22] In September 1552, the English adventurer Thomas Stukley, who had been for some time in the French service, betrayed to the authorities in London some French plans for the capture of Calais, to be followed by a descent upon England.[23] Stukley himself might have been the author of these plans.

 

On 7 January 1558, king Henry II of France sent forces led by Francis, Duke of Guise, who laid siege to Calais.[24] When the French attacked, they were able to surprise the English at the critical strongpoint of Fort Nieulay and the sluice gates, which could have flooded the attackers, remained unopened.[25] The loss was regarded by Queen Mary I of England as a dreadful misfortune. When she heard the news, she reportedly said, "When I am dead and opened, you shall find 'Philip' [her husband] and 'Calais' lying in my heart."[26] The region around Calais, then-known as the Calaisis, was renamed the Pays Reconquis ("Reconquered Country") in commemoration of its recovery by the French.[27] Use of the term is reminiscent of the Spanish Reconquista, with which the French were certainly familiar—and, since it occurred in the context of a war with Spain (Philip II of Spain was at the time Queen Mary's consort), might have been intended as a deliberate snub.[28] After that time the Dutch-speaking population was forced to speak French.

 

The town was captured by the Spanish on 24 April 1596 in an invasion mounted from the nearby Spanish Netherlands by Archduke Albert of Austria, but it was returned to France under the Treaty of Vervins in May 1598.[29][30]

 

17th century to World War I

Calais remained an important maritime city and smuggling center throughout the 17th century. However, during the next century the port of Calais began to stagnate gradually, as the nearby ports of Boulogne and Dunkirk began to rise and compete.

 

The French revolution at the end of the 18th century did not disturb Calais and no executions took place.[31]

  

World War II bunkers at Calais

In 1805, Calais hosted part of Napoleon's army and invasion fleet for several months before his aborted invasion of Britain.[32] From October to December 1818, the British army used Calais as their departing port to return home after occupying post-Waterloo France. General Murray appointed Sir Manley Power to oversee the evacuation of British troops from France. Cordial relations had been restored by that time and on 3 December the mayor of Calais wrote a letter to Power to express thanks for his "considerate treatment of the French and of the town of Calais during the embarkation."[33]

  

Debris from the Siege of Calais

The British Expeditionary Force or BEF arrived in Calais on its way to the nearby frontline cutting through Nord-Pas-de-Calais and Flanders. Calais was a key port for the supply of arms and reinforcements to the Western Front.[34] In the 1930s, the town was known for being a politically socialist stronghold.[35]

 

World War II

Calais was virtually razed to the ground during World War II.[36] In May 1940, it was a key objective of the invading German forces and became the scene of a last-ditch defence—the Siege of Calais—which diverted a sizable amount of German forces for several days immediately prior to the Battle of Dunkirk. 3,000 British and 800 French troops, assisted by Royal Navy warships, held out from 22 to 27 May 1940 against the 10th Panzer Division. The town was flattened by artillery and precision dive bombing and only 30 of the 3800-strong defending force were evacuated before the town fell. This may have helped Operation Dynamo, the evacuation of Allied forces at Dunkirk, as 10th Panzer would have been involved on the Dunkirk perimeter had it not been busy at Calais.[37] Between 26 May and 4 June 1940, some 330,000 Allied troops escaped from the Germans at Dunkirk.[38]

 

During the ensuing German occupation, it became the command post for German forces in the Pas-de-Calais/Flanders region and was very heavily fortified, as it was generally believed by the Germans that the Allies would invade at that point.[39] It was also used as a launch site for V1 flying bombs and for much of the war, the Germans used the region as the site for railway guns used to bombard the south-eastern corner of England. In 1943 they built massive bunkers along the coast in preparation for launching missiles on the southeast of England.[40] Despite heavy preparations for defence against an amphibious assault, the Allied invasion took place well to the west in Normandy on D-Day. Calais was very heavily bombed and shelled in a successful effort to disrupt German communications and persuade them that the Allies would target the Pas-de-Calais for invasion (rather than Normandy). The town, by then largely in ruins, was liberated by General Daniel Spry's 3rd Canadian Infantry Division between 25 September and 1 October 1944.[41] On 27 February 1945 Calais suffered a last bombing raid—this time by British bombers who mistook the town for Dunkirk, which was at that time still occupied by German forces.[42] After the war there was little rebuilding of the historic city and most buildings were modern ones.

