#green homes Whyalla

[rocksolidbuilding]

Make Your Dream Come True with Unique Home

Everyone's dream is to have a unique dream home design. It takes research and solid design skills to get your ideal home designed the way you want it. Numerous rooms in a house must be created to meet the needs of the client. It entails flawlessly integrating every element to achieve the ideal appearance. It is necessary to take care of the flooring, furnishings, colours, and textures. It is important to remember that every home has a distinct location and appearance. Finding the newest and most fashionable ideas for a unique home requires a lot of research. In this blog, we will disclose some unique homes ideas in Port Lincoln. So, keep your eyes on the rest of the blog and gather a bit more knowledge.

Designing a house comes once in a lifetime and hence people take utmost care to get it done as per their needs and requirements. The best option is to hire a good designer who can provide you good offers with latest and unique designs. They may help you get your imagination live into your house.

There are many sections like rooms, attics, balconies, etc. which has to be designed in a way that all the room's look different yet one. The dreams may also have old traditions and beliefs into their houses. So, it is important to know how to get the imagination done into the house. The attics, pillars, and ceilings all exhibit distinctive designs. The flooring and furniture had to share the same characteristics. Everyone wants a good home. Starting from scratch requires time. A well-made investment might result in green homes with original designs in Whyalla. Better designs can result from having a vast space. These days, people only like original home designs. In order to draw in clients, architects work hard to produce fresh and distinctive designs. Despite being small, the distinctive vistas and decorations can draw in visitors.

[boxplanters-blog]

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[carolandrodsgetaway2018]

25th July 2018

After almost getting blown away by arctic winds in Aprilla Springs we left and headed for Whyalla. Shame because that camp was very pretty and would be very nice in good weather. The drive to Whyalla was a bit difficult at first because of the strong winds we were driving into. After the wind dropped it became a very pleasant drive. Lots of green hills and picturesque mountains in the distance. When we came over the mountains it opened up to a fantastic view of the sea. Paul and Wendy and Brian went ahead, we stayed and waited for Marc and Twinkle who weren’t quite ready. As we came into Port Augusta it was a bit like déjà vu as this was where we stayed before heading up the middle for our last trip. Anyway the closer we got th Whyalla the better the weather got. The sun was out and it was quite warm, I was excited because we were staying in a caravan park( yippee) all the hot water we wanted. The park is lovely, located right on the shoreline. We all had great views. I had to start shedding some clothes layers as it was really warm. First time since we left home I didn’t need long pants and coats. Very liberating. Twinkle and I decided to have fish and chips for dinner as Whyalla is the start of the seafood coast. You wouldn’t believe it but they told us at reception there was no good fish and chip places in town. Very disappointed, as my mouth was all ready for it. So Twinkle and I decided to try it anyway, but the only shop we could find was closed because it was Monday. Just not meant to be. Whyalla is not as big as I thought it would be. It’s an industrial town mostly based on the steel smelters. They mine the ore at Iron Knob and then process in town. It supplied a lot of the steel for the Second World War so there is a lot of history here. We visited the lookout which was a anti aircraft site in the war years because they were afraid they would try to bomb the area to stop the supply of steel. Now it’s a fantastic site to look out at the entire town and harbour. We also did some shopping here as it’s the last big town we are in before we head across the Nullarbor. The problem is where to put the groceries I bought. Rod had another meltdown trying to find somewhere in the car for them. He never has any trouble finding spots for the beer and wine to go though. The weather here has been wonderful. Very balmy, we had happy hour sitting next to the beach last night then we went to the BBQ the park put on for dinner. Extremely civilised. The outlook here is beautiful and the water looks very inviting but also very cold. Thor ran in yesterday chasing seagulls, still wearing his coat. Another meltdown from Rod. We are heading to a free camp now called Pt. Gibbon. Then down to Coffin Bay. We bought oysters this morning at a place called Cowell. We also got our fish and chips for lunch. Very nice but a bit expensive. Cost $20. for 1 piece of fish and a few chips but it was delicious. We will have the oysters for dinner tonight.

[kathleenseiber]

The incoming hydrogen boom

This week, New South Wales and Queensland have announced massive hydrogen fuel strategies, adding to the raft of policies, projects and agreements circling Australia.

What are the highlights of each strategy, and how do they compare? And where are the other states headed on hydrogen fuel?

New South Wales

New South Wales unveiled a hydrogen strategy on Wednesday, detailing a raft of measures to improve hydrogen fuel generation and uptake, including $3 billion in incentives for hydrogen production.

The state government aims to drive the price of locally generated clean hydrogen below $2.80 per kilogram (a reduction of $5.80 per kilogram) by 2030. Other 2030 goals include having 700 megawatts (MW) in electrolyser capacity, seeing 10,000 hydrogen vehicles on the road, and generating 110,000 tonnes of green hydrogen annually.

The strategy was announced with the verbal support of Andrew Forrest, chairman and founder of Fortescue Future Industries (FFI). Springing from the Fortescue Metals Group mining company, FFI is investing heavily in renewable hydrogen production around the world, with several projects underway in Australia.

Queensland

The NSW announcement comes hot on the heels of a hydrogen manufacturing project revealed[b1]  last weekend by the Queensland government and FFI.

This plan is more detailed and short-term than NSW’s strategy: it focuses on the development of a clean hydrogen manufacturing centre in Queensland.

The first stage of the six-stage project is construction of an electrolyser manufacturing facility at Gladstone, in central Queensland. Electrolysers use electricity to turn water into hydrogen, and thus can be used to make hydrogen with renewable energy. FFI aims to start building the factory in early 2022, and it will begin producing electrolysers in early 2023.

Beyond electrolysers, FFI also plans to manufacture solar cells, wind turbines, electric cabling and other tools for renewable-energy generation.  

Other states

These two announcements arrive after a series of hydrogen-fuel projects were mooted elsewhere in Australia.

Tasmania has also received interest from Fortescue, with a proposed hydrogen plant at Bell Bay in northern Tasmania announced in June. This plant would have a 250MW capacity and generate 250,000 tonnes per year of ammonia, which stores hydrogen in liquid form.

Western Australia updated its hydrogen strategy last month, with an additional $50 million for hydrogen investment. The Western Green Energy hub on the edge of the Nullarbor Plain, slated to be the largest renewable-energy hub in the world if built, aims to produce 3.5 million tonnes of green hydrogen and 20 million tonnes of ammonia per year.

South Australia, currently home to the country’s largest electrolyser – a 1.25MW plant that produces 20 kilograms of hydrogen per hour – has invested in the development of a green hydrogen plant 60 times that size at Port Bonython, near Whyalla on the Eyre Peninsula.

Victoria’s renewable hydrogen development plan focusses on developing hydrogen capacity and skills, with grants for feasibility studies and pilot programs.

The federal government has signed several renewable hydrogen agreements with other countries, including Germany and Japan. CSIRO has also this year launched a renewable Hydrogen Industry Mission, aiming to boost international collaboration on hydrogen research.

