Tuesday 25 September 2007

Ring those bells! 22nd Sept. 2007


We went into the city this morning in order to look at the Swan Bell Tower which we had seen yesterday when we caught the ferry to Rottnest Island. We had read that the eighteen bells were rung by hand but not much more than that. The tower is a most unusual building and doesn’t immediately bring to mind ‘bells’ when you see it; it is a very modern architectural design and is one of the world’s largest instruments with an 82.5 metre tower housing the 12 bells from St Martin-in-the-Fields, Westminster and the six new ones. The largest bell called Zachariah (they all have names) is 1,408 kg and is the third largest swinging bell in Australia. Visitors can watch the bell ringers through one-way dark glass but it is not easy to see through especially with murky handprints on the glass but it is stated that the ringers need to concentrate and that is why the glass is not clear. On the fourth floor which you can get to by either stairs or a lift you can see the bells swinging and ringing when being played. When we were there the ringers were apparently beginners who were practising but they were doing a very good job since there were usually eight to ten of them playing together at once and at one stage, the whole eighteen were being played so they have to really concentrate to pull their rope at the right time and with the right amount of gusto I imagine. It was fascinating to watch them and also the bells ringing. The sound from the other side of the glass wall was not too loud as I thought it might be since they are very big bells and being so close you would expect to get bleeding ear drums but the design of the building must prevent this from happening. As well as the bells, the tower affords excellent views of Perth city and the Swan River which can be seen from the balcony on the sixth level. This is a recommended tourist attraction if you are coming to Perth; well worth a look. I am not sure how often the bells are played but the practices are on Saturdays and Sundays so we timed it right. Probably best to aim for the weekend if you go.
From there we took a drive around to Fremantle to check out the markets and take a look around. The markets are near the first permanent building to be built in Western Australia in 1831; the prison. The place was buzzing with shoppers and there were many interesting stalls to browse; crafts and produce as well as the inevitable souvenir shop and junk type shop too. We didn’t buy much but it was interesting to check look. We went out into a courtyard area where there were tables and chairs outside an area of eateries mainly of Asian varieties and went in there for our lunch. After this we had a little time to spare and decided to look in the prison which was near where our car was parked but found that if you didn’t take a tour you couldn’t see much and we didn’t want to spend an hour and fifteen minutes on a tour which didn’t start for another quarter hour because we had things to organize for our train trip tomorrow and wanted to go for a walk just before dusk down on the river.
Our walk down along the river wasn’t as good as last time we were here but the weather has cooled a fair bit since then so that could be the reason. So, not many good bird shots unfortunately. Back to finish packing and have dinner so we can be away early tomorrow for the train ride of a lifetime. Well, a good train ride anyway. I just hope we can find Platform 9 3/4 !
Below is a video of the bells ringing that I took with my mobile phone. It may take a while to download so if you only have a slow connection you might want to avoid it but it does show you what we saw pretty well.

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