A Pleasant Morning on the Reef

[aggienaut]

Yesterday, Saturday, April 8th, Point Lonsdale - Finally there was a conservation project only an hour from me. I'd never actually been to Point Lonsdale, because I thought it was a non-place, just a point, beside the town of Queenscliff, so I was pleased this project brought me there to find that it's actually at least five shops on a street fronting a beach, as well as a kind of cool reef that's exposed at low tide, and a lighthouse. I've always thought of Queenscliff as the end of the peninsula on this side but I guess Pt Lonsdale is the actual narrowest point of the harbor entrance (I wish that picture was bigger but I took it from within the facebook app, which apparently only takes small res pictures).

   It turned out there were only two other volunteers -- two marine biology students (a couple?), as well as myself and two rangers (both young women in probably later 20s. Apparently several more people had signed up but never turned up. Which was weird because the weather from the beginning (9am) was just perfect, sunny, in the 70s. We once again were out putting quadrants on the ground and using the same form to fill in what was within them, and this time they had already selected random places by GPS to set them on the ground for random sampling. Consisted of a lot of counting sea snails (I counted 311 limpits in one 50cm/50cm quadrant!). I feel like a started to become familiar with the names of the various sea snails but its not quite cemented in my head yet. Some had these cool digital camo style patterns though.
   On our arrival there were several people out on the reef with dogs off leash, they started quickly trying to move away upon sighting the rangers but the one of them hustled after them to give them all a chastising. Halfway through the morning someone brought to one of the ranger's attention a dead sting-ray in a small pool in the exposed reef, she (the ranger) was concerned someone may have killed it on purpose because people do, but after examining the poor dead cute thing there were not visible external injuries so cause of death was inconclusive. Faith in humanity reached a nadir when it came to the ranger's attention that there was a human poop on the end of the pier. But on a more positive note, people with little kids would often ask what we were doing and the rangers clearly enjoyed explaining it to the kids and were able to do it in a manner the kids found interesting.

   A large number of other young people started appearing with measuring tools of their own (tape measures?), which caused the ranger to grumble a bit about how people are supposed to let them know when they have a planned research project, but eventually the person in charge of these people came over and it came out that he'd told a different ranger who had failed to tell this one, so instead she grumbled about him.



   We finished our surveys just after noon. Apparently the next one, on the 22nd of this month, is even closer to me! So that'll be nice. In general I've noticed as we go in to winter there's far fewer conservation projects on any of the calendars.

   The weather was lovely and being as I've never been to Pt Lonsdale before I walked down to the row of shops, and just as I was walking into the one I decided to have lunch at, there were the rangers at a table! They waved me over and I joined them (no mom, no romance). They had to go back to the office, and bemoaned about how "people think we have such a great job working in such a beautiful place but, what it really means is we are stuck in an office here while we can see people enjoying the beautiful beach out the window!" I had an absolutely delicious calamari salad, would totally go back to that place for it.

   Then I drove around the corner to Queenscliff town and just spent awhile walknig around town. It's a cute sort of victorian coastal town kind of place. Really cute. And the weather as really nice so I was in no hurry to get home.



   Saturday had also been a day of lovely weather, again in the 70s and sunny. I had helped my friend Udi man his booth at a farmer's market in the morning, and then slowly made my way home, stopping for a delicious lunch in the town of Inverleigh,




   But back to the reef, big ships kept passing through the narrow entrance to the bay to reach Melbourne (recognize this one??). And the above lovely picture is a good segue to an article I came across last week and had been meaning to share, this totally gripping article about the worst US maritime accident in 30 years. It's estimated that a major merchant ship sinks somewhere in the world once every two or three days, but it doesn't make the news the way aviation disasters do. Having gone to sea myself (as a tallship sailor) and knowing many people who work in commercial maritime (two of my exes have captain's licenses), stories of maritime disasters really hit me close to home.

Comments

[pondhopper.livejournal.com]

Another great chronicle...love the camo snails!
And a beautifully clear Autumn day for you!