The incoming hydrogen boom published first on https://triviaqaweb.weebly.com/

[thatlot2017-blog]

DAY 10

Left Wayne and Megan at Cowell who, at the suggestion of Malcolm T (PM), went to learn once again where the black, red and green wires go. Megan and Wayne meanwhile took the Lucky Bay ferry complete with the Tandem Telstra Trailer to Wallaroo and then into Adelaide. The rest of ‘That Lot” drove to Port Lincoln stopping in at Arno Bay and Tumby Bay.  We settled into the Hilton Motel where Jim and Sandy, Bill and Beth took advantage of the basement suites whilst Gary and Julie had a more conventional room.   Drove over to Coffin Bay where we had lunch – oysters natural and sea food at Café 1802 looking out over The Great Southern Ocean. Travelled back to Port Lincoln for the night and afternoonzees drinks included waiting for the Pink Moon that never eventuated. Dinner that night was interesting with the largest but thinnest schnitzel you have ever seen. About the size of a pair of thongs and just as tough too!

DAY 11 Left Gary and Julie in Port Lincoln to see more of the sights of the area and to visit their old friends while the remainder of That Lot - Bill and Beth, Jim and Sandra headed back to Cowell to buy some oysters for the ferry trip across Spencer Gulf from Lucky Bay to Wallaroo.  Beautiful day and worth the trip.  Then drove down to Glenelg timing our arrival to meet with Adelaide’s peak hour traffic.  Phones flat, GPS recalcitrant, drivers and passengers a little tense. Nice to catch up with the vast majority of MG members and then out to dinner taking in the sunset from Glenelg water front

DAY 12 Jim and Bill set off to help maintain the profitably of Supercheap and Repco and to do some maintenance on their cars. Meantime Beth and Sandra did some retail therapy in nearby Glenelg. Gary and Julie rejoined the party later that day after driving around the top of Spencer’s gulf from Whyalla.

DAY 13, 14, 15, 16 MG National Meeting Thought we should put Wayne out of his misery and let him know that the puddle of oil under the two toned green TF20 in the Telstra tandem trailer that had it tethered, was not so much engine oil but rather the consistency of a little bottle of oil that may or may not reside in a two thousand and twelve Toyota Hilux toolbox.   Needless to say, the look of relief was spectacular.  Megan said she hadn’t seen Wayne look that relieved since the little stick came back negative.  Wayne said, ‘With friends like that who needs drip trays’. Jim maintains that he tried desperately to stop Gary and Megan from performing such a nasty trick but to no avail! Another successful meet for That Lot Wayne was the unsung hero wining everything, showing shrewd judgement by updating his trailer to the infamous Telstra Tandem Trailer which delivered the TF in terrific condition complete with white wall tyres.   Behind our Perpetual Trophy winner stands the Magnificent Megs attending to all the minute detailing.  The additional space in the trailer was just enough to store the innumerable number of trophies he had to take back with him. Telstra will be pleased! Jim once again picked up the gold medal in concourse while Bill was awarded the bronze in concourse, silver in the motorkhana and along with Beth’s invaluable assistance picked up the gold in the observation run. Graham and Bev Hoyle who had to cancel their trip due to a little puff of wind called Debbie, also picked up the “Hard Luck Trophy” The highlight of the meet must surely be the theme evening.  Who will ever forget the Australian Swim Team ……  sorry, the Minions. Surely congratulations are in order to Pat Walker, who, every year endeavours to make us look silly, really excelled herself in 2017. Great night, good friends, good fun! If there was a trophy for best dancers, Queensland would have won that too!  Those Minions know how to move. It should, however, be noted that the competition were real Wallys.

DAY 17 Enjoyed our farewell breakfast at the Glenelg Club and took our separate ways with Wayne and Megan heading to Sydney, Jim, Sandy, Gary and Julie taking off to celebrate a 1st and a 40th birthday party in Melbourne with Gary and Julie’s granddaughter and daughter in law and Jim and Sandras’ 45th wedding anniversary. They traveled by the Coorong and the Great Ocean Road. Bill and Beth took a respite in McLaren Vale and then headed home. All members of That Lot made it home safe and sound ready for the next adventure.

THE NEXT SEGMENT IS BOUGHT TO YOU BY THE LETTER A (and Telstra of course)

Altogether the Adelaide trip was an aphrodisiac of adventure.  Alternate itinerarys were abundant and aspired to be a great antiseptic for apathy. Acquaintances became allies. Associates became Alter egos. More importantly, accomplices became alibis! Our almighty automobiles ( F20 included Jim!!!) aided in the aesthetics of abundant Australian atmospheres. Had we been on aeroplanes we would have accrued ample points to enhance one’s arithmetic. One could not easily ascertain if the MG A had alloys or was an automatic as it ascended areas of inclination with agility, ease and acceleration. Aside from a small acclivity at Ouyan of course!

Alas, we had to acquiesce to the abatement of our Adelaide adventure.  Anguish not, dear friends, for we will adjourn at an alternate time and place elsewhere with analogous automotive objectives to accommodate our itinerant ways. Auf Wiedersehen. Au Revoir. Adios. Adieu. Alleluia! AMEN.

[ericfruits]

A state election stirs a row about renewable energy in Australia

A TUMBLEDOWN farmhouse from Australia’s pioneering days has unlikely new neighbours. Giant wind turbines owned by Neoen, a French company, loom over it in the dusty red scrubland outside Jamestown, north of Adelaide, the capital of the state of South Australia. The world’s biggest lithium-ion battery sits a stone’s throw away. Elon Musk, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur, installed it last year through his company, Tesla, to store energy from the turbines and feed it back to the grid when other supplies run short. About 100km to the west, across the Spencer Gulf, Sanjeev Gupta, a British billionaire, is also pouring money into renewable energy. He is building solar and pumped-storage hydropower plants to revive a failed steelworks at Whyalla that he bought six months ago.

With just 7% of Australia’s population, South Australia has become a testing ground for a political argument about how hard the government should push to replace fossil fuels with cleaner energy. The projects at Jamestown and Whyalla loom large in the state election on March 17th. The rest of Australia, too, is paying more attention than it normally would. The last coal-fired power station in South Australia closed two years ago. While the bigger eastern states still rely on coal for most of their electricity, South Australia now gets almost half of its power from wind and solar, the highest proportion in the country. (The rest comes mainly from gas.)

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Jay Weatherill, the state’s Labor premier, recently set an even higher renewable-energy target: 75% by 2025. The federal government, a coalition of the (conservative) Liberals and Nationals, has dismissed this as a “big experiment”. Josh Frydenberg, the federal energy minister, likens Mr Weatherill to a “problem gambler chasing his losses”. He says too much renewable power will lead to blackouts and push up power prices. Instead, his latest energy plan calls for reliable electricity from any source, although the details remain unclear. Critics see this scepticism as a bid to guarantee a future for coal, a big industry in Australia. The federal renewables target, about two-thirds lower than South Australia’s, expires in 2020.

South Australia has long been connected to a grid encompassing four other states in eastern Australia with 40,000km of transmission lines. But in 2016 a freak storm disconnected it, leading to a statewide blackout. A smaller outage followed five months later. To Mr Weatherill, the drama meant the national electricity market was “failing”. He launched a plan a year ago for South Australia to “take charge” of its own energy with A$550m ($430m) of public money, by building a gas-fired plant and financing green projects. Private investors are keen. Solar Reserve, a Californian company, will start work on a solar thermal power plant at Port Augusta, near Whyalla, this year. Tesla will build a “virtual power plant” by fitting 50,000 homes with solar panels and batteries.

