True North Mark's Blog

This will be our second last night at Rottnest for this season due to a very questionable decision by the Mc Gowan Government to turn Rottnest into some sort of quarantine centre.

Today we were given 2 days notice to clear out and advised that military vessels will be patrolling the island after that.

In one minute of lateral thinking I can think of numerous alternatives far better than this decision, namely:

Leeuwin Barracks, Northam refugee detention centre, Any of the empty hotels in Perth, any of the old hospitals that are under utilised, or even Garden Island for that matter!

So instead they kick everyone off the mainland today, then all the boats who have chosen to self isolate here whilst the Corona Virus Storm passes are told to leave by Midnight Thursday!

Everyone of the boats here are self sufficient and we have absolutely no need to go to the mainland, we can make our own water, we have our own supplies.

We are the lowest risk group of people in Perth and now we have to go into lock down in Perth?

Not to mention the knock on effect to the island businesses themselves, who have to just shut down at short notice.

A seriously inappropriate decision made as a knee jerk I think.

I also hope that the stigma of Rottnest being the ‘quarantine island doesn’t stick when this is all over.

Lets hope the rest of the decisions needed to be made before this is all over is done with some more smarts than this one!

Seeing as the world is going kinda crazy at the moment I will be posting some uplifting and tranquil photos from my library for a while to help put a positive moment to the day.

Stay well everyone…be positive….be strong …..be good!

We are down south for a couple of days and made it to Busselton in time for sunset.
Not epic but not bad!

I was out and about North of the River today and dropped in to see the new Scarborough pool, which I haven’t seen since it was completed.

Very nicely done I would say and it really adds to the iconic beach surroundings of Scarborough.

There was some nice light around so I set the drone off to do a quick triple layer stitch.

I headed out to Carnac this morning on the good ship Polaris and got the drone up to get some shots.

On the way out there were a few sailing schools operating out of the sailing club, showing some little tackers the ropes…literally!

I thought I would post something nice and normal given all the hype out there and I hope the post puts a little smile on your day.

True North departed for this years cruise season today, 4 weeks and 2 days from when she was lifted.
The upgrades to the bow area and the cocktail deck really have improved these areas considerably and the new paint job makes her shine better than new.
A huge effort by the Echo and True North teams in getting everything done in time for today’s departure and I am sure there will be some catch up sleeps happening over the next few days.

Another stunning view of Parker Point

Well the organisers of the Highway to Hell would have to be pretty happy with that result.

We went down to Troy park on the bikes and then scooted back to Petra Street and caught it all again there.

This is the view of the Highway from the drone when the first truck arrived at Troy Park.

Everyone looked like they we very much enjoying themselves.

I had a Sony A7R4 on loan from Saul at camera Electronics for this weekend and will review that shortly.

Overall pretty impressed with it so far.

There is quite a story to this photo!

I was down at the sailing club refuelling my boat when I looked up and saw this coming down the coast, so I cut the refuel short and dashed back to the pen, then opened up the back of the cruiser then remembered i hadn’t charged my drone batteries from this morning’s True North shoot…doh!

Note to self….charge batteries after each flight!

So, with only 2 batteries with 35% in each one I shot the drone up from where I stood in the sailing club carpark, pinged one set of stitches with one battery, landed then did the same with the second one.

I had just enough juice in each battery to do one stitch and land.
How’s the water coming out of those clouds and getting lighten up by the setting sun and how’s how solid the cloud above the system was?

I then packed up the car and tried to get ahead of the system and down to the Power Station only to be foiled by traffic!

Net result rain pouring down and lightning all around me and me sitting inside devastated that I didn’t get a second crack at the system.
Pretty happy with this shot but!

I went down to Fremantle this evening to check out the Queen Mary and was lucky enough to see her being turned around.
I then shot the other way!