We made a trip on Saturday again by car: this time to the south of Sydney to Kiama, where we were very lucky and could see the blowhole working very hard))

Kiama is about 120 km to the south from Sydney, located at the coast. ‘The name Kiama is from the aboriginal word Kiaram-a, to which some sources give the meaning “Where the sea makes a noise“‘. It has two blowholes - a bigger and a smaller one. They were discovered ‘by George Bass on his voyage of coastal exploration on December 6, 1797‘, but it was known by the local Aboriginals before, who called it ‘Khanterintee’.

I discovered only after the trip on Internet, that there is a smaller blowhole as well, not too far from the other one, so we just missed it this time…But no worries, the bigger one made us amazed already.

So what is a blowhole exactly? It is a kind of hole in the rock at the coast, from which the water is blown out under high pressure. It becomes first vapour and falls back to the ground in big drops. There was a board with a good picture and text explaining the phenomenon:

`The Kiama Headland is composed of volcanic rock called latite. A volcanic extrusion, known as a dyke, cuts through the latite. The dyke is composed of a softer rock called basalt. Over millions of years the softer basalt has eroded faster than the latite creating a tunnel under the headland. Eventually part of the headland collapsed creating the Kiama Blow Hole.

As each wave surges through the tunnel, air is compressed in the rear chamber building tremendous pressure. As waves subside, pressure in the chamber releases forcing the trapped water up the blow hole with loud `whoomp`.`

If the blowhole functions at full capacity, the spout comes up about 20 m high- maybe sometimes higher-, and it makes a tremendous noise, so you even feel the energy under the rocks. It is nice to watch it for a while and waiting for the biggest launches. Believe me, it surprises everybody. And it is worth waiting because the spouts are not standard high, neither in frequency nor in `quality`.

It is said, that the success of this phenomenon depends on a lot of things - the height and the direction of the curls and the height of the sea. For the bigger blowhole for example the waves coming from the south-east are the most prosperous.

There is already a safety fence built around the hole after many accidents. This blog from a Hungarian guy tells a story about three unlucky persons who wanted to have a shower in the water vapour. Unfortunately the shower was not the best idea, because a sudden enormous break took all of them under the rock, and

they had to be taken in away in a coffin. Sad story. I am not sure if it is true, maybe it is only an urban legend, but it is true, that somebody in the NSW Parliament had already asked for this fence in 2000 because of the many serious accidents earlier. In that speech there were mentioned other true and sad stories.

So there is a smaller blowhole in Kiama as well, and it is good because it is said to be working more balanced. It prefers the surfs coming from the north-east.

A white lighthouse has been standing behind the bigger blowhole majestically since 1887, where young couples like posing for wedding photos. I share their opinion, it is a really romantic place.

I read that around 600 thousands visitors arrive here every year, which means about 11 and a half thousand people a week. It is a huge number, isn`t it? As I remember there were about 100 visitors already together

with us at the same time on Saturday -an hour before sunset. Luckily, the place around the blowhole was not overcrowded, so it was fine.

Anyway, there are blowholes in other places in the world as well, for example in New-Zealand I would be very curious about this one. And about any other ones of course. Have you seen other blowholes? Do you want to share your story and pictures? It would make us very happy!!

But until then watch this funny video about the blowhole working in tough times!)))

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It is already a bit late, and I really would like see the French movie that is starting in a few minutes on television. But I promised myself this morning that, whatever may happen, I will write this post tonight.  Today was a very nice day, not only with respect to the weather, but much more interesting than we initially thought as well. Today is April 25: ANZAC Day, I will tell a bit more about this day.

ANZAC is an acronym for ‘Australian and New-Zealand Army Corps ‘. Both in Australia and New Zealand, they celebrate this event on April 25. Maybe it is one of the most important Australian days, with very long parades and many memorial services.

Initially this day was to pay tribute to those soldiers that died in World War One. In 1915 the Australian and New Zealand army entered the Turkish peninsula Gallipoli on this day, trying to force back the Turkish troops. The initial plan did not really succeed end ended up in an almost eight months during bloody war. At the end of the year the ANZAC-soldiers had to be rescued after enormous losses. (more than 8700 Australian and 2700 New-Zealand soldiers have died.)

The first ANZAC day was already held in 1916 to honor this war, and over the decades it became a important tradition to memorise those who died. Today ANZAC day is to honor all who have died in any war or conflict. All those who have sacrificed their blood and live for the nation and for peace.

I was surprised when I heard today, that only in the state of New South Wales, there are about 3000 ANZAC memorials.  There are many parades, services, prays, flags, drums and bagpipes, and lots of wreaths.

What was really interesting for me is that the memorials already started at quarter past four in the morning.  Not only here, but everywhere in Australia they start with the ‘Dawn Service ‘ before the first light. This has a very deep meaning. On the war-field it was very common (apparently it still is), that the enemy starts to attack at dawn. For this reason the defending soldiers had to be ready for war way before sunrise, quite and without moving. These are the moments that makes the bond between troops stronger, the moment that are still remembered, that soldiers were in the same situation with the same problems.  This is the so called ‘stand-to ‘ moment, which is repeated at sunset.

The precise program of all the memorials can be found in the link at the bottom of this post. I found a lot on interesting information on these pages. Maybe you would like to know what kind of symbols they use on this day. Apart from the many decorations that can be found on the countless uniforms, there are the paper poppies. These small flowers can also be seen on Remembrance day, which are used to make wreaths and are placed on all the war memorials. They are also used to pin next to the names of those who have died, on the so called Memorial’s Roll of Honour. The other one is the laurel, which is used to make laurel wreaths, we have seen many on Market Place.

Most common on ANZAC day, is that those who ‘remember’ pin a small twig of rosemary on their breast. We asked a friendly veteran, who allowed us to make a picture of his decorations while he was telling about them. Many were not his own, but from his father who was in the army all his live. The rosemary is  a very old symbol , and because of the smell that apparently improves your memory, it is the symbol of memorial.

We are not Australians, but we like special events, and for us one of the best associations with ANZAC day is the ANZAC-biscuit. This is a small coconut flavored tea biscuit, which originally used to be baked by the women and was sent to the front, ‘to keep morale high’.

It was interesting to see the many generations of soldiers: the young man in his early twenties, the grown up man surrounded by his family or the old veterans, sometimes in a wheelchair. The city was full of celebrating families; all the bars were occupied by marines with their friends and girlfriends. In front of us one marine man traded his cap with that of girl from the royal air force.  During a memorial service in Hyde Park, the boys holding the flags were starting to faint one by one, it was to warm, or teenagers here do not eat properly either The veterans were proudly showing their medals and decorations. On every corner we met men in skirts playing the bag pipe.

After all, I am really glad that we have seen the parade and one of the memorials in Hyde Park, as it was very interesting and impressive.

So this was our ANZAC-day very briefly. And while I have been writing all of this, I also managed to see the movie…)))

http://www.awm.gov.au

Wikipedia

cityofsydney

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