It's Friday 17th September (even though the date above will show 20th September, which is when I finally found time to post this page) and we have been on Tasmanian soil for two weeks. So many great activities happening all the time I am struggling to keep up with the daily posts.
We went on a tour of the NORSKE SKOG paper mill at Boyer (near New Norfolk) this morning. As the tourist season proper hasn't yet started, we were the only couple there. As I wrote in my last blog, no cameras or mobile phones were allowed on the tour, but I sneaked a couple of lasting images from outside beforehand.
Our guide, Denis is a really down to earth local bloke (from New Norfolk), approaching his 70th birthday. He was a worker in the chlorine plant at this mill for 30 years, back in, what he described, as the "bad old days" when the mill was doing huge environmental damage with its processing methods. After the giant Norwegian conglomerate Norske Skog took over and modernised the plant to eliminate those practices, Denis was one who took a voluntary redundancy package. After being retired and bored for some years, the company offered him a part-time job as tour guide and that he has lovingly done for the past eight years.
The "feel good" news story about Norske Skog's Boyer Plant is (like the plant) far too big for me to tell here, but if blog readers would like to know more about a company that really is doing the right thing by our environment, then this link will provide a "little" insight. But "little" is the operative word here. You will probably need to go to your "zoom" setting to read it ... the pictures and the type are so damned small! (To do that, go to "View" on your browser tool bar and click to reveal the drop down menu. Scroll down to "Zoom" and click to reveal "Zoom In". You may need to do this several times)
In a nutshell, at Norske Skog, Boyer, they turn the item on the left into the item on the right in just three hours and at no stage is any damage done to the fragile Tasmanian environment
The afternoon was spent exploring the delightful township of New Norfolk, so named after the residents of Norfolk Island in 1806/7 ... both convicts and free settlers ... were forcibly moved of that tiny island and transported to this place. Everywhere there is evidence of those early residents.
This is the Toll House and it features a roof design that was repeated frequently around New Norfolk. That roof style caused us to investigate this place which can be seen from a distance as one approaches New Norfolk from the direction of Hobart.
It turned out to be Corumbene ... a nursing home.
The "feel good" news story about Norske Skog's Boyer Plant is (like the plant) far too big for me to tell here, but if blog readers would like to know more about a company that really is doing the right thing by our environment, then this link will provide a "little" insight. But "little" is the operative word here. You will probably need to go to your "zoom" setting to read it ... the pictures and the type are so damned small! (To do that, go to "View" on your browser tool bar and click to reveal the drop down menu. Scroll down to "Zoom" and click to reveal "Zoom In". You may need to do this several times)
In a nutshell, at Norske Skog, Boyer, they turn the item on the left into the item on the right in just three hours and at no stage is any damage done to the fragile Tasmanian environment
The afternoon was spent exploring the delightful township of New Norfolk, so named after the residents of Norfolk Island in 1806/7 ... both convicts and free settlers ... were forcibly moved of that tiny island and transported to this place. Everywhere there is evidence of those early residents.
But to get to Corubene we had to drive through streets, on either side of which were old hospital-like buildings and a chapel in the process of being demolished. We estimated the whole area of this bomb-blitz like site to be at least one hundred acres. In the absence of any explanatory signs, our curiosity at what the place could have been, was soon satisfied by a lady picking up her child from a modern day-care facility slap-bang in the middle of all this devastation. It seems this was the infamous Royal Derwent Hospital, or as previously known, the New Norfolk Lunatic Asylum.
My son Glenn would have been in his element had he been with us. He is fascinated by the paranormal and even though I am ambivalent about such things I confess to experiencing a very queer feeling the whole time Barbara and I were on the sight. If you go to the Royal Derwent Hospital link above, Wikipedia has a whole lot of interesting stuff about what is said to be "the most haunted place in Australia". Also look at this link.
The day ended with a call at Inland Fisheries headquarters where I was able to collect 22 different maps detailing the trout fishing regions I am hoping to visit.
And tomorrow ... a new day dawns!
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My son Glenn would have been in his element had he been with us. He is fascinated by the paranormal and even though I am ambivalent about such things I confess to experiencing a very queer feeling the whole time Barbara and I were on the sight. If you go to the Royal Derwent Hospital link above, Wikipedia has a whole lot of interesting stuff about what is said to be "the most haunted place in Australia". Also look at this link.
The day ended with a call at Inland Fisheries headquarters where I was able to collect 22 different maps detailing the trout fishing regions I am hoping to visit.
Thanks for linking in my video.
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