 

21st century - migration issues

 

Since 1999 or earlier, an increasingly large number of migrants and refugees have started to arrive in the vicinity of Calais, where they remain living in the Calais jungle, the nickname given to a series of makeshift camps. The people live there while they attempt to enter the United Kingdom by stowing away on lorries, ferries, cars, or trains travelling through the Port of Calais or the Eurotunnel Calais Terminal.[43] The people are a mix of refugees, asylum seekers and economic migrants from Darfur, Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Eritrea and other troubled areas of the world.

 

The Calais migrant crisis[44] led to escalating tension between the UK and France in the summer of 2015.[45] The UK blamed France for not doing enough to stop migrants from entering the tunnel or making attempts to scale fences built along the border. The British Prime Minister David Cameron released a statement saying that illegal immigrants would be removed from the UK even if they reach the island.[46] To discourage migrants and refugees from jumping on train shuttles at Calais, the UK government supplied fencing to be installed in the Eurotunnel where the vehicles are loaded on to train shuttles in Calais.

 

Geography and climate

 

Calais is located on the Pas de Calais, which marks the boundary between the English Channel and North Sea and located at the opposite end of the Channel Tunnel, 34 kilometres (21 miles) from Dover. On a clear day the White cliffs of Dover can be viewed across the channel.[47] Aside from being an important port and boarding point between France and England, it is at the nucleus of many major railway and highway networks and connected by road to Arras, Lens, Béthune and St. Omer. Dunkirk is located about 47 km (29 mi) by road to the east.[48] Calais is located 288 km (179 mi) north by road from the French capital of Paris, roughly a 3-hour 15 minute journey.[48] The commune of Calais is bordered by the English channel to the north, Sangatte and Coquelles to the west, Coulogne to the south and Marck to the east. The core area of the city is divided into the Old Town area within the old city walls, and the younger suburbs of St. Pierre, which are connected by a boulevard.

 

Calais is part of the Côte d'Opale (Opal Coast), a cliff-lined section of northern French coast that parallels the white cliffs on the British coast and is part of the same geological formation. It is known for its scenic cliffs such as Cape Blanc Nez and Cape Gris Nez and for its wide area of dunes. Many artists have been inspired by its landscapes, among them the composer Henri Dutilleux, the writers Victor Hugo and Charles Dickens, and the painters J. M. W. Turner, Carolus-Duran, Maurice Boitel and Eugène Boudin. It was the painter Édouard Lévêque who coined the name for this area in 1911 to describe the distinctive quality of its light.[49]

 

The climate is temperate oceanic in Calais. Temperature ranges are moderate and the winters are mild with unstable weather. It rains on average about 700 to 800 mm (28 to 31 in) per year.

 

Economy

 

Town centre

 

The city's proximity to England has made it a major port for centuries. It is the principal ferry crossing point between England and France, with the vast majority of Channel crossings being made between Dover and Calais. Companies operating from Calais include SeaFrance (currently in liquidation[57]), DFDS Seaways,[58] and P&O Ferries.[59] The French end of the Channel Tunnel is situated in the vicinity of Calais, in Coquelles some 4 miles (6.4 km) to the west of the town. Calais possesses direct rail links to Paris, 148 miles (238 km) to the south. More than 10 million people visit Calais annually.[32]

 

From medieval times, English companies thrived in Calais. Calais was a particularly important centre in the production and trade of wool and cloth, which outweighed the costs of maintaining the town as part of England. In 1830 some 113 manufacturers were based in Calais and the St Pierre suburbs, the majority of which were English.[60] There are still two major lace factories in Calais with around 700 looms and 3000 employees.[60] The town exports in the early 20th century were lace, chemicals, paper, wines, especially champagne, spirits, hay, straw, wool, potatoes, woven goods, fruit, glass-ware, lace and metal-ware.[61] Principal imports in the early 20th century included cotton and silk goods, coal, iron and steel, petroleum, timber, raw wool, cotton yarn and cork.[61] During the five years 1901–1905 the average annual value of exports was £8,388,000 (£6,363,000 in the years 1896–1900), of imports £4,145,000 (£3,759,000 in 1896–1900).[61]

 

