Erica has had a fascination with Cockatoo Island for some time. You can see the island from our new home and Erica has asked us many times if we could take her there for a visit. I think she was imagining some sort of tropical island, not an old convict penal site and shipyards. However, at the conclusion of our visit Erica declared Cockatoo Island to be the best island she has ever been to (I think the only island she has ever been to).
Ethan acted as our guide, as he had been to Cockatoo Island in a previous year for a school excursion. He remembered a lot and was able to navigate his way around the island. Ethan even pointed out where scenes from Wolverine had been filmed and showed us a wall of fake bricks left over from the set.
Ethan and Erica looking out of the window from the old convict guardhouse.
Standing in that same window frame.
Erica running across the courtyard, keen to see what is in the next building
(from memory it was the mess hall, but I could be wrong about that).
Some old buildings in the ship design precinct. If you look closely you will notice that Clara has removed her shoes. We didn't realise this until some time later and ended up having to retrace our steps in order to figure out where she had thrown them (they were found by Ethan and Erica in one of the rooms in the convict area).
Looking out over the dockyard.
Ethan outside of Biloela House, built in 1841.
Around the other side of Biloela House.
An old crane. On the foreshore you can see a row of tents. Cockatoo Island rents out camp sites and also has some permanent tents set up for glamping.
Overall it was a nice way to spend a couple of hours on a Saturday afternoon and we made a note that next time we visit we need to bring some bikes as there were a lot of cool places to ride.
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