Neoen now owns and runs the giant battery next to its 99 wind turbines on the edge of the Flinders Ranges, one of Australia’s windiest places. The device started operating in December, in the middle of a hot summer, when demand for air-conditioning is high. Since then, says Franck Woitiez of Neoen, it has kicked in several dozen times in response to “unexpected failures” at coal-fired plants as far away as Queensland, in north-east Australia. The Australian Energy Market Operator, which oversees the national system, seems to approve of South Australia’s initiatives. Audrey Zibelman, its head, says the battery is “faster than traditional generators” and dependable: “That’s important to us.”

The scale of foreign investment in South Australia’s projects also seems to defy sceptics. Mr Gupta alone, through his company GFC Alliance, is spending about A$1bn on the Whyalla steelworks. He has also bought a majority stake in Zen Energy, an Australian renewables outfit, to power the works. He thinks South Australia can become a “hub of renewables industries”.

But South Australia has higher wholesale electricity prices than other states. Its unemployment rate, 6%, is Australia’s second-highest, partly because of the closure of its last car factory last year. Steven Marshall, the Liberal candidate for premier, says scrapping Mr Weatherill’s renewable-energy targets would reduce power prices and so boost the local economy. He wants to focus instead on improving transmission lines to the rest of the country.

Mr Weatherill argues the reverse: that turning the state into a renewables powerhouse will mean more jobs and lower power prices. A recent poll showed more people approve of his renewable-energy target than disapprove. But the election could still be close. Labor has been in power for 16 years (with Mr Weatherill as leader for just over six). To further muddy the waters, Nick Xenophon, a former independent federal senator, is fielding candidates for SA-Best, his new state party, in most seats. His energy policy is woolly, and his support appears to be waning, but he could still take votes from both big parties. The field is confused enough, in short, that the result is unlikely to resolve the debate about renewables, whichever party ends up in charge.

This article appeared in the Asia section of the print edition under the headline "The power and the furore"

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[diveplanit]

Australia’s Best Local Dive Getaways

As the pandemic lock down continues, many of us around Australia are just itching for a dive getaway – so for those states allowed to move around, here are our Best Dive Getaways for each.

And for all our Victorian subscribers, we are all thinking of you and can’t wait to help get you diving again – locally or internationally!

New South Wales Divers

Lord Howe Island

Imagine you had to design the perfect place for an adventurous scuba diver to escape to for a week’s diving holiday. You’d probably go for an island, maybe where tropical, sub-tropical and temperate ocean currents converge, a nice long reef around a lagoon, so you could dive and snorkel inside the lagoon, and explore more adventurous stuff outside in the gullies and arches. Then you’d probably give the island some sharp drop-offs, and maybe add a few small islands around to create a variety of dive sites. You could not design a more magnificent setting if you tried. The island has limited capacity, so is booked up quickly (especially now) with many divers returning annually. We have some great packages with Pro Dive Lord Howe Island.

Julian Rocks

Among the regular species found year-round at Julian Rocks, a 10-15 minute boat rude from Byron Bay, are wobbegong sharks, eagle rays, cuttlefish, king fish, trevally, mulloway, and three different species of sea turtle – Loggerhead, Green and Hawksbill. There is an abundance of hard and soft coral. You can also see Manta Rays, Grey Nurse Sharks, and Leopard (also called Zebra) Sharks at various times throughout the year.

Nelson Bay

Whether you’re interested in the big stuff, or teeny tiny macro delights, you’ll find it here in Nelson Bay, Port Stephens, which has long been a popular NSW seaside retreat. Some locals will tell you that if you haven’t dived North Rock or Looking Glass (think large schools of grey nurse sharks), you don’t deserve to call yourself a real diver. Conversely, others might say: ‘If you haven’t done Fly Point or Pipeline then likewise!’ (nudibranchs, seahorses and all sorts of macro wonders).

Jervis Bay

Weedies, whales and the world’s whitest sand. Jervis Bay is 3 hours’ drive south of Sydney – it’s already Insta-famous for having the world’s whitest sand at Hyams Beach and the underwater world in the bay itself is pretty special as well. With over 60 dive sites, divers can expect to see weedy sea dragons, wobbegongs, grey nurse sharks, Port Jackson sharks, beautiful sponge gardens and… right now is a great time to swim with humpback whales.



Coffs Harbour

Coffs Harbour diving opportunities includes the marine reserves of the Solitary Islands, and South Solitary Island in particular. There amongst boulders, walls and gutters you will see anything from Mantas to Handfish, and everything in between, and at the nearby Split Solitary amongst coral and kelp you will see many species of resident fish, as well as eels, turtles and grey nurse sharks. In season (May to September) you can also swim with migrating humpback whales.

Queenslanders

Cairns by liveaboard

Pro Dive Cairns is running 3-Day/2-Night liveaboard trips to the Outer Reef each week every Wednesday and Friday. The trips include up to 11 dives, including two-night dives, on a variety of 19 dive sites over four reefs: Flynn, Thetford, Milln and Pellowe Reefs. You will encounter a wide diversity of marine life including giant clams, turtles, stingrays, reef sharks, an incredible variety of tropical fish, spectacular coral formations and consistent underwater visibility.

Ribbon Reefs and the Coral Sea

There’s never been a better time to dive the pristine, rarely-visited dive sites of the Ribbon Reefs and the Coral Sea – you’ll be sharing them with a very small group of divers. Mike Ball Dive Expeditions has just announced four brand new Great Barrier Reef itineraries to the Ribbon Reefs, Cod Hole, and in the Coral Sea, Osprey (shark city) and Bougainville Reefs. Choose a from 4 or 5-night trips to the Ribbon Reefs, Cod Hole and the Coral Sea, or explore the Far North Coral Sea on a 7-night Exploratory dive trip.

Townsville and Magnetic Island

In recent years the stunning Central Great Barrier Reef has played second fiddle to the reefs out from Cairns and Port Douglas, but there are two great reasons to rediscover beautiful reefs such as John Brewer and Lodestone reefs. The 100-year old wreck of the Yongala and a new underwater installation by world-famous sculptor Jason deCaires Taylor; Museum of Underwater Art (MOUA). Dive it by liveaboard with Adrenalin Dive, based in Ayr with Yongala Dive or base yourself on beautiful Magnetic Island.

Bundaberg & Lady Musgrave Island

Three great reasons to dive the Capricorn Coast: Lady Musgrave Island, fantastic shore diving in Bundaberg and the wreck of the ex-HMAS Tobruk. Lady Musgrave, like Lady Elliot Island, sits close to the continental shelf, so attracts impressive pelagic action including leopard sharks, reef sharks, turtles, all sorts of rays including mantas and the occasional migrating humpback whale. The HMAS Tobruk was only scuttled a couple of years ago but has already attracted large schools of Jacks, barracuda, bat fish, a couple of resident turtles and Queensland gropers.