As a fishing port, Calais has several notable fishing markets including Les Délices de la Mer and Huîtrière Calaisenne on the Boulevard La Fayette, the latter of which is noted for its oysters, lobster and crabs from Brittany. The Emile Fournier et Fils market on the Rue Mouron sells mainly smoked fish including salmon, trout, herring and halibut.[62]

 

Notable landmarks

 

Place d'Armes

 

Place d'Armes is one of the largest squares in the city of Calais, adjoins the watchtower, and during medieval times was once the heart of the city. During the English occupation (1347–1558), it became known as Market Square (place du Marché). Only at the end of English occupation did it take the name of Place d'Armes. After the reconquest of Calais in 1558 by Francis, Duke of Guise, Francis II gave Calais the right to hold a fair twice a year on the square, which still exists today, as well as a bustling Wednesday and Saturday market.[63]

 

Hôtel de Ville

The town centre, which has seen significant regeneration over the past decade, is dominated by its distinctive town hall (Hôtel de Ville) at Place du Soldat Inconnu. It was built in the Flemish Renaissance style between 1911 and 1925 to commemorate the unification of the cities of Calais and Saint Pierre in 1885.[64] A previous town hall had been erected in 1818.[65] One of the most elegant landmarks in the city, its ornate 74 metre (246 ft) high clock tower and belfry can be seen from out to sea and chimes throughout the day and has been protected by UNESCO since 2005 as part of a series of belfries across the region.[66] The building parts have also been listed as a series of historic monuments by government decree of 26 June 2003, including its roofs and belfry, main hall, glass roof, the staircase, corridor serving the first floor, the rooms on the first floor (including decoration): the wedding room, the VIP lounge, the lounge of the council and the cabinet room. The hall has stained glass windows and numerous paintings and exquisite decor.[64] It houses police offices.[35]

 

Église Notre-Dame

 

Église Notre-Dame is a cathedral which was originally built in the late 13th century and its tower was added in the late 14th or early 15th century. Like the town hall it is one of the city's most prominent landmarks. It was arguably the only church in the English perpendicular style in France.[67] Much of the current 1400 capacity church dates to 1631–1635.[67] It contains elements of Flemish, Gothic, Anglo-Norman and Tudor architecture. In 1691, an 1800 cubic metre cistern was added to the church under orders by Vauban.[68] The church is dedicated to the Virgin, and built in the form of a cross, consisting of a nave and four aisles—[69] The old grand altar dated to 1628 and was built from Carrara marble wrecked on the coast, during its transit from Genoa to Antwerp. It contained eighteen figures, the two standing on either side of the altar-piece—representing St. Louis and Charlemagne.[69] The organ—of a deep and mellow tone, and highly ornamented by figures in relief—was built at Canterbury sometime around 1700. The pulpit and reading-desk, richly sculptured in oak, is another well-executed piece of ecclesiastical workmanship from St. Omers. The altar-piece, the Assumption, was often attributed to Anthony van Dyck, though in reality it is by Van Sulden; whilst the painting over the side altar, believed to be by Peter Paul Rubens.[69] A high and strongly built wall, partaking more of the fortress than a cathedral in its aspect, flanks the building, and protects it from the street where formerly ran the old river, in its course through Calais to the sea.[69]

 

The square, massive Norman tower has three-arched belfry windows on each face, surmounted by corner turrets, and a conically-shaped tower of octagonal proportions, topped again by a short steeple. The tower was a main viewing point for the Anglo-French Survey (1784–1790) which linked the Paris Observatory with the Royal Greenwich Observatory using trigonometry. Cross-channel sightings were made of signal lights at Dover Castle and Fairlight, East Sussex.

 

The church was assigned as a historic monument by decree of 10 September 1913, only to have its stained glass smashed during a Zeppelin bombardment on 15 January 1915, falling through the roof.[70][71] General de Gaulle married Yvonne Vendroux on 6 April 1921 at the cathedral.[68] The building experienced extensive damage during World War II, and was partially rebuilt, although much of the old altar and furnishings were not replaced.

