Newington armory

The newly created suburb of Newington is built on the site of the old Newington Armory, which is where the Navy used to store a stack of munitions etc. Part of the site is still closed to the public, but most of it now seems to be covered in horrible, lego-like houses. More lego blocks are being stacked on top of each other as I write in order to cover all the remaining land in horrible monuments to the inability of architects to build something liveable.



If you walk down a backstreet in Paddington, the old terraces look mighty fine. Somehow, I doubt whether these terraces in Newington will evoke the same feelings in 100 years time.

I don't know what the builders were thinking when they put these places up, but they all have the most horrible doors and entrances imaginable. The front door and the entranceway to a house sets the tone for the whole place. I rode up and down a dozen streets looking at doors and failed to find one that was even remotely attractive. I guess the builder went to Bunnings and bought a few hundred copies of the cheapest one on the rack - it certainly looks that way.

I passed the Rivercat on the way around to Newington. Let me say that again - I passed it. It must be restricted to 20 km/h in this part of the river due to the wash it creates. The Rivercat doesn't create a bow wave at all, but it does create an odd wave fro mthe stern. If you look in the bottom right hand corner, you can see a big ripple coming off the stern and leading to the shore.



I've heard that the pollution problems that have been experienced in this area of late are a result of the wash created by the Rivercats - they don't create any turbulence on the surface, but apparently they stir up the river bottom something fierce. All the heavy metals and pesticides and so on that were happily sitting on the river bottom for decades doing nothing were suddenly all stirred up when the rivercat started plying up and down.

I almost ran over a couple of ducks a bit after this shot was taken. They were waddling across the path in front of me, and showed no inclination to get a move on. I suddenly thought that if the fish are full of heavy metals, then these ducks are probably so full of lead and cadmium, that they could barely float - let alone fly.

This is the wharf in front of the armory. There are a couple of old cranes on it, as well as a very narrow gauge railway line that leads into the armory. It's pretty easy to imagine ships tying up at the wharf and a train trundling out with ammunition that was then swung out via the cranes. Today, it has some nice benches and BBQs as well as a series of cute fountains down the back.



For once, I ran into some other cyclists who were out and about. One group headed on down the path towards Parramatta (at least that is what the sign said) and another group sat on the wharf waiting for the ferry to come back. It's not often that I see other cyclists when I am out, mainly because I am stooging around in the middle of the day. If it was a weekend, or 7am on a weekday, I am sure I would be running into them all over the place.



I wanted to actually look around the armory, but it is only open on weekends. I can't figure out why, but I was in no mood to jump the gate and find out the reason.



The jaunt around the armory extend todays ride by a smidgeon - my total now stands at 60km over 2 days. Pathetic, but better than zero.

The weather was lovely today - it was about 27 degrees when I was out, with a slight breeze. Again, I hardly broke a sweat - going west, everything is flat as a pancake. Unless I really crank up the speed, I am not getting much of a cardio workout.