Lady Elliot Island

Lady Elliot Island is one of those rare gems that exist through the serendipitous combination of location, location and human intervention. Location is important as the island is just 10 km from the edge of the continental shelf and the East Australian Current. This means frequent pelagic action such as manta rays, migrating whales and nesting grounds for green and loggerhead turtles. And human intervention? Lady Elliot Island sits within the Green (no take) Zone of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, which is why the corals are in perfect condition and over 1,000 marine species can be found in the waters around the island.

West Australians

Whale Sharks and Whales at Ningaloo Reef

Swim with whale sharks and humpback whales and dive Ningaloo Reef with Exmouth Dive & Whalesharks. The Coral Coast’s Ningaloo Reef is a pristine aquatic wonderland that is home to an abundance of marine life including dolphins, manta rays, turtles, humpback whales and of course the whale sharks. Exmouth Dive & Whalesharks are whale shark tour pioneers, with the experience, knowledge and reputation that will ensure that your day will be an ‘experience of a lifetime’.

Exmouth Navy Pier

Also based at Exmouth, Dive Ningaloo is the only dive centre with access to world-famous dive site Exmouth Navy Pier voted as one of the top 10 dive sites in Australia, and one of the top shore dives in the world. Dive Ningaloo specialises in small groups, personal service and adventure diving in the best, remote and beautiful places, travelling to remote Muiron Islands and untouched reef.

Rowley Shoals

The Rowley Shoals is a chain of three spectacular pristine coral atolls which rise up from the ocean floor 400 m below on the very edge of Australia’s continental shelf, hence one of the most remote dive locations in Australia and diving Rowley Shoals is seasonal with trips only available around October each year. Dive amongst the giant clams, shellfish, giant potato cod and Maori Wrasse. Trevally, mackerel and tuna hover in large schools around you, and you can discover over 200 species of coral and over 650 species of fish. Visibility in excess of 60 metres is common.

Christmas Island

Dive Christmas Island, Australia’s own Galapagos in the Indian Ocean, with pristine coral reefs and plenty of pelagic action including schools of silky sharks, mantas, eagle rays and whale sharks. Being so remote, you’ll be diving with small groups, with pristine reefs, forests of enormous gorgonian fans and plenty of sea caverns to explore. Plus, during surface intervals, swim with spinner dolphins.

Cocos Keeling Island

Dive Cocos Keeling Island – Australia’s own little jewel in the Indian Ocean, with pristine coral reefs and mantas, eagle rays, schooling reef sharks, pods of dolphins, a resident friendly dugong called Kat – and (officially) Australia’s most beautiful beach at Direction Island – also home to one of the world’s best drift snorkels.

South Australians

Neptune Islands

To see a Great White Shark in the wild is absolutely grand and rare, but to come face to face with one underwater is one of the most exciting experiences available to divers today! Come and ‘hunt with cameras’ the world’s best known and most feared shark with the world’s best: Rodney Fox Shark Expeditions. On a 4-day liveaboard trip you will also encounter New Zealand fur seals and an abundance of bird life, dolphins and other unique fish and wildlife.

Fleurieu Peninsula

The beautiful Fleurieu Peninsula is home to one of the world’s most unique species of marine life, the leafy seadragon. These stunning creatures are found nowhere else in the world except the Great Southern Reef of Australia.

Credit: Jayne Jenkins

Whyalla

Each winter, tens of thousands of Australian Giant Cuttlefish gather to mate and spawn. This mass event happens nowhere else in the world. These cuttlefish are endemic to South Australia and have a very short life cycle of two years, which means the need to mate in such large numbers ensures the success of generations to come. A great way to see both leafy sea dragons and giant cuttlefish, and learn how to photograph them, is on a tour with award-winning photographer Scott Portelli.

Kangaroo Island

Kangaroo Island is a nature lovers dream. With large, resident pods of bottlenose dolphins, it is the ideal location to immerse yourself with these playful mammals. According to underwater photographer Rosie Leany; “Getting buzzed by a pod of highly intelligent mammals who are just as curious about you, is an amazing feeling.” Shore diving at Kingscote Jetty will also reveal a wide array of macro wonders, from blennies and angler fish to the odd leafy sea dragon. Scott is also running photography tours here early next year.

The post Australia’s Best Local Dive Getaways appeared first on Diveplanit.

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[sumikoirala]

Diminishing city: hope, despair and Whyalla

This piece is republished with permission from State of Hope, the 55th edition of Griffith Review. Articles are a little longer than most published on The Conversation, presenting an in-depth analysis of the economic, social, environmental and cultural challenges facing South Australia, and the possibilities of renewal and revitalisation.

Exactly 50 years ago, in the spring of 1966, my family left Pennington Migrant Hostel in Adelaide to drive up Highway 1 to Whyalla. Our destination, BHP’s Milpara hostel, was a full day’s journey away in a second-hand faded blue Ford Zephyr.

As recently arrived migrants from Britain, the drive would take us into an utterly unfamiliar landscape: the red-soil and saltbush country of South Australia’s upper Eyre Peninsula.

We were not alone. Whyalla was booming. BHP’s steelworks had opened the year before, the shipyard’s orders book was healthy, while ore from Iron Knob was being shipped from Whyalla in increasing quantities – my father was to work in BHP’s diesel locomotive repair shop.

The Stanleys – like many of Whyalla’s newcomers, working-class Britons (in our case Liverpudlians) – were optimistic about our future in a brand-new Housing Trust semi-detached in a dirt-pavement street on the city’s expanding western fringe: this was the new start in a new, sunny country for which we had left rainy, grey Liverpool.

We were surely not alone. Thousands of other migrants were arriving in the city. In our first year there the Housing Trust constructed over 600 houses. In the decade of the 1960s, Whyalla’s population doubled from 14,000 to 30,000.

BHP helped its employees to build substantial ‘staff’ houses as Whyalla expanded during the war years. These are in Bean Street, named after the compliant SA parliamentary draughtsman who produced the bill that met the needs of ‘The Company’ in developing Whyalla. BHP Archives, Author provided

The newcomers reflected an extraordinary ethnic diversity – booklets promoting the city to migrants spoke of 45 or more ethnic groups living there. The largest groups in the late 1960s came from the British Isles, from elsewhere in Australia and from Europe (mainly Germany, the Netherlands, Yugoslavia, Spain and Poland).

BHP and the City Commission aggressively promoted the city’s advantages. A 1964 BHP promotional booklet extolling its climate, facilities, community amenities and lifestyle (one my family almost certainly read) ended:

This, then, is Whyalla: a place where a young community leads a busy, sunlit life, a city which is growing, always growing.

But the growth of the 1960s stopped in the following decade, when the population had reached around 34,000. In 1978, BHP launched the last of the 64 ships built in Whyalla, bringing to an end the 20-year boom begun with the construction of the steelworks. Between 1977 and 1983, the Housing Trust built only 120 houses. Whyalla began a gradual contraction, one that continues still.

Construction of the blast furnace and associated wharf just before the second world war drew thousands of workers and later their families from the depressed Eyre Peninsula and the Mid North. Author provided

In 1980, sociologist Roy Kriegler published Working for the Company, an analysis of “work and control” informed by his time as a labourer in the shipyard’s final years. He identified what he saw as an intractable dynamic of alienation among those who worked for BHP, a malaise of lack of commitment that infected the city as well as its industrial workplaces.

