Bass Strait
Bass Strait is a sea strait separating Tasmania from the Australian mainland the state of Victoria. The International Hydrographic Organization defines the limits of Bass Strait as follows: On the west; the eastern limit of the Great Australian Bight. On the east; the western limit of the Tasman Sea between Gabo Island and Eddystone Point [being a line from Gabo Island to the northeast point of East Sister Island thence along the 148th meridian to Flinders Island. Some authorities consider the strait to be part of the Pacific Ocean as in the never-approved 2002 IHO Limits of Oceans and Seas draft. In the in-force IHO 1953 draft, it is instead listed as part of the Indian Ocean; the Australian Hydrographic Service does not consider it to be part of the Southern Ocean, using the expanded Australian definition, states that it lies with the Tasman Sea. The strait between the Furneaux Islands and Tasmania is a subdivision of Bass Strait. Aboriginal Tasmanians came to Tasmania 40,000 years, ago across a land bridge called the Bassian Plain during the last glacial period.
Sea levels rose to form Bass Strait 8,000 years ago leaving them isolated from the rest of Australia. Based on the recorded language groups, there were at least three successive waves of aboriginal colonisation; the strait was detected by Captain Abel Tasman when he charted Tasmania's coast in 1642. On 5 December, Tasman was following the east coast northward to see; when the land veered to the north-west at Eddystone Point, he tried to keep in with it but his ships were hit by the Roaring Forties howling through Bass Strait. Tasman was on a mission to find the Southern Continent, not more islands, so he abruptly turned away to the east and continued his continent hunting; the next European to enter the strait was Captain James Cook in the Endeavour in April 1770. A talented and diligent hydrographer, Cook identified the strait, but knew he had to conceal it, he was working during the period of intense Anglo-French rivalry that filled the twelve years between Britain's success in the Seven Years' War and France's revanche in the American Revolutionary War.
The Admiralty had issued its usual verbal instructions to hide strategically important discoveries that could become security risks, such as off-shore islands from which operations could be mounted by a hostile power. In his journal Cook disguised his discovery with a riddle. Cook's ploy worked and Tasmania's insularity was suppressed for three more decades; when news of the 1798 discovery of Bass Strait reached Europe, the French government despatched a reconnaissance expedition commanded by Nicolas Baudin. This prompted Governor King to send two vessels from Sydney to the island to establish a garrison at Hobart; the strait was named after George Bass, after he and Matthew Flinders passed through it while circumnavigating Van Diemen's Land in the Norfolk in 1798–99. At Flinders' recommendation, the Governor of New South Wales, John Hunter, in 1800 named the stretch of water between the mainland and Van Diemen's Land "Bass's Straits", it became known as Bass Strait. The existence of the strait had been suggested in 1797 by the master of Sydney Cove when he reached Sydney after deliberately grounding his foundering ship and being stranded on Preservation Island.
He reported that the strong south westerly swell and the tides and currents suggested that the island was in a channel linking the Pacific and southern Indian Ocean. Governor Hunter thus wrote to Joseph Banks in August 1797. Strong currents between the Antarctic-driven southeast portions of the Indian Ocean and the Tasman Sea's Pacific Ocean waters provide a strait of powerful, wild storm waves; the shipwrecks on the Tasmanian and Victorian coastlines number in the hundreds, although stronger metal ships and modern marine navigation have reduced the danger. Many vessels, some quite large, have disappeared without a trace, or left scant evidence of their passing. Despite myths and legends of piracy and alleged supernatural phenomena akin to those of the Bermuda Triangle, such disappearances can be invariably ascribed to treacherous combinations of wind and sea conditions, the numerous semi-submerged rocks and reefs within the Straits. Despite the strait's difficult waters, it provided a safer and less boisterous passage for ships on the route from Europe or India to Sydney in the early 19th century.