 

Towers

 

Tour de Guet

The Tour du Guet (Watch Tower), situated in Calais Nord on the Places d'Armes, is one of the few surviving pre-war buildings. Dating from 1229, when Philip I, Count of Boulogne, built the fortifications of Calais, it is one of the oldest monuments of Calais, although the oldest remaining traces date to 1302.[72] It has a height of 35–39 metres (sources differ). An earthquake in 1580 split the tower in two, and at one time it threatened to collapse completely.[73] The tower was repaired in 1606, and then had the purpose of serving as a hall to accommodate the merchants of Calais.[73] It was damaged in 1658 when a young stable boy set fire to it, while it was temporarily being used as royal stables during a visit of King Louis XIV.[74] It was not repaired for some 30 years. In 1770,[39] a bell identical to the original bell of 1348 was cast. Due to its height, from the late 17th century it became an important watchout post for the city for centuries until 1905;[72] the last keeper of the tower was forced to leave in 1926. Abraham Chappe, (a brother of Ignace Chappe) installed a telegraph office in the tower in 1816 and operated for 32 years.[65] It was this office which announced the death of Napoleon I to the French public in 1821. It also had the dual function as lighthouse with a rotating beacon fuelled by oil from 1818.[72] The lantern was finally replaced by a new lighthouse on 15 October 1848. During the First World War, it served as a military observation post and narrowly missed destruction during World War II.[73] This tower has been classified as a historic monument since 6 November 1931.[73]

 

The Calais Lighthouse (Le phare de Calais) was built in 1848, replacing the old watch tower as the lighthouse of the port. The 55 metre high tower was electrified in 1883 and automated in 1992. The staircase has 271 steps leading up to the lantern. By day it is easily distinguishable from other coastal lighthouses by its white color and black lantern. The lighthouse was classified as a historical monument on 22 November 2010.

 

Forts

 

The Citadel of Calais

The Citadel, located on the Avenue Roger Salengro, was built between 1560 and 1571 on the site of a former medieval castle which was built in 1229 by Philippe de Hureprel.[29] Its purpose of its construction was to fend off would-be invaders, but it wasn't long until the city was successfully invaded by Archduke Albert of Austria on 24 April 1596. Both Louis XIII and Cardinal Richelieu at one time considered expanding the citadel and Calais into a great walled city for military harbour purposes but the proposals came to nothing.[29]

  

Fort Risban

Fort Risban, located on the coast on the Avenue Raymond Poincaré at the port entrance, was besieged by the English in November 1346 and was used by them until 1558 when Calais was restored to France. In 1596, the fort was captured by the Spanish Netherlands until May 1598 when it was returned to the French following the Treaty of Vervins. It was rebuilt in 1640.[75] Vauban, who visited the fort some time in the 1680s, described it as "a home for owls, and place to hold the Sabbath" rather than a fortification.[76] During World War II it served as an air raid shelter. It contains the Lancaster Tower, a name often given to the fort itself.[73]

 

Fort Nieulay, located along the Avenue Pierre Coubertin originally dated to the 12th or 13th century. During the English invasion in 1346, sluices gates were added as water defences and a fort was built up around it in 1525 on the principle that the people of the fort could defend the town by flooding it.[77] In April and May 1677, Louis XIV and Vauban visited Calais and ordered a complete rebuilding of Fort Nieulay. It was completed in 1679, with the purpose to protect the bridge of Nieulay crossing the Hames River.[78] By 1815 the fort had fallen into a ruined state and it wasn't until 1903 that it was sold and improved by its farmer tenants.[77] The fort was briefly the site of a low-key scuffle with Germans in May 1940.

 

Museums, theatres and cultural centres

  

Calais Theatre

Calais contains several museums. These include the Musée des Beaux-Arts et de la Dentelle de Calais, Cité internationale de la Dentelle et de la Mode de Calais and the Musée de la Seconde Guerre Mondiale (World War II museum). Cité internationale de la Dentelle et de la Mode de Calais is a lace and fashion museum located in an old Boulart factory on the canalside and contains workshops, a library and a restaurant and regularly puts on fashion shows.[60] The World War II museum is located at Parc St Pierre opposite the town hall and south of the train station. The building is a former Nazi bunker and wartime military headquarters, built in 1941 by the Todt Organisation. The 194-metre-long structure contains twenty rooms with relics and photographs related to World War II, and one room dedicated to World War I.[60][79]

 

