After a month of roughing it in the bush, the expedition took Steph, the expedition’s wonderful benefactor, out for a night on the town at the Sydney Opera House.
The pinnacle of Sydney high society.
The Sydney Harbour Bridge at night.
Steph and I along the waterfront.
The two expedition co-leaders back in civilization.
Waiting in some low couches for seating to open for the Pirates of Penzance.
A pirate hat is produced from newspaper for the evening.
Wine and pirate hats.
The stage is set for the Pirates of Penzance.
At intermission.
Observing the socialites of Sydney.
After a night at the opera, the expedition dispersed in our separate directions. Lord Bailey sailed onward to Los Angeles where he promptly began work at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. I sailed for New Zealand to meet up with Kristen for a romp across the two major islands that comprise the sheep-ridden country. Steph stayed in Sydney, awaiting my return.
Yesterday I went with Steph to Cockatoo Island to check out the 17th Biennial of Sydney art installation. There was a free ferry to the island so it made the outing all the better.
As is always required when taking a ferry ride out of Circular Quay, a shot of the Sydney Harbor Bridge.
And the opera house.
The old wharves west of the bridge.
We spy the island rising up out of the harbor.
A tunnel leads under the island.
It has a dog leg in it so you can’t see the other end.
No clue what this is.
An interesting art installation made out of strainers.
Steph and the art.
Steph being eaten by the strainers.
All of the derelict cranes gave the island an eerie feeling.
Sometimes you just have to rectify the situation.
Inside the power house.
There was a birdcage in one corner of the powerhouse that periodically had a big electric discharge play across its wires. Standing close to it, you could feel the static electricity.
Static electricity art.
So many knobs and switches that I wanted to throw!
The Japanese god of thunder chilling out on a pedestal in the middle of the room.
It was so hard to not jump over the barriers and start throwing switches.
When I visited Cockatoo Island, I no clue what these strange contraptions are for. Each was about three or four feet tall. There were a total of eleven of them in a bank on the upper floor of the power house. Since then, I’ve been told that they are probably mercury-arc rectifiers (also known as mercury-arc valves and mercury vapor rectifiers) which would have been used to take AC voltage and change it to DC voltage to run the large motors on the cranes spread around the island. The sign for the powerhouse (several photos below) indicates that, if this is what these strange contraptions are, they were installed in 1930. I plan to return to Cockatoo Island to get more photos of them and poke around a bit more. Considering that these things, if they are in fact mercury-arc rectifiers, would have a tendency to periodically explode, I bet that whole building is contaminated with mercury.
Another one. They all looked identical.
The tunnel leading to the power house.
The power plant chimney. It has started losing bricks.
Funny signs such as this were interspersed throughout the island.
A grand old tree standing watch over the island.
Another tunnel through the island.
Another funny sign.
Fidel Castro on his death bed.
Another funny sign.
Strange art.
No clue what they had behind the door that was radioactive.
This wild exhibit had a series of cars suspended from the roof of a large building.
Back in Sydney we stopped in the Customs House and looked at the 3-D map under the floor. I am standing over Sydney looking down. It felt like I was Godzilla.
