Apollo 11 and a big blue moon

The Powerhouse Museum, like many other institutions around the world, has been doing its bit to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon visit earlier this year. They have a small but eye-catching array of exhibits to enjoy and experience.

 I was very taken by the big moon hanging from the ceiling. OK, it's smaller than the real one but a lot bigger than most moon globes.



The (replica) spacecraft on offer was actually a Mercury replica rather than an Apollo, but what the hell!
You could do virtual reality explorations of a moon walk, or conduct an actual moon landing yourself, driving a simulator. I was tempted to push in on the queue of youngsters wanting to do all this. But their need was greater than mine, I decided. I'd lived through the 1969 events myself, after all.




















I've written about the Powerhouse Museum before. About what a fine institution it is, but how it's being closed down and shipped out from its unique site next year, presumably so the government can hand over the land to the property developers that actually run the state. See here: April 2018 Powerhouse post

Still a powerful museum experience

Not just a science museum, Ultimo's Powerhouse Museum is the main site of the Museum of Arts and Sciences. It's housed in the old powerhouse building of the electric tram system, and it's quite an institution.

As well as science and technology, it deals with transport, decorative arts, design, media, communication, and lots more. A visit is quite an education.

I first visited the Powerhouse in the 1980s, shortly after it was rehoused in its current spectacular lodgings. I've been back once or twice, and last week it was time to catch up with it once more. It might be the last time too, with much talk of its impending destruction and/or exile to Parramatta and/or duplication. Who knows what the final outcome will be, but the State Government seems to have all kinds of secretive plans for it, all probably involving wins for property developers and losses for us, the public.

Among the probably immovable exhibits is the enormous Boulton-Watt steam engine, said to be the oldest working rotative one in the world.

There's even a nice little corner devoted to space exploration. It includes a section of International Space Station mock-up, which pretends to rotate around you, giving you a very disorienting experience to simulate, sort of, not knowing up from down, as you wouldn't.


And there's the obligatory section of hands-on science education exhibits, like the 'Zap the plasma ball' Van de Graaff machine.

Discovering the Discovery Centre

I finally made it the other day to the Castle Hill Discovery Centre museum thing. It used to be known as the repository for most of the stuff that couldn't fit into the Powerhouse Museum. It's now administratively linked to the Australian Museum and the Museum of Applied Arts & Sciences, maybe a new name for the Powerhouse anyway. Who knows.





Anyway, it's well worth a visit. There's an excellent eclectic collection of museumy things, and it's open weekdays, and beautifully uncrowded, out there in its Castle Hill site, which it shares with an even quieter looking TAFE campus.

Look at how uncrowded the car park was! That's quite a recommendation in itself, for a nice stress-free cultural experience.

The Goods Line

In New York they've got the High Line - a disused piece of elevated railway track that's now a very popular linear park. Well in Sydney we've now got the Goods Line. It's a similar concept. It's not as long or as elevated, but it's a nice little creation all the same.

It too follows an old freight line - through Ultimo, and it connects the pedestrian tunnel along the southern end of Central Station with Darling Harbour and the Powerhouse Museum. It extends the current walkway which passes the ABC building and UTS.

There are historic references and information boards, there are flower gardens, and lots of whimsical little touches like the solid iron chairs and table tennis tables.


I also found it the perfect spot to take in the full majesty of the Frank Gehry designed 'crumpled paper bag' building of the UTS Business School, the Dr Chau Chak Wing Building.