Newcastle, New South Wales

Newcastle might not exist if it wasn’t for two things – escaped convicts and coal.  In 1797, just nine years after the First Fleet’s arrival, Lt. John Shortland was chasing convicts who had stolen a boat and sailed north to escape the penal colony at Sydney.  Though he did not find the convicts, he did discover the Hunter River with its natural harbour and also noticed chunks of coal lying loose on the ground.  Shortly thereafter, Australia’s second city was founded and named after Great Britain’s famous coal city, Newcastle.

The modern Hunter Harbour

Newcastle’s massive coal deposits have been a driving force in the region and along with its other natural resources, like timber and sandstone, helped build not only this city but also much of Sydney.  Coal deposits are everywhere and much of Newcastle and the nearby city of Stockton stand over a Swiss cheese of underground mine shafts.  Even now, all proposed building sites must be carefully reviewed and any underground shafts filled in before development can begin.  Coal is still mined in the region and Newcastle is today the largest exporter of coal in the world.

This is a coal seam on a beach not far from Newcastle Beach.  

It is common to find pieces of coal washed up on the beach.

These early 19th century coal train tracks are still visible 

not far from the coal seam in the photo above

Newy, as the locals call it, has done a fine job preserving its heritage architecture.  Newcastle East where we live, near the mouth of the Hunter River, has a number of beautiful buildings.

Christchurch Cathedral just up the hill from our apartment

Terrace houses in Newcastle East

City Hall was built with local sandstone and steel made at the BHP Steel

 Works on the Hunter River.  They burned coal mined here to make steel.

City Council Chambers.  Note the picture of Queen Elizabeth on the wall to the left.

Back in the early days of the city Customs House oversaw the collection of tax on imported goods entering the harbour.  Due to its close location to the river, the building also had a time ball mounted on its tower.  In the early 19th century, time balls were used in harbours all over the world.  At precisely the same time every day the ball dropped down a pole, signaling to ships to set their chronometers, a crucial navigational tool used to determine longitude.  Though redundant now, the Customs House time ball still drops daily at 1:00 pm, preserving an important piece of local maritime history.

Imported goods were often held in large warehouses, called bond stores, until the bond or customs tax was paid.  The word “store,” in this usage, doesn’t mean a place where things can be purchased but rather a place where goods were stored.  Owners of bond stores typically made a good living in a busy port like Newcastle and often their structures were quite handsome.

Earp Gillam Bond Store

Nobbys Lighthouse, sitting atop Nobbys point, dominates the mouth of the Hunter River.  Once an island, convicts helped build the causeway that now connects Nobbys to the mainland.  Over the years a beautiful beach has built up and the original rock-filled breakwater has disappeared under the sand.  

Nobbys at sunset

The sunsets in Newcastle can be quite stunning.

Newcastle is a truly lovely town and we have come to feel completely at home here.  The people are friendly and kind, the weather is fantastic, there are restaurants and cafes galore, and we have enjoyed so many wonderful adventures both within the city and nearby.  It is the perfect size, in our opinion; big enough to have all the amenities we like but small enough to feel like a real community.  We have loved every minute of our three months in Newcastle.

But today we say a fond and bittersweet farewell to Newy and head south to Sydney, another pretty fantastic but much larger city.  Newcastle has a population of about 550,000 compared to Sydney’s massive number of around 5 million citizens (just slightly less than the entire population of the state of Minnesota).