The strait saved 1,300 km on the voyage. Bass Strait is 250 km wide and 500 km long, with an average depth of 60 m; the widest opening is about 350 km between Cape Portland on the North-Eastern tip of Tasmania and Point Hicks on the Australian mainland. Jennings’ study of the submarine topography of Bass Strait described the bathymetric Bass Basin, a shallow depression 120 km wide and 400 km long in the centre of Bass Strait, a maximum depth is the channel between Inner Sister and Flinders, which navigation charts indicate reaches 155 m. Two plateaus, the Bassian Rise and King Island Rise located on the eastern and western margins of Bass Strait are composed of
Drysdale, Victoria
Drysdale is a rural township near Geelong, Australia, located on the Bellarine Peninsula. The town has an approximate population of over 3,700. Drysdale forms part of an urban area, along with nearby Clifton Springs, that had an estimated population of 13,494 at June 2016; the town is named after Anne Drysdale. The area was known as McLeod's Waterholes and Bellarine. A township began to develop in the late 1840s and a Post Office opened on 1 January 1855. From 1902 until 1951 Murrudoc Post Office to the west operated in the area known as Murradoc; the railway reached the local railway station from South Geelong on the way to Queenscliff in 1879, remained in Victorian Railways service until 1976. It is now the western terminus of the tourist orientated Bellarine Peninsula Railway; the station lies next to an important regional site for waterbirds. Until abolished in 1993, the Rural City of Bellarine council seat was in Drysdale. A popular youth music and performing arts venue, affectionately labelled'The Potato Shed' is located in the back of Drysdale.
The industrial size venue is the site of'Battle of The Bands', a yearly music festival which has seen a number of local bands make a name for themselves in a popular setting. Drysdale has several primary and high schools, including Saint Ignatius College, the senior campus of Bellarine Secondary College, a campus of Christian College; the local football club is the Drysdale Hawks, who play Australian Rules Football and compete in the Bellarine Football League. The Hawks were formed in 1879 and have won 15 premiership titles, the last in 2010; the Bellarine Rail Trail runs through the town. The local Cricket club is named the Drysdale Hawks. Anne Drysdale "Trains,Troops&Tourists"-The South Geelong-Queenscliff Railway Drysdale - City of Greater Geelong
Electoral district of Lara
Lara is a seat in the Victorian Legislative Assembly. It covers much of the area between the western suburbs of Melbourne and the regional city of Geelong; as a result, many of the voters come from Melbourne suburbs such as Wyndham Vale and the northern suburbs of Geelong, including Lara, Bell Post Hill and Corio. The district includes the country towns of Anakie and Little River but these add few voters to the district; the electorate was created at the 2002 state election. A safe Labor seat like its predecessor, it was won by Peter Loney the MP for Geelong North. Loney faced a preselection challenge ahead of the 2006 election from upper house member John Eren, whose seat was being abolished as part of sweeping government reforms to the chamber. Facing certain defeat at the hands of the factionally connected Eren, Loney chose to retire. Eren faced little challenge in the general election, was returned as the new member for Lara. Electorate profile: Lara District, Victorian Electoral Commission
Lara, Victoria
Lara is a small town north of the City of Greater Geelong, 18 km north-east of the Geelong CBD, inland from the Princes Freeway to Melbourne. The explorers Hume and Hovell arrived at Lara on December 16, 1824, believing that they had reached Westernport Bay, they recorded that the Aboriginals described the bay as Djillong and land as Corayo, suggesting origins for the names of Geelong and Corio. The area was named Kennedy's Creek but was given several different names including Duck Ponds, Hovell's Creek, Cheddar and Lara Lake; the area of Lara was no more than a few farms at this time. The railway though the town was opened in 1857 along with the local railway station, with several subdivisions announced. A Post Office opened on 1 March 1858 as Duck Ponds, renamed Hovell's Creek in 1872, Lara in 1884; the population grew to a few hundred by 1890, several facilities like schools and churches were built, but a municipal water supply was not completed until 1947. In January 1969, 17 people were killed in bushfires.
Most of the victims were trapped by the fast-moving grass fire while travelling on the Princes Highway. Several scenes from the 1979 feature film Mad Max were shot on location around Lara, as well as several scenes from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation mockumentary We Can Be Heroes: Finding The Australian of the Year, in which the town carried the fictional name "Dunt"; the town's history is being preserved at the Lara Museum and Historical Centre on the corner of Forest and Canterbury Roads. This historic property the Lake Bank Hotel, was renovated by local businessman Lino Bisinella and provided in 2013 to the community group which runs the museum, Lara Heritage and Historical Inc. Lara contains a number of heritage listed sites, including: 605 Bacchus Marsh Road, Elcho Homestead Princes Highway and Hovell Monument 108 Windermere Road, Pirra Homestead Hovell's Creek runs through Lara and ends at Limeburners Bay, a small inlet of Corio Bay. Owing to the poor soils and low runoff inherent in Australian streams, along with the fact the region is the driest in southern Victoria because of the Otway Ranges’ rain shadow, the creek is ephemeral and is not useful as a water source.