Theatres and cultural centres include Le théâtre municipal, Le Centre Culturel Gérard Philipe, Le Conservatoire à rayonnement départemental (CRD), L'auditorium Didier Lockwood, L'École d'Art de Calais, Le Channel, Le Cinéma Alhambra and La Médiathèque municipale. Le théâtre municipal or Calais Theatre is located on the Boulevard Lafayette and was built in 1903 on a plot of land which was used as a cemetery between 1811 and 1871.[80] The theatre opened in 1905. On the first floor of the façade are statues which represent the performing arts subjects of Poetry, Comedy, Dance and Music.[80]

 

Monuments and memorials

 

The Burghers of Calais

 

Louis XVIII column

Directly in front of the town hall is a bronze cast of Les Bourgeois de Calais ("The Burghers of Calais"), a sculpture by Auguste Rodin to commemorate six men who were to have been executed by Edward III in 1347. The cast was erected in 1895, funded by a public grant of 10,000 francs.[11] Rodin (who based his design on a fourteenth-century account by Jean Froissart) intended to evoke the viewer's sympathy by emphasizing the pained expressions of the faces of the six men about to be executed.[11]

  

Monument Le Pluviôse

The Monument des Sauveteurs ("Rescuers' Monument") was installed in 1899 on Boulevard des Alliés, and transferred to the Quartier of Courgain in 1960. It is a bronze sculpture, attributed to Edward Lormier.

 

The Monument Le Pluviôse is a 620 kg (1,367 lb) bronze monument built in 1912 by Émile Oscar Guillaume on the centre of the roundabout near the beach of Calais, commemorating the accidental sinking of the submarine Pluviôse in May 1910, off the beach by the steamer Pas de Calais.[81] Armand Fallières, president of the Republic, and his government came to Calais for a state funeral for its 27 victims. One of these victims, Delpierre Auguste, (1889–1910), drowned at age 21 before the beach at Calais; a dock in the city is named for him. The monument was dedicated on June 22, 1913.

 

Monument "Jacquard" was erected on the square in 1910, opposite the entrance to the Calais theatre. It commemorates Joseph Marie Jacquard, popular in Calais because of his contribution to the development of lace through his invention of the Jacquard loom.[82]

 

A tall column in the Courgain area of the city commemorates a visit by Louis XVIII.

 

Parc Richelieu, a garden behind the war memorial, was built in 1862 on the old city ramparts and redesigned in 1956.[83] It contains a statue designed by Yves de Coëtlogon in 1962, remembering both world wars with an allegorical figure, representing Peace, which clutches an olive branch to her breast.[84]

 

Hotels and nightclubs

Hôtel Meurice de Calais is a hotel, established in 1771 as Le Chariot Royal by the French postmaster, Charles-Augustin Meurice, who would later establish the five-star Hôtel Meurice, one of Paris' most famous luxury hotels. It was one of the earliest hotels on the continent of Europe to specifically cater for the British elite.[85] The hotel was rebuilt in 1954–55.[86] It has 41 en-suite rooms.

 

The main centre of night activity in Calais is at the Casino Le Touquet’s on the Rue Royale and at the 555 Club. Every month, Casino Le Touquet hosts a dinner and dance cabaret. The casino features slot machines, blackjack, roulette, and poker facilities.[87]

 

Education

There are several schools in Calais. These include Groupe Scolaire Coubertin, Eglise Saint-Pierre, Universite du Littoral, Centre Universitaire,[48] Lycée HQE Léonard de Vinci on Rue du Pasteur Martin Luther-King, École d'Art de Calais on Rue des Soupirants, and the Centre Scolaire Saint-Pierre on Rue du Four à Chaux which provides education in the primary grades, high school, and vocational school.[88] There are at least seven colleges in the city, such as Collège Martin Luther King on Rue Martin Luther King, Collège Nationalisé Lucien Vadez on Avenue Yervant Toumaniantz, Collège Les Dentelliers on Rue Gaillard, College Jean Mace on Rue Maréchaux, Collège République on Place République, Collège Vauban on Rue Orléansville, and Collège Privé Mixte Jeanne d'Arc on Rue Champailler.

