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Any time you take a casual walk around the museum you are likely to have a close encounter with some of our friendly feathered friends like Egrets, Herons, Pelicans and ducks.
There very friendly and you can spend ages just watching their antics, especially the ducks there always interacting with each other.
Pitting of the hull
This is what the Crest restoration team found behind a few layers of Copper Sheeting designed to protect the hull.
It’s to be expected from a vessel of around 100 years old.
The Crest is the only surviving example of the many Jervis Bay launches built at the Dent shipyard at Huskisson.
If you visit the museum, make sure you stroll down to the shed next to the pond and have a close encounter with one small piece of this areas rich maritime history.
Looking at Huskisson today it’s hard to imagine that ships of this size were ever built along it’s banks.
This clipper ship was one of the largest ships built on Currambene Creek. Around 180 feet in length the hull and super structure were built in Huskisson and the mast stepped in Sydney where rigging was also fitted.
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The detail and precision is really amazing.
It’s a collection of objects you really have to concentrate on to see just how intricate and beautifully made they are.
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Since John knows better than to climb ladders he used his skills as a pilot and flew his Phantom Chopper with Go Pro camera attached and made it all look so easy with the safety of having both feet firmly planted on the ground.
This nifty little craft is another amazing piece of technology that can be put to many useful purposes.
Below are a few frame grabs from the flight.
Here we see the Phantom flying over the Museum roof.
After inspecting the video footage we could see the tiled roof section of the museum had a few tiles that looked like they needed attention.
Here we see John preparing his Phantom Chopper with a group of his flying feathered friends looking on.
The Museum has a fine collection of paintings
this shot shows the beautifully handled detail in a painting by
Laslett J Pott RA (1837 –1898)
Biography of the Artist.
And while where on the subject of art, the Museum will be hosting the JB Arts Summer Addition right through December,
That will be another exciting exhibition of art by local artists.
More details soon.
 The ladies from the Collection Management Centre (CMC)Shown here with the Imagine Award. This group of ladies are dedicated and work tirelessly for the Lady Denman to catalogue, clean and manage the collection. Well done and well deserved. |
 Morgan Sant, Graham Hinton and Oliver Morgan and Graham from the Lady Denman Heritage Complex accepted the Collection Management Award (1-2 staff category) for the Collection Management Centre. |
If you need a reason to get out of bed early maybe something like this might be all the motivation you need to come to Jervis Bay and do a slow leisurely walk along the foreshore.
Don’t forget to visit the Museum while your here.
The sailing ship “The Reliance”
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Imagine Awards 2013.Today the Collection Management Team from the museum received an award in acknowledgment of their dedicated work in cataloging and managing the many amazing relics within the museum. 
Another couple of pieces recovered from the wreck
around 1975.
Every day items contain their own story of this tragic event in our maritime history.
Extensive work has been carried out below decks to stabalise the Lady.
It must have been a cramped and difficult environment for the engineer to work in.
Here we see another small brass piece recently handed in from the wreck of the Dunbar.
I have no idea what it might be,
If you have an idea of what it is please let us know.
Beautiful colours
This is one small part of the copper sheeting that lines the hull of the Lady Denman.
Even though the Lady has been out of the water for many years now, the slow release of moisture mixing with air oxidizes the copper and creates these rather beautiful stains.
It’s a slow ongoing process.
Why does Copper oxidize
Copper oxidizes because it is highly reactive and readily loses electrons to react with oxygen in the air. The electro potential of copper is higher than that of oxygen causing a spontaneous oxidation reaction resulting in a green layer of copper oxide. Copper exhibits good resistance to corrosion in urban, marine, and industrial atmospheres.
Many parts make the whole.
Following on from earlier posts here is another piece of our local Maritime history.
It’s one of the port holes from the Crest. The restoration is preceding well, now that the Crest is nice and secure in it’s cradle more work will be carried out.
The restoration crew have just discovered many layers of copper sheeting all applied one over the other lining the vessel.
Like all restoration projects discovery of the unknown is just one part of the joy in this type of project.
Wrecked just North Of Bendalong in 1870.
There’s not much left of the Walter Hood, beaten by the oceans relentless motion, currents and storms and pillaged by divers and souvenir hunters over many years it still makes a fascinating dive.
If you visit the site pay your respects at the mass grave site located near by of the unfortunate victims of that tragic event.
The Lady Denman Museum has a collection of relics including the bell on display and is well worth a visit.
This is the remains of one of the many bottles recovered from the wreck, it shows how with time nature finds a use for everything, this small tube worm must have thought he had found a nice spot to make his home.
This is an Historic Wreck protected by the Historic Shipwreck act 1976 – Please do the right thing and report any finding to the authorities.
You can also bring any items to the Museum where they will be recorded and reported to the appropriate authorities.
Anytime your visiting the Lady Denman you should take a leisurely walk along the mangrove boardwalk, if you go quietly you will be amazed at all the different sounds you will hear from the surrounding forest.
High tide brings different rewards than low tide, this morning swimming amongst the mangroves I saw schools of mullet, a small school of tailor, lots of tiny bait fish seeking shelter, a couple of whiting skimming the bottom looking for food some friendly colourful toads and right at the end of the walk adjacent to Currambeen Creek a nice little sting ray.
It was the first Saturday of the month and time for the Lady Denman Markets. The stall operators had a glorious day to put on their displays.
I did a brief walk through and was surprised at how many different stalls there were.
Music was coming from the pavilion on the far side of the pond and Stan and friends were entertaining on the western side of the Museum.
There was a good crowd milling about the stores and the B,B,Q had a good line up of people drawn to the smell of sausages and onion that was drifting across the green.