Is there anything you haven't done yet in life which you'd like to do? I mean, how many people can say they've been tall ship sailors and snail counters?
:)

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

I wish I knew about aquaculture, it's also big on development projects. I also want to try my hand at a variety of little things like say cheese making. (:

[ravenfeather.livejournal.com]

Start now on cheesemaking with a simple one. Heat a gallon of whole milk slowly on the stove, with half a cup of vinegar until is separates into curds and whey. Stir it, don't let it boil, but when it separates you can turn it off. Pour it through a colander and squeeze and rinse it until it is dry. Add salt, and if you like a bit of sweet cream. I promise you, you will never be able to eat store bought cottage cheese again after you taste it. *grin*

I meant to post this as a separate comment, but I know Donna will not mind me jumping in on her conversation. I am not an ocean or beach person, I don't care for large bodies of water, but that place is stunning.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Haha interesting. I thought it had some kind of aging step and maybe some kind of yeast and/or bacteria culture? where do different kinds of cheese come from?

[ravenfeather.livejournal.com]

Not for cottage or fresh cheeses like mozzarella, farmers, or cottage cheeses. Different cheeses come from different kinds of bacteria and or mold, but that is primarily aged cheeses. What type of animal the milk comes from and length of aging, pressing, type of covering all affect taste, texture and the grain of the cheeses. Cheese making is something I really want to explore ,but so far I have only made fresh cheeses. Milk is expensive, and it is not something I drink. It is also not available unpasturized here, so growing my own milk is my first step.

[num3bers.livejournal.com]

Nice

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Thanks (:

[aerodrome1.livejournal.com]

Love the photos. And the town sounds lovely.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Its such a cute little town, lots of old Victorian buildings and at least three really grand edifices of old colonial style hotels ( :

[wpadmirer.livejournal.com]

The El Faro was off the coast of North Florida, so I'm unfortunately very familiar with that. It was really sad.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

I actually do not recall having heard about it at the time, which is surprising because I _am_ really tuned in to such news. It's probably more likely I somehow never heard about it than that I forgot. :-/

[halfshellvenus.livejournal.com]

Sounds like a wonderful day overall, and the pictures are terrific!

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Thanks! (: I ended up with more pictures than I could fit in here but most were fairly similar so I didn't want ot burden you all with all of them. I might stick some more in later entries that don't have an obvious accompanying picture of their own.

[richaarde.livejournal.com]

You’re right. I don’t remember ever hearing about a ship going down in the news. That was a riveting article.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

The way it uses the bridge voice recorder to recreate the story is what makes it really gripping I think. Like this isn't a work of fiction, I feel like we can see these real people going about their day, and we know they are all about to die but of course they don't. If I recall correctly the (2nd? 3rd?) mate was grinding coffee about an hour before it came time to abandon ship. And then finding that unidintifiable body which they then lose again, it's like a ghost appearing. I found it all really chilling

[thismaz.livejournal.com]

Oh, I would love to be in your climate right now *g*

Those items on the railing of the pier, are they for clamping fishing rods?

Having been to sea, I can't bear to read stories about maritime losses. I started to read that one, but...
I agree that Disasters at sea do not get the public attention that aviation accidents do, in part because the sea swallows the evidence but to be blunt it must also be because the loss of a big ship only involves 30 or so lives and 30 lives are not news.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

I don't blame you for not finishing this one, it was all too real, like I said I felt very sad after I finished. And then I had all these people I'd been talking online being like "where'd you go?" because I had stopped responding to anyone while reading it.

In 2012 the tallship Bounty went down with a loss of 2 out of the 17, and I knew people aboard. I didn't sleep at all the night it happened (was reloading news constantly), and had bad dreams about it for years after ):

[yesididit2.livejournal.com]

that container ship almost looks like a city off in the distance

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Yeah I always think of them as whole city blocks hurdling through the sea -- they travel at 20+ knots which is actually crazy fast -- that guy speeding by in his motorboat shooting up a big wake is probably not even going as fast. But where the motorboat can come to s top in a minute or two, the container ships require dozens of miles to come to a stop! Through reasons of physics I don't quite understand it apparently is easier to go faster the longer a ship's hull is. As mind boggling as it seems, aircraft carriers are among the fastest ships at sea. Their top speed is classified but I think they've been reliably reported to be able to reach more than 90 knots. It's insane!!

[furzicle.livejournal.com]

I think you may not hear about all the maritime disappearances because ships are registered from so many countries around the world. Do you think first world nations are going to report on some missing ship (carrying 20 crew members) that is registered from, say, Turkey?It's part of the same phenomenon where there will be a news item that announces, "Russian 200 passenger plane is down killing all aboard. Fortunately, none were Americans."

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Or how an earthquake that kills 10,000 people in inner China will be like a back page mention