If you look at a map of lighthouses in Australia (like this one) you can see that there aren't many of them on the northern coastline of the continent.
In fact, there's just one, on Cape Don.
That intrigued me, so this one became this week's Lighthouse of the Week.
Let's get the location and the specifications.
Location: here's a map. It's actually located in a national park, the Garig Gunak Barlu National Park; I'm going to have to investigate that later.
As for the specifications, this time we will go to Lighthouses of Australia, which is also where I linked to the lighthouse map for Australia.
Constructed: 1917 (and it wasn't easy)
Environment: Tropical and hot
First light: Third order dioptric lens
1970s: Converted to tungsten-halogen electric light
1983: Automated, high-intensity solar powered light installed, and "demanned".
Range: 20 nautical miles
Color: Somewhat orange
Ease of access: Not easy at all.
By the way, I noticed that the lighthouse map linked above does not have all the lighthouses of Australia, as there is at least at lighthouse at Cape Hotham and on Emery Point near Darwin, which aren't real far away from Cape Don. And they aren't lighthouse buildings, they are both steel framework towers. So Cape Don is indeed Australia's northernmost traditional lighthouse.
Pictures:
View from above:
On a postcard:
The original Cape Don lighthouse lens
On a stamp:
And a different view than most of what you'll find online:
No comments:
Post a Comment