 

Sport

Calais is represented in association football by the Calais RUFC, who compete in the Championnat National. The club was founded 1902 as Racing Club de Calais and in 1974 was renamed as Calais Racing Union Football Club.[89] Calais RUFC have a good reputation in French cup competitions and went as far as the final in the 1999/2000 season, losing out finally to Nantes. Since 2008 they have played at the Stade de l'Épopée, a stadium which holds about 12,000 spectators. The rugby club in Calais is Amicale Rugby Calaisien. Basketball is popular in Calais with the teams Calais Basket (male) and COB Calais (female) as is volleyball with the Lis Calais (male) and Stella Calais (female) teams. There is also the SOC club which caters in a range of sports including athletics, handball and football and Yacht Club de Calais, a yachting club. Calais also has Les Seagulls, an American football team.

 

Transport

 

Sea

 

The Port of Calais was the first cable ship port in Europe and is the fourth largest port in France and the largest for passenger traffic.[97] The port accounts for more than a third of economic activity of the town of Calais. Cargo traffic has tripled over the past two decades. In 2007 more than 41.5 million tonnes of traffic passed through Calais with some 11.52 million passengers, 1.4 million trucks and trailers, 2.249 million cars and 4,700 crossings a year. On average, ships sail from the port every 30 minutes. A new 400 million euro project is underway at the port to create a breakwater protecting a pool of 700 meters long, thus allowing virtually all types of ships to stop at Calais.

 

Rail

As well as the large port, the town is served by three railway stations: Gare de Calais-Fréthun, Gare de Calais-Ville, and Gare des Fontinettes, the former being the first stop on mainland Europe of the Eurostar line. Gare de Calais-Ville is the nearest station to the port with trains to Gare de Boulogne-Ville and either Gare de Lille Flandres or Gare de Lille Europe.

 

Road

Local bus services are provided by STCE. Free car parking facilities are available in front of the Calais ferry terminal and the maximum stay is three days. Calais is served by an airport and an airfield. Calais–Dunkerque Airport is located at Marck, 7 kilometres (4.3 mi) east north east of Calais. Saint-Inglevert Airfield is located at Saint-Inglevert, 13 kilometres (8.1 mi) south west of Calais.

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calais

A greater glory, I have never seen. Needs to be viewed like this.

 

Geologically regarded as part of the main axis of the Himalayan range, Kanchenjunga (alternative spellings Kangchenjunga, Kangchen Dzö-nga, Khangchendzonga, Kanchenjanga, Kachendzonga, or Kangchanfanga) is the third highest mountain in the world and the second highest in Nepal and the highest in India, located in the Taplejung district straddling the frontier between Nepal and India.

 

Figures recognised by the Survey of India:

• 1st Mount Everest - 29,002'

• 2nd Godwin Austin - 28,250'

• 3rd Kanchenjunga - 28,156'

 

Figures according to Col. Burrard's calculation:

• 1st Mount Everest - 29,141'

• 2nd Kanchenjunga - 28,225'

• 3rd Godwin Austin - 28,191'

 

The Kanchenjunga massif is in the form of a gigantic cross, the arms of which lie north, south, east, and west. The individual summits connect to neighboring peaks by four main ridges, from which four glaciers flow.

 

The rough translation of Kanchenjunga is "Five Treasures of the Snow", as it contains five peaks, four of them over 8,450 metres. Until 1852, Kanchenjunga was assumed to be the highest mountain in the world, but calculations made by the British 1849 Great Trigonometric Survey showed Mount Everest to be the highest and Kanchenjunga the third-highest.

 

The five peaks of Kanchenjunga are as follows:

 

Kanchenjunga Main 8,586 m. 28,169 ft. †

Kanchenjunga West (Yalung Kang) 8,505 m. 27,904 ft.

Kanchenjunga Central (Middle) 8,482 m. 27,828 ft.

Kanchenjunga South 8,494 m. 27,867 ft.

Kambachen 7,902 m. 25,925 ft.

 

Three of these five peaks (Main, Central and South) are on the India-Nepal border, while the other two are completely in Nepal.

 

In 1955, a British expedition under Charles Evans climbed the mountain but, in deference to local religious beliefs, the party stopped a few yards short of the summit.

   

- From Wikipedia, Encyclopedia.com, and Encyclopædia Britannica.

I am selling these shirts for Wishing Well: Water for the World.

 

$10 and totally epic.

 

www.wishforwater.com

 

There is a drop that is needed

In the land where clean water has receded

A drop on the tongues’ dry land

Where government funds and hands are tied to the back pockets of the thirsty sand

and their eye sockets fixed on their spry dockets which sign them to sky rockets lifting them out of the parched paper novel where the dying log their struggle for one drop just wishing. Well, these drops are better than none.