Kriegler, writing in the wake of the shipyard’s closure, ended his final chapter with a prediction: “Company Town to Ghost Town”. Reports of Whyalla’s demise were premature, but he was not alone in his pessimism.

The first of 64 vessels built at the shipyard before it closed is now the centrepiece of Whyalla Maritime Museum. Wayne Thomas/flickr, CC BY-NC-ND

The shipyard’s closure coincided with the growth to maturity of the children of the migrant generation of the 1960s like me. It became usual for young people to leave Whyalla. Among the 75 or so members of my own, very large matriculation class of 1974 many left Whyalla for work or study (as did I). At the 30-year reunion in 2004, no more than two or three still lived in Whyalla.

Many of those remaining found limited opportunities for work and little sense of fulfilment. A survey of drug problems in Whyalla by the Drug and Alcohol Services South Australia in 1985 found “no positive community feeling about Whyalla”, and that “the entire social life of Whyalla revolves around alcohol”.

Not surprisingly, one-quarter of the young people interviewed said they drank “because there is nothing better to do in Whyalla”.

Living through times of hope and despair

I came to know several of Whyalla’s incarnations. I had grown up there in the boom years, had worked at the steelworks in vacations, and while driving taxis became closely acquainted with Whyalla’s pub and clubs. I also wrote a Litt.B. thesis about the town’s voluntary war effort during the second world war, which the council published.

Through that research I gained an understanding of both the earlier wartime boom and of the insular little community it had disrupted. And because I continued to visit the city, over the ensuing 40 years I saw it diminish.

The shipyard’s closure hit Whyalla hard, but it went down fighting. Community workshops cast about for ideas to generate a sustainable economy. Ideas to diversify the city’s economy included rabbit farming, a ferry (or even a bridge!) across Spencer Gulf and exploiting the ever-elusive tourist dollar. None came to much.

Looking up Patterson Street, the main street of ‘old’ Whyalla, to the second world war defence emplacements, one of the city’s many features that the council attempted to turn into tourist attractions. Peter Stanley, Author provided

From the 1980s, Whyalla became better known for providing a home for welfare recipients than for producing ships and steel – its Housing Trust stock allegedly enabled beneficiaries in Adelaide to be offered accommodation if they were willing to move to Whyalla.

With the arrival of Indo-Chinese, South American and East African refugees in successive decades, Whyalla maintained its ethnic diversity. This included a small community of Indigenous people, some Barngala, the region’s original inhabitants.

Looking back over the century since BHP renamed the little ore-shipping port of Hummock Hill Whyalla in 1914, we can identify cycles of hope and despair against the larger rhythm of expansion and then contraction.

For at least 50 years Whyalla has seen optimism and idealism but also, if not despair, then its close neighbours, alienation and apathy. The city has seen repeated contests between hope and pessimism. Both seem to be embedded in the city’s culture, in its people’s repeated responses to the challenges of their situation.

Postwar boom upset the old stability

Whyalla had been a tiny company town until the late 1930s. It was simply an ore jetty and a railway workshop, loading iron ore from Iron Knob, 50 kilometres away in the Middleback Ranges.

In its first incarnation as a small ore-shipping port, Whyalla had been remarkably stable. The 1934 federal electoral roll, for example, listed some 800 voters, but the surnames of five families accounted for a tenth of residents. Whyalla seemed free of the sectarianism endemic to Australia 80 years ago – the town’s Catholic and Anglican ministers played in the town’s orchestra.

Premier Thomas Playford opens the Morgan-Whyalla pipeline in 1944, ending years of water shortages and enabling residents to plant gardens to make the town more pleasant. As the Murray River’s salinity rose, the water quality declined, becoming virtually undrinkable. SA Water/flickr, CC BY-NC-ND

In the late 1930s, the Playford state government persuaded (and subsidised) BHP to build a blast furnace, and a shipyard followed in 1940.

The town’s expansion upset the old stability. During the second world war the town grew from fewer than a thousand inhabitants to nearly 7,000, most drawn from the economically depressed Eyre Peninsula and Mid North.

The war years brought hardship – many families attracted to the town by war work lived in tents and shacks in what was called “Siberia” – but also a sense of hope after years of worldwide, national and local economic depression. People built their own houses, bought them under the company’s scheme or sought Housing Trust homes – small, but well-built and secure after the rural poverty many had known.

These Housing Trust homes in Goodman Street were built to house the many people who migrated to Whyalla to work in the shipyard and the blast furnace in the early 1940s. Residents’ groups agitated to have the streets sealed, the cost of which was a factor in BHP accepting calls for elected local government in 1945. BHP Archives, Author provided

Houses in the same area of Whyalla South 60 years later show how Murray water helped ‘green’ the city. What will happen as the wartime housing stock ages is a pressing question. Peter Stanley, Author provided

But the war also saw tensions between old residents and new. Established residents dominated the town’s social organisations, especially its voluntary war effort. Newcomers were, however, active in pressing for civic improvements and for improved working conditions in the company’s shipyard and blast furnace.

Under the leadership of trade unions and groups such as the Housewives’ Association, newcomers pressed for price controls, new schools, bread and postal deliveries, telephone and bus services, cheaper water and better housing. They expressed a powerful idealism characteristic of a generation that fought and worked for a better world.

While established residents accepted the company’s paternalism, newcomers (almost all from rural South Australia) pressed for representative local government. BHP, reluctant to pay for the larger, more expensive town services but equally loath to relinquish control, engineered a compromise in the form of a town commission.

The commission, established by the state government in 1944, comprised three representatives each of company and residents, chaired by an independent commissioner, Charles Ryan (who held the position from 1945 to 1970).

BHP was ‘not very pleased with the results’ of the first town commission election – it later sacked an employee, Eric Stead, who had been elected as a residents’ representative. Trove/National Library of Australia

The commission reflected idealism, pragmatism and paternalism. The elections for the first town commission in 1945 revealed the extent to which many of Whyalla’s newcomers yearned for a better society. The three ratepayers’ representatives included Eric Stead, a member of the Communist Party and an embodiment of the “progressive” movements in the town.

“Naturally, we are not very pleased with the results,” the company’s director in Whyalla reported to head office in Melbourne.

Stead’s election reflected, of course, the Communist Party’s popularity generally at the end of the war. But it also disclosed the deep yearning for a better life among a generation traumatised by economic depression and war; Whyalla’s new houses and company-subsidised services could provide that life.

Many of those attracted in wartime moved on after 1945, but those who stayed formed an enlarged “old Whyalla” – notably loyal to the paternalist BHP (naturally, known to residents simply as “the company”). That stability was disrupted once more from the late 1950s. Again supported by a state government (still Playford’s), BHP built a steelworks at Whyalla. This created the boom that brought the Stanleys and tens of thousands of other newcomers to the city.

A city of contradictions

Whyalla’s sense of itself as a community – as distinct from the dismal catalogue of deprivation on a range of socio-economic indicators – has never been clearer than in the Australian Frontier report of 1973, at the height of the second boom.

