Journey Jottings

Tuesday Tip :

At the end of each month I jot down on one of our Map Journals what has been the main highlight for that month, so at the end of the year (and for the fun of future reminiscing) I’ll have the year simply summarized on a single sheet ~

The highlight for May was the expansion of our Map Magnet range! Back in January we launched the first of our Map Magnets, which covered 22 regions across the country ~ We’ve added a further 8 areas so now we have 30 Map Magnets covering most of Australia!

And for something new for me…. here is a little video clip ~

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tp-kclvroY

Click on the ‘2010‘ tag to see a synopses of my year at a glance

At the beginning of this year we introduced a line of Map Magnets to our range of Map Journals, Mail-It Maps and Scrapbook packs ~

Regions covered by our Map Magnets

We started off with 22 to test the water that covered the major cities such as Sydney

Sydney Map Magnet (on backing card)

Melbourne:

Melbourne Map Magnet

Perth and the south west of Western Australia:

Perth Map Magnet (on backing card)

and Brisbane covering from Fraser Island down to Byron Bay:

Brisbane Map Magnet (on backing card)

We have just added another 8,  so we now have a total of 30 regions across Australia covered

The latest cover some of the more remote regions such as Bourke and Cameron Corner:

Bourke Map Magnet (on backing card)

Coober Pedy up to Alice Springs:

Coober Pedy Map Magnet

and the Gulf of Carpentaria

The Gulf of Carpentaria Map Magnet

…with lurking crocodile

To see more, they’re on our website:

http://www.journeyjottings.com/magnets.html

Happy travels

“A grand sea on today; one moment we are in a valley & the next on a mountain. It is also considerably colder now. Our friend was quite near us this morning & we found by looking through the glass that she had got a lot of horses on board. Yesterday afternoon Ada had a fit of some sort or another (I suppose through the change in the weather) & is now in her bunk not feeling over bright. Daisy is helping Sails while the guv’nor is lying down for a rest, Clara & Brown are doing a little in the spooning line & I am enjoying myself by watching Joey write his diary from my bunk. Of course not much can be done but play cards etc of which luckily we have a small stock as we brought our box of games with us. After a smoke we turned in at 10.

We saw the southern cross to-night for the first time but it is nothing grand.”

Extract from A.Whelen’s journal aboard the Hesperides sailing from England to Australia in 1878

We’ve had a major removal company take a bundle of our Mail-It Maps!

They’re going to give them to their clients who are moving home to use as change of address cards that will visually illustrate where they used to live and where they are now!

We’re over here… where are you?

Living by the sea I’ve become very aware of the ever changing tides… their times and their heights.

Governed by the moon the two high tides and two low tides, in each twenty-four hour period, follow the lunar cycle of a twenty-nine and a half-day month. This means that each day the tide occurs 50 minutes later than the same event on the preceding day.

Moon Map by Johannes Hevelius dated 1645

When the moon is full, and then two weeks later when we have a new moon, the gravitational pull due to the moon, the earth and the sun all being aligned results in a much higher high tide and a much lower low tide.

Alignment of Sun, Moon & Earth create Spring tides

These tides are called Spring tides. This is nothing to do with the season, but is rather from the old English word ‘springan’ to well up.

The Bay of Fundy in Canada has the claim to fame of having the largest range between its high and low spring tides, which reaches nearly 16 metres. Avonmouth in the Bristol Channel, UK comes in second with a range in excess of 15 metres.

Here, in the bay off Brisbane the difference between high and low spring tide is a mere 2.5 metres but at low tide on these weeks the bay looks as though someone has pulled out the plug as the water drains far away exposing the silty sand.

In North-Western Australia where the spring tidal range reaches 10 metres it creates a natural phenomenon called ‘Staircase to the Moon’. For three nights each month between March and October, when the full moon creates an exceptionally low spring tide, it then reflects off the exposed mudflats of Roebuck Bay, Broome to create a beautiful optical illusion of a stairway reaching up to the moon!

Staircase to the Moon, Western Australia

On alternate weeks between the full and new moon, when the sun, earth and moon are at right angles to each other resulting in a less intense gravitational pull there are Neap tides. Neap is derived from the old English word ‘nep’ meaning to nip in the bud. On these weeks, here in Queensland, there is then only a metre difference between our high and low tide so happily there is nearly always something left to paddle in!

For the time and height of tides here in Australia:

http://tide-times.com.au/

Time and tide wait for no man

While there is no dispute that Aboriginals have inhabited the Australian continent for at least 40,000 years, it is another matter as to which western nationality was the first to ‘discover’ Australia and put it on the map.

Ptolemy's World Map 150AD

Terra Australis Incognita ~ The Unknown Land of the South ~ appeared on Ptolemy’s maps circa 150AD.

Ptolemy’s 8-book atlas ‘Geographica’ was the source of information upon which maps were based during the age of discovery in the late 1400 – 1500’s. It was with this limited data, which had changed little in nearly 1,500 years that sea explorers set off to ‘discover’ the world. Columbus setting off for India across the Atlantic in 1492 when he  ‘discovered’ America; Magellan, the Portuguese born, and Spanish national who made the first circumnavigation of the world via the Spice Islands in 1522, followed by Drake who was the first Englishman to circumnavigate in 1580.

Woodcut of Ptolemy map by Johane Schnitze 1482

The first records of Europeans landing in Australia are:

• 1606 Willem Jansz, the first recorded Dutchman to set foot on the western shore of Cape York Peninsula.

• 1616 Dirk Hartog, the first Dutchman to set foot in Western Australia

• 1688 William Dampier was the first Englishman to visit Australia, yet…

• 1770 Captain Cook has the credit for officially claiming Australia in the name of the British.

The map below is the first map from the western world depicting Australia and was published prior to any of these official landings, in 1593.

Map of Australia by de Jode 1593

It shows the east coast of Australia with New Guinea to the north. The land hosts an archer taking aim at a griffin, which is a mythical creature with an eagle’s head and a lion’s body. A lion and writhing snake also inhabit the landscape.

This map ‘Novae Guineae Forma, & Situs’ was part of a major work entitled ‘Speculum Orbis Terrarum’

It had been initiated by Gerard de Jode (1509 – 1591) a Dutch born cartographer, engraver and publisher who died in Belgium leaving the atlas uncompleted and which his son Cornelis de Jode (1568 – 1600) finally published 2 years after his father’s death in 1593.

With its whimsical sea monsters, mermaids, sailing ships & sense of discovery I think this is my favourite antique map

I was talking with Rosemary this week!

A few years ago she decided to pack up home to travel around Australia on an extended holiday.

When she reached Central Australia she came across Journey Jottings Map Journals, bought three and posted one to each of her grandchildren who live over in Great Britain.

From here on, she informed them where she was by Postcard or email and the children had to search the map to find where she was and once located, plot and dot their grandmother’s progressive route around the country.

Grandma's Footsteps

What a fun, educational and interactive way of involving them in her travels as they together discovered and then shared the adventure

My earliest childhood recollection of a map would be100 Aker Wood (sic) drawn by ER Shepard for the endpapers of AA Milne’s book, Winnie the Pooh.

This pictorial map not only illustrates the spatial relationship between Pooh’s home and those of his friends, it also charmingly encapsulates a scattering of some of his more memorable moments such as where the Bee Tree is, where the Woozle wasn’t and where the heffalump trap was set.

The map simply summarizes the book on a single sheet, creating a visual keepsake of Pooh’s trails and tales that conveys the spirit of Pooh and his adventures.

The acorn for Journey Jottings was planted