16 September 2010

A Day in the life of Launceston



Today I had to put my car in for a service so I took advantage of the free time and spent it in the 'city'. Seems strange calling it the city because it is teensy compared to most I have lived in. All the same it is one and it does have some lovely spots. However, instead of capturing scenic or arty shots I decided to capture my day and my walk about and these are some of the shots I took.


This is the QVMAG or the museum it is in the arts precinct of Inveresk and encompasses the old railway workshops, museum, uni arts, drama and architecture blocks and cafes. It is quite a big space with a board walk along the river and wet lands surrounding the space. Inveresk is a trendy part of town but used to be the slums/swampy area. People who came from this area many years ago were 'affectionately' known as "swamp rats".


The city now has a free bus service known as the Tiger Bus. This allows you to park at Inveresk for a mere $3 a day and get the bus into town. The route isn't a great one and could really be improved on in the number of stops it has but it sufficed for today, so I rode the Tiger Bus to the southern end of town to start my trek.


Princes Square is a small park in town. It is a nice and relatively quite park opposite my favourite veggie restaurant (Fresh) among others. It gets a lot of walk thru traffic but due to a lack of playground it doesn't seem to see a lot of action.


The fountain is lovely and can be seen in it's original state in the previous link. I loved it today as many locations around town are still sporting knit graffiti left over from the Junction 2010 Arts festival. She seems to be saying "WTF! How did that get there?"
This shot is looking West along Elizabeth St. The suburb in the hills is West Launceston and hides the spectacular Cataract Gorge behind it. I am not sure how true it is but I once heard that all the streets for Launceston were drawn up in England with the engineer never actually visiting and that is why it is like a rabbit warren in the hilly suburbs because he had no idea that the city was in a valley. If the streets are anything to go by I would believe it.








Not sure but I think a ladies car was side swiped

This is the mall! A one block space of car free shopping. Often discussed on local radio because older people don't want to see "young/lazy/drug addicted/drunk/useless/did i say lazy?/no hoper youth loitering". Such a friendly atmosphere!

There used to be large blocks for children to climb on a play but I guess due to escalating insurance costs and/or vandalism these were removed and replaced with talking, immoveable pillows. Hmmm, not sure how much fun a child can take!





He does look rather bored
I hope he earned some money. I like seeing buskers around, especially young fellas


An alley way that leads to another alley way. It had some great graffiti art on the walls, I suspect left overs from the arts festival.




The town clock. This is a beautiful building that is really going to waste. It used to house the post office and was just magnificent. In the time I lived in Melbourne the post office moved to another venue and now it only houses the private boxes and a small post office agency. There are offices in the building but a large space is vacant and I find that sad.



mmmmmmmm lunch, a treat of sushi in the sunshine. I actually made a point of taking a photo every 5 minutes for 30minutes while I sad enjoying the sun. I will post those on my other photo blog eventually.


Lastly, I went to the library. I sat and read for a while and then found some great books on photography and caught the tiger bus back to Inveresk. All in all and great day with many more photos to come.

5 comments:

Samala said...

awesome photos Kelli. I love Launceston!

The Absence of Alternatives said...

Thank you for the tour of your city! I am most intrigued by those pillow things. Mostly I was thinking what kind of cool pictures one could potentially take with one's kids. ;-)

The Absence of Alternatives said...

Thank you for the tour of your city!

Marita said...

What a great idea for a blog entry. Feel like I was actually there with you. Thank you :)

Kim H said...

Oh the beautiful Launceston! i love Tasmania sooo much. What a gorgeous, gorgeous place. You are so lucky to be living there. Thanks for sharing:)