 

There is a problem that has gone unsolved

An unbalanced equation that has evolved

To the point where numbers can’t get involved

Because they can’t explain how one drop just dissolves

The water crisis problem around which death has revolved

 

Some things, just don’t add up

 

I’ve done the math

And 1 + 15 + 5 +2 + 4 + 8 +1 still equals zero

1 15 year old boy walks 5 hours a day with 2 Jerry cans to get 4 gallons of water for his family of 8 to use for 1 day

And they still don’t have one drop of clean water

 

I’ve done the math

And billions of dollars does not equal one days work for struggling fathers

That’s Bono’s billions, and Larry’s millions not coming close to the work of an impoverished civilian

Because when water’s not on tap as much as corruption and greed

It means a five hour disruption to get one thing you need

And the hours spent watching feet bleed to reach knee deep ponds where bacteria breeds could be spent working to buy what your family eats

Because the billions of dollars aren’t reaching as far as the pavilion of haulers marching with jars

The equation is unbalanced

 

I’ve done the math

One school year subtracted by one clean pool near has distracted generations who’ll never hear the classroom’s scrub to remove the fool’s veneer leaving nations in frustration living off nothing but poverty inflating vocations

443 million days of school are missed by children walking water like a mule

No close water

Means they have to walk farther

Means no education for the daughter

Means the continuous walk toward the unseen slaughter

 

I’ve done the math

Half the world’s hospital wards are soaked by people who drink from an unclean source

No cancer or swine

No plague or line of STD or mental disease or diabetes comes close to the 80% of sickness being born in water overseas

 

We are killing the world with the gold in our sinks

I’ve done the math

And I’ve seen the floods that America drinks

Every day each of us uses 150 gallons or more

While each African only uses 4

What we use in a day they use in a month

What they make last 24 hours we use in 30 seconds in our showers

Something just doesn’t add up

 

So we have to change the equation

Change the way we look at the whole situation

So that our relation with death’s proliferation

Might lead to the donation of salvation in the appropriate location

Let’s change the quotations of unclean water’s dictation

Creating invitations for our hearts combination

Until we change our hesitation from a guilty fascination

From our conscience’s accusations

To a completed obligation of humanities conservation

 

It’s time for One Drop Mathematics

 

You see

One drop can’t stop the world from going thirsty

The One drop mathematic must employ symbiotic mercy

That’s one drop across the plots of seas

Sent from one basic human providing one basic human need

One drop mathematics cancels out the impossibility of solving problems globally

By one person recognizing one person’s humanity

One drop hasn’t got what it takes to fill the ocean of oppressions mistakes

But realizes the significance of the ripple it makes

 

One drop algorithms count numbers like tears

One dollar here means one person gets clean water for a year

Luckily, some things just don’t add up

 

One drop formula’s are challenging the foundations of oppressions’ equations

We are breaking new ground in the field of trigonometry where you and them and me form a triangle equilaterally in what mathematics deemed an impossibility our unity solves the problem perfectly

 

You see I’ve studied the path of One drop math

I found the text book for One drop mathematics

In the attics of Teresa’s homes that she built out of the broken tomes of lives that she quilted together with every patch of each person to which she roamed

I found the homework for one drop mathematics

In the charismatic reform of democratic storms of inequality, who had to write an essay with her life that proved that one bus seat equaled a nation of change

I found the answer key for one drop mathematics

In the one of three that some may see as a fanatic who became ecstatic over a widow’s penny, but was emphatic in his judgment of the dramatic donation of aristocratic prosperity

 

All we need is a drop

Just one

Because we are dealing with those who are dealing with none

So please don’t get discouraged before you’ve begun

Because there is eternal significance in the mathematics of one

 

A man on trial knows the power of one word

A mute man knows the desire he feels to be heard

A street walker knows the importance of one dollar

A soldier knows the pain of one red bullet’s color

An addict knows the lust for one deal

The starving know the meaning of one meal

The farmer knows the importance of one crop

And the thirsty know the significance of even one drop

 

Well I am one drop

Through high waters and hell

But together

Here’s wishing

that we will be the well

 

-David Bowden (epic spoken word artist)