Fort Queenscliff, Bendigo bollards, Queen Mary II

A quickie tonight as I'm tired and we have a early start tomorrow - heading out toward Adelaide

First, I went and did the tour of Fort Lonsdale, built from 1860 to protect the second richest port in the world from the marauding Russians, who had the richest gold port, St Petersburgh and may well have fancied our gold as well. Anyhow it got built complete with umpteen canon, a 20ft wide and deep ditch all around it and communications with Fort Nepean on the other headland guarding the entrance to Port Philip Bay. Needless to say, like most of these things in Australia, it never saw active service and never fired a round in anger and was turned into a school for budding Generals in 1945. Since then the Army have kept it and used it for various bookkeeping jobs but don't really want to spend anything on its upkeep.

Some snaps:

Fort Queenscliff, Victoria

Fort Queenscliff, Victoria 

Fort Queenscliff, Victoria 

Fort Queenscliff, Victoria

After 1hour 45 mins in the howling freezing gale, I came back to the park and picked up Judith and went into Geelong proper for a look at some real shops before we head out into the untamed outback wilds of western Victoria. After a coffee and a few bouts of retail therapy we drove down to East Beach and drove about taking some snaps:

Geelong Victoria

Swimming enclosure Geelong Victoria

Geelong Victoria

While I was on my tour of the Fort, the guide told us that the Queen Mary II was due out through the heads tonight about 9pm, so after a pizza we thought we'd be clever and go to the best lookout early to watch it go through the heads. Ha! 10,000 others thought the same thing and it was packed. I banged off a few snaps, only one or 2 come close to being sort of alright - I must put that tripod in the car....

Queen Mary II Point Lonsdale Victoria