We wanted to place our virtual reward somewhere we would be unable to place a physical cache. My partner and I enjoy coming to this part of Sydney Harbour National Park for walks along the headland, and we never cease to be amazed by the spectacular views. We hope you enjoy this spot as much as we do! The site is accessible via the South Head heritage trail – an easy walk that leaves from Camp Cove at Watsons Bay (enter via north end of Cliff Street), taking you past historic gun emplacements before reaching Hornby Lighthouse (a little further east from gz coords). Signage indicates the park is closed from 10pm to 5am, and no drones are allowed at this location - fines apply (as the site is adjacent to HMAS Watson - Royal Australian Navy Base). As a side note / FYI, the walk to the lighthouse passes Lady Bay Beach; a designated nudist beach. There is clear signage, and if you don't want to see anything, you can simply keep your gaze away from the beach as you walk past! (the path is higher up than the beach and partially obscured by vegetation)
To qualify to log this virtual cache, you need only post a photo of either yourself, your geocaching team, or your gps / phone at the lighthouse in your log. Any found logs that do -not- include this photo as requested will be removed.
The following information outlines the history of the lighthouse - sourced from www.lighthouses.org.au
The wreck of the Dunbar & Catherine Adamson
Two shipwrecks led to public opinion in Sydney demanding that a lighthouse be erected so that the entrance to Jacksons Bay could be exactly defined. The first was the Dunbar of 1,334 tonnes in August 1857. It arrived at Sydney Heads on a gale ridden night. A pilot from the Watsons Bay Pilot station would have been unable to get out through the heads to guide the ship in, so the captain decided to seek shelter but got caught between The Gap and Outer South Head. All attempts to claw the ship away from land failed and the ship crashed onto the rocks just after midnight. It wasn't till next morning when people at the signal station saw the wreckage that they realised the disaster had occurred. There was only one survivor of the 122 on board. An Irish seaman, James Johnson, was found that morning clinging to a ledge. His family was to go on and play a significant role in the manning of New South Wales lighthouses.
Two months later in October 1857 another wreck occurred, this time off North Head. It was the Catherine Adamson, a clipper ship of 895 tonnes with the loss of twenty-one lives including the pilot who was guiding the ship in.
The Building of the Hornby Lighthouse
After these disasters, a small lighthouse was erected at a low elevation on the extreme point of Inner South Head in 1858 - making it the third lighthouse to be built in what is now the current boundaries of NSW (after Maqcuarie and Nobby's Head lighthouses). The light was opened by Sir William Denison, Governor of New South Wales, in 1858. It was named after the family of Governor Dennison's wife, whose father became Admiral Sir Phipps Hornby, Commander in Chief of the British Pacific Fleet in the 1860s. However it was known as the Lower Light to distinguish it from the nearby Macquarie Light, New South Wales' first.
Designed by colonial architect, Alexander Dawson, the lighthouse was a circular tapered tower constructed with curved dressed sandstone (quarried from the local cliff-faces) with the light standing 9 metres above ground level. A simple Georgian style sandstone cottage (also designed by Dawson) was built to the west of the lighthouse - with extensions and repairs carried out on the cottages in 1860 including a second cottage for the head keeper. Each cottage had a small garden surrounded by a picket fence and an underground tank stored water for general use.
The original apparatus was a first order catatropic lens that has been purchased in 1853. The lamp was powered by kerosene which conformed with advances in lighthouse technology of the day. It was converted to incandescent gas in the early 1904, a huge advance in technology with benefits in safety, brilliance and cost. With the final conversion to electricity in 1933 it was automated and demanned. The character was altered in 1948 to oscillating when a new Chance Brothers' catadioptric lens was installed that had originally been in the lightship Bramble that had been anchored off the Sow and Pigs Shoal and had since been in use in the light tower at Shark Island. The lighthouse tower has distinctive red and white vertical stripes.
Virtual Reward - 2017/2018
This Virtual Cache is part of a limited release of Virtuals created between August 24, 2017 and August 24, 2018. Only 4,000 cache owners were given the opportunity to hide a Virtual Cache. Learn more about Virtual Rewards on the Geocaching Blog.
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Did you know that NSW has a geocaching association? Geocaching NSW aims to enhance and improve the activity of geocaching and holds regular events where geocachers meet to enjoy their common interests. Visit the association website here. |