Produced by a Melbourne social research consultant in response to a request by the new Whyalla City Council (which supplanted the commission in 1970), the report investigated the “Factors Influencing the Stability of Whyalla”. It drew on a “Community Self Survey” co-ordinated by a Congregational Church social worker, Don Sarre, notable because it reflected the views of residents rather than planners.

Sarre’s report documented two contradictory themes. One was of physical or social hardship and deprivation. It noted the concern of doctors and nurses at the incidence of boredom, isolation and depression, and that at least half – and perhaps two-thirds – of respondents had no firm intention to remain in Whyalla.

Sarre identified the “inadequacy of the nuclear family” as a key cause of instability – most newcomers to the city (over half migrants or their Australian-born children) had no extended families and the support they could offer.

But among those who remained (which included some of the Stanleys), people expressed yearnings for facilities and conditions that would enable them to make a home in a place not immediately seen as hospitable, or even (at the height of summer) habitable.

They valued “the ease of making good friends” in the city and its healthy climate, and they had aspirations and desires. Their wishes expressed a powerful positive vision. They wanted better educational opportunities for their children, more parks and gardens and, above all, better and more local control over their community.

Don Sarre, reflecting on the report 40-odd years later, recalled that the aspects that most struck him in retrospect were the energy with which Whyalla’s newcomers built a community and the quality of community leadership evident in the city’s expansionary period.

For example, teachers staffing the dozen primary and four high schools were often graduates, ���bonded” or posted to the country and bringing a quality of youthful, professional enthusiasm that matched the aspirations of their pupils’ parents.

Decline stretches over decades

From a peak of 34,000 in the 1970s, Whyalla’s population had shrunk to 27,000 last decade and is now 22,000. Abi Skipp/flickr, CC BY

Despite this idealism, by the 1990s the city had slipped to be the state’s third-largest city (after Adelaide and Mount Gambier). This was a reflection of Whyalla’s decline rather than growth elsewhere.

Visiting at least annually, I observed how shops closed, shopping centres became increasingly shabby and houses and then entire blocks of Housing Trust houses fell derelict and were then demolished.

Signs of Whyalla’s decline were everywhere: driving in from the airport, my mother’s litany would be “there’s another Trust house knocked down”; but she’d also express pride at “the new leisure centre” or “the new Harvey Norman’s”.

The local newspaper, the Whyalla News, begun in 1940 as a weekly, went to twice weekly in the 1950s and thrice weekly in the 1970s. It then declined, losing pages, advertisers and readers. It now appears once a week again, like many country newspapers permanently on the brink of closure.

The decline of the city’s human infrastructure can be seen in the case of its Protestant churches. In the early 1970s, nonconformist congregations supported half-a-dozen clergymen and several other social and community development officers. Now the Uniting Church has one minister in the entire city, though arguably the need for the social and spiritual support that churches represent could not be greater.

On virtually any socio-economic measure in the 1990s, Whyalla scored more poorly than other cities in South Australia, even in the state’s “iron triangle”. Whyalla’s Department of Community Welfare office, a 1990 study revealed, had the highest per-capita number of “clients” in the state.

On an index of “relative socio-economic disadvantage”, Whyalla at 911 was below Port Pirie and its lead residues (at 921), Port August at 943, Mount Gambier at 957 and genteel Victor Harbour at 1,011.

The study also revealed shockingly high levels of domestic abuse, as suggested by the numbers of women seeking shelter. One area of just eight streets around Jenkins Avenue produced 201 “clients” (though a similar-sized area in the city’s east produced just one).

In the face of these grim realities, Whyalla had its boosters. The council remained resolutely positive, even though most initiatives failed to deliver the benefits promised. The Whyalla News seemed to have a generic news story permanently set, ready to be deployed, beginning with the headline “[insert name of company] plans will bring jobs”.

Sue Scheiffers’ privately published 1985 history of the city, A Ribbon of Steel, though appearing a decade after the shipyard’s closure, was sub-titled Whyalla Surges Ahead. Her book catalogued a relentless succession of development, urban amenities and civic progress.

As a serial grey nomad, in the 1980s and ’90s, my mother became a one-woman travelling embassy for Whyalla, persuading dozens of fellow caravanners in parks all over Australia that, regardless of its reputation, Whyalla was a paradise.

Determinedly sunny despite it all

High rates of chronic illness keep Whyalla Hospital busy. SA Health/Government of South Australia

Of the migrants of the 1960s who remained, the environment in which they lived now actively harmed their health. Epidemiological surveys by the state’s Department of Health in 2005 established shocking figures of chronic illness.

Whyalla’s residents manifested significantly worse health than people in comparable towns. Rates of lung cancer were “significantly higher” – more than 50% greater – as were chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (77% more), alcoholic liver disease (70% more) and chronic hepatitis (330% more). The report had been prompted by long-standing concern about the red dust emitted from the steelworks, and especially its iron ore-processing “pellet plant”.

Nevertheless, the early 1990s brought yet another wave of consultants’ investigations, facilitated workshops and strategic planning, again with wildly optimistic outcomes. The report of a planning weekend among city council elected officials and employed officers in 1991 came up with extravagant ideas, such as developing a resort for Asian honeymooners and redeveloping the local racecourse and golf course to attract international punters and players.

The workshop considered several scenarios for Whyalla in 2001. While accepting its remote, hot and dry location and its “dirty” industry, participants nevertheless foresaw it at worst becoming a “pleasant backwater”. They even then thought that “ghost suburbs” might generate visitors.

One positive scenario for an “innovative, entrepreneurial, attractive human and humane” city sketched out a “green, almost tropical environment” based on recycled water and tourist attractions (such as a large sculpture park) that would, naturally, “put Whyalla on the international tourist circuit”.

Despite the city’s unpropitious situation and its precarious economic base, its people – and especially its city council – remained doggedly optimistic. In the 1990s, after two decades of decline, a brief and, as it turned out, almost fruitless movement aspired to make Whyalla an exemplar of the new “ecocity” movement.

The council, in association with the Adelaide-based Centre for Urban Ecology, endorsed plans to generate power from Whyalla’s abundant sunshine, creating a “green city”: a paradoxically enticing vision for a place that received only 270 millimetres of rainfall but over 300 sunny days annually.

An “eEcopolis”, as its proponents called it, involved “creating vibrant human settlements … shaping a healthy economy in keeping with ecological principles [and] promoting social justice and wellbeing”.

The ecocity push reflected Whyalla at its most optimistic. In Whyalla Why Not?, sustainable city theorist Paul Downton espoused the visionary idea that Whyalla could become “internationally renowned as a centre of the global solar industry, as well as being a major tourist destination”.

Downton wrote a short story, set 25 years in the future, painting a bold vision of a solar-powered city living in harmony with its environment and enriched by “green” industries. The ecocity idea set out to “reinvigorate the city, not only in environmental terms, but economically and culturally”.

The Whyalla of 2021 it envisaged would have “a seriously major rock music industry” and would have made multiculturalism work. Its population would have doubled but its jobless rate would be the lowest in Australia.