Granite peaks known as the You Yangs, 4 kilometres north of Lara, rise to a height of 352m and can be seen from most areas of Geelong. Lara offers education through its three primary schools; the town has the opened Lara Secondary College, which accommodates years 7 - 12 and the VCE since 2008. Lara is home to Avalon college, a school for International Students preparing them for traditional schools. In the Lara outskirts are industry parks and two prisons – the maximum security HM Prison Barwon, opened in January 1990, the medium security Marngoneet Correctional Centre, opened 3 March 2006; the former Pirra Girls' Home, a home for girls age 13 to 18, part of the Victorian youth welfare system, closed during the 1980s. Lara is home to St. Laurence Park, set on 42 acres of parkland and houses 86 self-contained cottages and 22 flats for the elderly. Ford Australia operates a proving grounds for automotive testing and evaluation at the north end of the You Yangs. Lara has regular V/Line passenger train services on the Geelong line to Melbourne and Geelong to cater for the many residents who commute to work each day via Lara railway station.
Lara has become a popular place to live for those wishing to work in Melbourne and have ties to Geelong. After the extension of Myki ticketing to the Geelong line in 2013, Lara became a Myki Zone 2, 3 & 4 station. Following the introduction of 20-minute off-peak services in 2015, there has been an increase in passenger traffic by train between Geelong and Lara. Under contract to Public Transport Victoria, CDC Geelong operates bus services in the Lara area on routes 10, 11 and 12, running to and from Lara station. Taxis are available. Avalon Airport is nearby but there is no regular public transport from Lara station to the airport terminal. Lara has a post office, two banks, several hairdressers, a barber, a travel agency, a butcher, a greengrocer, a Woolworths supermarket and a Coles supermarket; the Coles supermarket opened in December 2014 as part of the town centre expansion on the site of Austin Park, as well as a re-alignment of Waverley Road to create a more spacious site for the supermarket and the re-configuration of the park.
There are one newsagency. The Lara Library opened in 2011. Lodging and entertainment are provided by a pub/hotel, sports club, a lawn bowls club. There are several eat-in bakery/coffee/cake shops, two Thai restaurants, an Indian restaurant, four pizza shops, three fish-and-chip shops, McDonald's, three Chinese and noodle shops and other take-aways. There are two petrol stations, both of which are open for business 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Lara has an Australian rules football team competing in the Geelong Football League. There are two soccer clubs: Lara Soccer Club. North Geelong play in the National Premier Leagues Victoria and Lara Soccer club who play Geelong Premier Division the GRFA 1 the 9th tier in Australian football. Golfers play at the Lara Golf Club on Elcho Road. Avalon Airport Avalon Raceway Serendip Sanctuary Lara - City of Greater Geelong Lara Museum Lara Weather
Shire
A shire is a traditional term for a division of land, found in Great Britain, New Zealand and some other English-speaking countries. It was first used in Wessex from the beginning of Anglo-Saxon settlement, spread to most of the rest of England in the tenth century. In some rural parts of Australia, a shire is a local government area; the word derives from the Old English scir, itself a derivative of the Proto-Germanic skizo, meaning care or official charge. In the UK, "shire" is the original term for what is known now as a county; the two are nearly synonymous. Although in modern British usage counties are referred to as "shires" in poetic contexts, terms such as Shire Hall remain common. Shire remains a common part of many county names. In regions with so-called rhotic pronunciation such as Scotland, the word shire is pronounced. In non-rhotic areas the final R is silent; when shire is a suffix as part of a placename in England, the vowel is unstressed and thus shortened and/or monophthongised: pronunciations include, or sometimes, with the pronunciation of the final R again depending on rhoticity.
In many words, the vowel is reduced all the way to a single schwa, as in for instance Leicestershire or Berkshire. Outside England, in Scotland and the US, it is more common for shire as part of a placename to be pronounced identically to the full word, as a result of spelling pronunciation; the system was first used in the kingdom of Wessex from the beginning of Anglo-Saxon settlement, spread to most of the rest of England in the tenth century, along with the West Saxon kingdom's political domination. In Domesday the city of York was divided into shires; the first shires of Scotland were created in English-settled areas such as Lothian and the Borders, in the ninth century. King David I more created shires and appointed sheriffs across lowland shores of Scotland; the shire in early days was governed by an Ealdorman and in the Anglo-Saxon period by royal official known as a "shire reeve" or sheriff. The shires were divided into hundreds or wapentakes, although other less common sub-divisions existed.
