Sydney from on high (8)

Here we are, due south, looking down the gunnels of one of Sydney's industrial areas. The swathe of water across the top of the image is Botany Bay. The crane of the foreshore on the LHS is Port Botany container terminal, and over on the peninsula behind the crane, is Captain Cook's landing place, close to 20kms as the crow flies. Between where I am on the tower, and Port Botany used to be all swamps and dense melaleuca undergrowth. Convicts (and soldiers) who wanted out, thought they would just scarper down there and somehow get back to The Old Dart. Hah! They all perished. Read "The Lieutenant" by Kate Grenville. Bring your focus closer to the city now. See the line of high-rise in front of me, and then the green park. Just before that green bit, are the tracks and out-buildings for Central Station, If you are very, very focused you will see the clock face on the 1921 station tower just peeking out from behind a sky-scraper. And the green patch? That is Prince Alfred Park, bounded by Cleveland St and Chalmers Street. In the 1820s this area was known as Cleveland Paddocks and the City of Sydney has done a tremendous restoration of this parkland with grasses and trees of the period. Like yesterday's image, there are historic markers and park benches for the populace to sit back and think about the debt we owe to those who came before us, while the city hums its backdrop.