The vision of Whyalla as an ecocity offered an idealistic vision, as passionate as the boosters’ prophecies of growth 30 years before. It failed, killed by lack of investment. Its only reminder is a water-recovery plant near the city’s racecourse, its bare red-earth berms giving no idea of the passion that inspired it.

That the would-be ecocity’s economy remained fundamentally dependent upon mining and processing minerals, using coal-generated power and water brought from the ecologically failing Murray River, remains a sad and tragic irony.

Quest continues in a new century

In the early years of the 21st century there was a further burst of optimism, based on the promotional slogan “Whyalla: Where the Outback Meets the Sea”. In 2005, the council was promoting the city hopefully:

Long a steel and ship-building hub, Whyalla is now experiencing a tourism renaissance based around its proud industrial history and natural phenomena.

In truth, tours of the steelworks attracted few visitors. The tourist promotion office was now putting its eggs in the baskets of the Whyalla Maritime Museum, itself based on the preserved second world war corvette HMAS Whyalla (the first ship built in the shipyard, launched in 1941 and in 1987 hauled ashore).

Whyalla promotes the giant cuttlefish as a tourist attraction, but a cuttlefish-led revival is unlikely. southoz/flickr, CC BY

Even more, they hoped for a boon from fishing tourism, from the annual angling festival, and from the exploitation of the giant cuttlefish, which swarm in the waters of nearby False Bay. While the lure of Spencer Gulf’s snapper and kingfish has failed to attract gourmet travellers, the cuttlefish do attract a thousand or so divers each winter.

Successive mining or processing proposals, boosting the prospects and benefits of aquaculture, betalene (an algae used in food manufacture) or the processing of titanium dioxide, came to nothing; more is hoped from reports that Indian energy giant Adani might develop a solar-power plant in one of the city’s huge – but virtually unoccupied – industrial estates. Sometimes the city’s main product seems to be consultants’ reports and optimism in industrial quantities.

Isolated, but no cultural desert

For all that the city has become smaller and poorer, Whyalla remains (as the town commission’s 1965 booklet put it) “a city of contrasts”. Alongside the pub-club-bingo and poker-machine culture that seemingly characterises the city, it is also, paradoxically, a place with greater access to culture than comparable communities.

Partly because of its isolation and perceived disadvantages, the state government and other agencies have long made special efforts to bring culture to Whyalla. I first heard Mozart’s Eine kleine Nachtmusik live in the Nicholson Avenue primary school library, because South Australia’s arts council sent a string quartet on tour in about 1973.

The opening of what is now the Middleback Arts Centre in 1985 has given Whyalla residents an impressive program of theatre, music, ballet and other performances.

Nor is the culture all imported. The Whyalla Players have performed musicals annually since 1956, and not just the traditional Rogers and Hammerstein or Gilbert and Sullivan repertoire, but also complex and recent works such as Phantom of the Opera or Cats.

Again, this activity suggests a triumph of optimism over the city’s unpromising background of deprivation. Ironically, the Middleback Arts Centre is located in the same precinct that houses government and church employment and welfare offices.

This ambivalence can be detected in the reflections of resident writers published in anthologies produced by successive incarnations of the Whyalla Writers’ Group (WWG). In 2001, Julie Drogemuller, in her poem The Beauty of Whyalla, reflected lyrically:

Her eyes

are the lights

that shine

in the clear starry nights.

And her name is Whyalla.

Contributors to another WWG anthology, Iceblocking in Red Haze, expressed the disaffection seemingly endemic among the city’s “youth”. In a piece featuring a sustained diatribe beginning “I hate Whyalla”, an anonymous author ended her piece, paradoxically, by writing fondly of:

… the red sand, the saltbush, the desert … the RED HAZE, my home Whyalla.

The red sand, the saltbush, the desert, the RED HAZE … not everyone loves Whyalla’s setting. Michael Coghlan/flickr, CC BY-SA

Ideas, we’ve had a few

As this suggests, while arguably a community in perpetual crisis, optimism can be found – not least in the pages of the city’s newspaper. Jan Vrtelka, a Czech migrant, wrote dozens of letters to the Whyalla News in the mid-noughties. He later published a selection of over 60 of them under the telling title of All for Whyalla.

Vrtelka’s optimism for Whyalla’s potential seemed boundless. He too advocated developing coastal resorts and remaking the railway to Port Augusta – which had carried passengers for only two years before closing in 1978 – to ship cattle to Darwin for export to Asia. He also proposed desalination plants, a medical school and university to make it the “education hub of western South Australia”.

The coastal track to Port Augusta, he claimed, could rival Victoria’s Great Ocean Road, if only it were sealed. He urged the introduction of dog-sledding (on sand) and land yachts (on mudflats near the city).

Whyalla, he thought, should plan for a city five times its present size: entice refugees to settle, he argued – perhaps having himself fled Soviet oppression.

Jan Vrtelka’s pride in Whyalla was not unique. Like my mother, he regarded Whyalla’s heat as invigorating and its generally fine weather as without parallel. It was as if the authors of BHP’s boosting booklets of the 1960s lived on.

Vrtelka’s optimism was at least rooted in an awareness that things really were pretty crook. He knew that the city’s population had declined more rapidly than in any comparable second city in any state in the world. He understood the notion of “a diminishing city” – an oft-used catchphrase – but he struggled against it.

Still defying the uncertainty

Dating from 1940, the frieze on the Hotel Spencer depicts the blast furnace, a relic of Whyalla’s first industrial boom. Peter Stanley, Author provided

Whyalla’s economic decline appears to be terminal. Ore mining in the Middleback Ranges brings modest benefits; as did the Santos natural gas development at Port Bonython on nearby Point Lowly in the 1990s. The development of BHP Billiton’s copper and uranium mines at Olympic Dam has not contributed much to Whyalla’s economy.

BHP divested itself of the steelworks in 2000 to OneSteel, later taken over by Arrium Steel, with each transfer costing jobs. Over the decade the total workforce in the steelworks – once 6,000-strong – fell to around 1,600. In April 2016, Arrium called in administrators and offered the plant for sale.

Today, the future of the steelworks remains uncertain. If it were to close, not only would Australia lose its only manufacturer of “long steel” products, but without its principal employer Whyalla would be mortally wounded, economically and socially.

Whyalla, where the outback meets the sea … or where the steelworks used to be? Abi Skipp/flickr, CC BY

Fundamentally, the question is whether an industrial community can survive in the harsh environment of the upper Eyre Peninsula. Arrium Steel’s collapse may reflect the structural impossibility of attempting to make steel in such a place, rather than merely chronic mismanagement and a worldwide glut of steel.

But amid the predictions of economic collapse and the social dislocation that would inevitably follow, optimistic voices are also heard.

The city council’s 2015–16 strategic plan predictably aims to create “a vibrant, attractive city offering our community a diverse range of sustainable economic, social, environmental and cultural opportunities”, creating “an energetic, harmonious, integrated community actively involved in shaping Whyalla for current and future generations”.

Just as deprivation and despair are an ineradicable part of Whyalla’s inheritance, so too are optimism and hope. A recent visit to the city disclosed new homes privately built where Housing Trust units had been demolished and, as well as many “For Sale” signs, new businesses opening (a perennial triumph of optimism over economic reality in the city).