An alternative name for a shire was a "sheriffdom" until sheriff court reforms separated the two concepts. The phrase "shire county" applies, unofficially, to non-metropolitan counties in England those that are not local Unitary authority areas. In Scotland the word "county" was not adopted for the shires. Although "county" appears in some texts, "shire" was the normal name until counties for statutory purposes were created in the nineteenth century. "Shire" refers, in a narrower sense, to ancient counties with names that ended in "shire". These counties are named after their county town; the suffix -shire is attached to most of the names of English and Welsh counties. It tends not to be found in the names of shires. Essex and Sussex, for example, have never borne a -shire, as each represents a former Anglo-Saxon kingdom. Cornwall was a British kingdom before it became an English county; the term'shire' is not used in the names of the six traditional counties of Northern Ireland. Counties in England bearing the "-shire" suffix include: Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Cheshire, Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Huntingdonshire, Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire, Oxfordshire, Staffordshire, Wiltshire and Yorkshire.
These counties, on their historical boundaries, cover a little more than half the area of England. The counties that do not use "-shire" are in three areas, in the south-east, south-west and far north of England. Several of these counties no longer exist as administrative units, or have had their administrative boundaries reduced by local government reforms. Several of the successor authorities retain the "-shire" county names, such as West Yorkshire and South Gloucestershire; the county of Devon was known as Devonshire, although this is no longer the official name. Dorset and Somerset were known as Dorsetshire and Somersetshire, but these terms are no longer official, are used outside the local populations. Hexhamshire was a county in the north-east of England from the early 12th century until 1572, when it was incorporated into Northumberland. In Scotland affected by the Norman conquest of England, the word "shire" prevailed over "county" until the 19th century. Earliest sources have the same usage of the "-shire" suffix as in England.
The "Shire" appears as a separate word. "Shire" names in Scotland include Aberdeenshire, Banffshire, Clackmannanshire, Dumfriesshire, Inverness-shire, Kinross-shire, Kirkcudbrightshire, Morayshire, Peeblesshire, Renfrewshire, Ross-shire, Selkirkshire and Wigtownshire. In Scotland four shires have alternative names with the "-shire" suffix: Angus, East Lothian and West Lothian. Sutherland is still referred to as Sutherlandshire. Argyllshire, Caithness-shire and Fifeshire are sometimes found. Morayshire was called Elginshire. There is debate about whether Arg
City of Geelong West
The City of Geelong West was a local government area about 5 kilometres west of the regional city of Geelong, Australia. The city covered an area of 5.26 square kilometres, existed from 1875 until 1993. Geelong West was first incorporated as a borough on 29 May 1875, became a town on 22 March 1922. After annexing the Moorpanyal Riding of the Shire of Corio on 9 December 1926, to form its fourth ward, it was proclaimed as a city on 17 April 1929. On 18 May 1993, the City of Geelong West was abolished, along with the Cities of Geelong and Newtown, the Rural City of Bellarine, the Shire of Corio and parts of the City of South Barwon and the Shires of Barrabool and Bannockburn, was merged into the newly created City of Greater Geelong; the City of Geelong West was divided into four wards, each of which elected three councillors: Little Scotland Ward Ashby Ward Kildare Ward Manifold Ward The City was bounded by La Trobe Terrace to the east, Aberdeen and Autumn Streets to the south, McCurdy Road to the west and Church Street, Western Oval and Coxon and Bell Parades to the north.
It included the suburbs of Geelong West, Herne Hill and Manifold Heights. The Town Hall was located at Geelong West. * Estimate in the 1958 Victorian Year Book
City of Geelong
The City of Geelong was a local government area about 75 kilometres southwest of Melbourne, the state capital of Victoria, Australia. The city covered an area of 13.4 square kilometres, existed from 1849 until 1993. Geelong was the second municipality in Victoria, behind the City of Melbourne, it was established under the Geelong Incorporation Act in October 1849, proclaimed as a town on 4 June 1858. On 8 December 1910, it was proclaimed a city. On 18 May 1993, the City of Geelong was abolished, along with the Cities of Geelong West and Newtown, the Rural City of Bellarine, the Shire of Corio and parts of the City of South Barwon and the Shires of Barrabool and Bannockburn, was merged into the newly created City of Greater Geelong; the City of Geelong was divided into five wards, each of which elected three councillors: Barwon Ward Bellarine Ward Fidge Ward Kardinia Ward Ormond Ward The city consisted of two parts. The main section, which included Geelong City, East Geelong and South Geelong, was bounded by Corio Bay to the northeast, Barwon River to the southeast, Boundary Road to the east and La Trobe Terrace to the west.
An additional section further to the north, between Victoria Street, Bell Parade and Thomson Road, included the suburb of Rippleside and part of Geelong North. * Estimate in the 1958 Victorian Year Book
