Ocean Pools of NSW Mar 1 2021

 Day 7, one more pool on the Central Coast, Pearl Beach, then Sydney’s Northern Beaches.  Palm Beach is only 5 km from Pearl Beach but it took over an hour and a half to drive there via the Pacific Highway. All the pools today were crystal clear and again at a perfect temperature.

Pearl Beach 

Rocks, Pearl Beach

 Palm Beach

 Palm Beach

 Whale Beach 

 Whale  Beach

 Avalon Rock Pool

 Bilgola Pool

 Bilgola Pool 

Note the wire mesh protecting the pool from falling rocks of which there are many, some quite large! 

Ocean Pools of NSW Feb 28 2021

 Day 6 and we’re on the Central Coast. The sun has appeared and it’s a beautiful day. Two of the pools were skipped because parking was impossible. Avoca had a Sunday market as well as the normal Sunday beach traffic. Terrigal was just as bad. So we visited Copacabana beach where the pool was covered by high tide. We could just see the outline of the walls of the pool. At the other end of this long beach is McMasters Beach which has a small an mostly shallow pool with waves crashing over the end wall. 

Then it was on to Killcare Beach which has a natural rock pool with a fairly rocky floor. The surf next to the pool was excellent. Then after a futile effort to get parking it was back to The Entrance where we found a collection of pools.

Back at our Forresters Beach  motel we swam in the rock pool there - admittedly an artificial one and not an ocean pool, but a very pleasant setting.

 Copacabana pool

 McMasters Beach

 Killcare Beach

 The Entrance 

 The Entrance

 Forresters Beach 

motel pool only

Ocean Pools of NSW Feb 27 2021

 7 Newcastle pools all within a short distance of each other. Soldiers baths were underwater, Newcastle Ocean bathes were found behind the Art Deco facade of the original building. Next to it is the Canoe Pool,  a shallow pool originally called the Mariners Pool as it had a map of the world  on its floor, but presumably renamed because children used to bring homemade canoes and paddle around the world.

The Bogey hole was being washed over by waves. Not a particularly safe place as can be seen by the warning sign.

Finally Merewether Baths has the remnants of a segregated pool for women only - the Ladies Baths and the current baths are actually  two pools next to each other: the oldest on the outside and the new pool on the inside, built to fill in a space that often had water in it anyway. These baths were the clearest we’ve seen so far.

Then one pool on the Central Coast, a shallow pool at Norah Head with a sandy beach.

 Soldiers Baths Newcastle 

 Newcastle Baths

 Newcastle Baths

 Canoe Pool Newcastle 

 Bogey Hole 

 Bogey Hole Newcastle

 Ladies Baths Merewether 

 Merewether Baths, old and new

 Norah Head Pool 

Ocean Pools of NSW Feb 26 2021

 Today two Ocean Pools one at Black Head and the second and much larger pool at Forster. A beautiful sunny day for a change.

 Black Head Beach

 Black Head Beach

    Forster Beach   

     Forster Beach

Ocean Pools of NSW Feb 25 2021

 Day 3 and we swam at Yamba. There have been severe storms so the sea is brown and the pool was a bit murky. At Sawtell the water was terrible. We weren't prepared to risk our health by swimming there. The River varied from milk chocolate colour to dark chocolate. All that rich soil washing out to sea!

 Yamba

 Yamba 

 Sawtell

 Sawtell

 

Sawtell - scum or algae floating in the water

Ocean Pools of NSW Feb 23 2021

 Shelley Beach Cronulla

Shelley Beach Ballina

 Shelley Beach  Ballina  

 Two Shelley Beach pools: Shelley Beach Cronulla and Shelley Beach Ballina the latter really just a wading pool - and we travelled 10 hours to see it

July 12

Final post for this holiday. Today we visited the Titan Missile Museum south of Tucson on the site of one of the cold war missile sites, now decommissioned and made into a national landmark. There were 12 of these sites around Tucson during the cold war. These missiles were the most powerful and longest range missiles in use at the time.

Missile nose cone

The entrance to the control room was through a thick steel door then a
1.2m solid concrete wall and another steel door.

Control room. Note the large steel spring in the corner.
This was to protect against earthquakes caused by a nuclear explosion nearby

The entire corridor was lined with shock absorbers

the hazard suits were for filling the missile with fuel which was highly toxic.
The fuel was a two part mix that self ignited removing the need
for an ignition system other than a means of feeding the two parts together.

The missile in its silo ready for launch - though it's no longer
fueled or armed of course.

The missile's stage one rocket engine.

July 4

In Fredericksburg, Texas, second largest wine area in the States. A bit like the Barossa Valley in that it was settled by German migrants 170 years ago so lots of German influence. The only drawback is that here they charge for wine tasting so we only went to a couple of wineries. There were some very good wines!

Fredericksburg Bank - now a shop

Fredericksburg library

Vereins Kirche - the first church in Fredericksburg, built around 160 years ago

July 2

Final Day in Chicago I visited the Frank Wright House Museum. Perhaps the greatest American Architect, his designs were innovative and clever at lots of levels. The house he built for himself and his wife in Oak Park Chicago when they were first married (in 1889) has been restored to its original state. In the surrounding area there are several other houses he designed in his spare time while working for a large architectural company.