Amid forebodings of doom, quixotic headlines characterise the Whyalla News: “Afloat with hope”; “City on the mend”, “Whyalla expands to great future” and, of course, “Jobs boost for region”.

The local council has launched a rebranding that will, they hope, attract tourists. (The Whyalla News cartoonist – who happens to be my elder brother – suggests that instead of “Where the outback meets the sea” it adopt “Where the steelworks used to be”). With the death in 2016 of Jim Pollock, long-term mayor named in obituaries as a “Whyalla warrior”, no fewer than seven candidates are standing for election as mayor: they all have positive visions for the city’s future.

On the way to the airport I stopped off at a magnificent exhibition of quilts by the Whyalla Quilters. The group’s members had produced over a hundred pieces, a startlingly characteristic expression of the creativity that Whyalla’s people can display.

No-one is really sure what “Whyalla” means in the language of the Barngala people: they were devastated culturally before anyone thought to ask. It may mean “place near water” (“Where the outback meets the sea”), or it may mean (in the classic Indigenous response to a white questioner) “I don’t know”.

Whyalla: I don’t know.

The author is grateful to Don Sarre, Ingrid and Stephen Stanley, Naomi Haldane and Ana Morris of the Whyalla Library Service, and Teresa Court of the Whyalla City Council. His work has also been published in Griffith Review 9 and 48.

You can read other essays from Griffith Review’s latest edition here.

[rocksolidbuilding]

Uncommon Features of Unique Homes

Uncommon features can transform a house into an extraordinary and unique home. One of the most striking uncommon features that can truly make a home stand out is incorporating natural elements into the design. For example, homes with interior gardens or vertical green walls bring a touch of nature indoors, creating a serene environment. This not only enhances the aesthetics of the space but also improves air quality and provides a calming effect. Such homes allow residents to feel connected to nature while staying indoors, which is rare and extraordinary.

Another uncommon feature that can define a unique home of Port Lincoln is a custom-designed staircase. Rather than using a typical staircase, homeowners can opt for an architecturally stunning and one-of-a-kind staircase design. This can include spiral staircases, floating staircases, or even stairs that are designed to resemble works of art. A uniquely designed staircase not only adds visual interest but also becomes a focal point for the entire house. It becomes a conversation starter and a reflection of the homeowner's personality and style.

Apart from these uncommon features, the integration of smart home technology can make unique homes in Whyalla. The incorporation of modern technology such as voice-activated assistants, automated lighting systems, and fingerprint recognition door locks adds a touch of innovation to the house. With just a few taps on a smartphone or a voice command, homeowners can control various aspects of their homes, from temperature to security. These technological advancements not only make day-to-day life more convenient but also position the home as a futuristic, cutting-edge space.

[diveplanit]

5 great marine encounters to have right here in Australia

As we sit out the Covid-19 storm, it’s worth thinking about the next dive trip – to give us all something to look forward to. For many of us here in Australia – that’s likely to be right here at home, as domestic travel restrictions begin to ease. Luckily for us, we have some of the most amazing diving experiences in the world. Here are just 5 incredible marine encounters – 5 reasons to #diveherethisyear.

Giant cuttlefish in NSW, VIC and Whyalla

Between May and July each year, giant Australian cuttlefish, the world’s largest species, congregate by the thousands in the shallow waters between Fitzgerald Bay and False Bay in Whyalla in South Australia’s Spencer Gulf, to breed. It’s one big cephalopod orgy and it’s spectacular to witness.

Credit: Jayne Jenkins

Cuttlefish are actually not fish at all, they are cephalopods, which translated literally means “head foot” which kind-of makes sense when you look at them. Their feet (eight tentacles) are directly connected to their head. Their tentacles, which are a bit like over-developed lips, are used for grabbing, moving and camouflage. The two feeding tentacles are smooth but tipped with a testicular club covered with suckers. This is what they use to catch their prey; which they then secure and eat with their beak-like mouth and a tooth-lined tongue.

After this marathon of three to four months of endless sex, most die from the sheer exhaustion. Giant Australian cuttlefish are also seen frequently at Sydney and Melbourne dive sites, and along the NSW and Victorian coastline.

Dwarf minke whales on the Ribbon Reefs

The dwarf minke whale is the smallest member of the baleen whales, growing to only 8m in length. This species is only found in the Southern Hemisphere, spending the summer months feeding in sub-Antarctic waters and migrating to the warm waters of the Great Barrier Reef over winter to breed and give birth.

These small whales are very different to their larger cousins, as when in reef waters they are strangely attracted to stationary boats, often hanging around for hours and even days. This has allowed dive operators, with special swim-with-whale permits, to place snorkelers in the water with these curious mammals for some remarkable encounters.

The season is short, from early June to late July and the best way to have an encounter is on a three-day liveaboard trip on board Spirit of Freedom or Mike Ball’s Spoilsport.

Ningaloo whale sharks

Whale sharks can grow up to 16 metres in length, with a mouth over a metre wide. So named because it is as big as many whales and like many whales, a filter feeder. Indeed, the whale shark (Rhincodon typus) holds many records for sheer size, being not only the largest extant fish species but also by far the largest living non-mammalian vertebrate, rivalling many of the largest dinosaurs in weight.

On Australia’s west coast, Ningaloo is the place to go for a whale shark encounter. Between mid-March and mid-July, you can enjoy a snorkel on Ningaloo Reef – the world’s largest fringing reef – in the Ningaloo Marine Park, and also go for a swim with the world’s largest fish. Whale shark swimming tours are operated from the towns of Coral Bay and Exmouth.

Small groups of only 10 swimmers at a time are dropped close by these gentle giants as they move through the water, and as a snorkeler, you’ll feel particularly dwarfed by their massive size and even wider mouth.

Whale sharks can also be seen diving or snorkelling at Christmas Island.

Mantas at Lady Elliot Island

Lady Elliot Island is well known for manta activity – indeed, the island advertises itself as ‘Home of the Manta’ and is used frequently as a base for the research team at Project Manta which has identified over 700 individuals in waters surrounding the island.

There are mantas at Lady Elliot all year round with numbers peaking between mid-May and mid-August. Mantas can be seen whilst snorkelling as well as diving, and there are a couple of known cleaning stations, around Lighthouse Bommie where mantas are reliably sighted. The Resort is also deeply involved in manta conservation and they offer lots of information about mantas.

Turtles at Raine Island

Did you know, the world’s largest green turtle rookery can be found in Australia? Roughly 620 km north of Cairns lies Raine Island, the world’s largest green turtle rookery, which itself is surrounded by pristine colourful reefs teeming with life.

During nesting season between October to March, upwards of 15,000 egg-laden turtles come here to nest. The island itself, a world heritage site, is off limits, but it is possible to dive the surrounding reefs, Mike Ball Dive Expeditions operate a couple of special expeditions here in November each year.

Naturally, turtles are seen in abundance diving Raine Island, either sleeping on the bottom or cruising the walls. Sharks are also common, especially grey reef sharks and whitetip reef sharks, but tiger sharks also frequent the reef to feed on sick or injured turtles.

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