Bart Bear's Blog

Yikes! It is 3 months since my last post and some of my readers have asked if I am still here.... Well, what with the cold, foggy, wet Canberra winter weather it has not been a good time to do much exploring outside, so the Oldies and I have been busy in our craft rooms. Craft rooms are strange places, usually with a large desk and lots of shelves. The actual useful space on a craft desk is usually just a couple of square metres/feet and most of the desk is covered by tools, plans and materials needed for the current project. The top row shows you some of Mum's craft room. It is fall of stamps, dies, card stock and paper. Finding the item that you actually need can be a major exercise. The bottom row is part of Dad's craft room. The shelves here are full of plastic and paper models of planes, ships, trains, lighthouses and special buildings. Today I am supervising the painting of a Spitfire in Dad's room and water colours in Mum's. I like water colours as I can usually manage to get a bit wet; long-time readers will know that Mum will not let me get wet, so I enjoy this game. So, lots of crafting going on but no travel. This is due to change in early November, we are all paid up and ready to go, watch this space.

Labels: aircraft, boats, card making, card models, models, train

I have been helping Dad with his hobby/craft as well.We have added another aircraft carrier to our fleet of 1/700 scale ships. This is the third Royal Navy ship to be named "Ark Royal". The Ark was the first carrier to have steam catapults to launch aircraft and the first to have the hangars and flight deck as integral parts of the hull (earlier carriers of all navies had them as "add-ons"). She had a fairly short life, launched in 1938 and torpedoed in November 1941, but she served in actions off Norway, the hunt for Bismarck and in the vital Malta convoys. Her aircraft made some of the first aerial U-boat kills. Our model shows her on her last trip,about to launch Sea Hurricanes for Malta and with Fulmars and Swordfish on deck. Another thing we have been working on is our card lighthouse collection. These are 1/250 scale and mostly UK lights. And of course we had to do another dragon. The big green one we made in November left us at Christmas to live with an Asian family, so we made a smaller version to keep our red one company. It is amazing what you can make from sheets of card and a good template.
 

Labels: boats, buildings, card models, lighthouse, models

Dad and I usually build aircraft, ships and military vehicles from plastic kits and lighthouses or even the occasional building from card. We felt like making something different so when we found the template for this dragon on the web we just had to make it. 17 sheets of A4 card and lots of cutting and glueing this critter was complete.The result is something that I will not let him give away to any of the grandkids. This dragon is MINE. Now we really should (according to Mum) make a Chinese dragon to keep this European one company. I have found a template for it so Dad has no way out.....

Labels: animals, Canberra, models

Well, Canberra is slowly coming out of COVID restrictions. We are able to travel around the ACT and NSW, but not other states yet. So the output of craft stuff is still our main way of filling in time. Mum and I have been making 2 sorts of cards. There are some pretty arty cards like the flowers one, and some crazy ones like the one with the snarky cat. I really like the snarky cat series and am bothering Mum to do more of them. Dad and I are building more ships, all 1/700 scale. The first photo has 3 ships that are important in the history of Pearl Harbour. The small one is the destroyer USS Ward, which sunk a Japanese midget submarine just outside the harbour on the morning of the attack. The middle-sized ship is USS Arizona, the battleship whose wreck is the centrepiece of the Arizona Memorial (see my post of Jan 11, 2014 for images of the site). The largest is USS Missouri the battleship that Dad and I were able to clamber over when we were at Pearl (see the post from Jan 15, 2014 for images of her). And for those who thought that RMS Titanic was the largest ship ever built, just compare it with the Queen Mary 2. The QM2 is not even the largest ship today as many tankers, container ships and aircraft carriers are longer and heavier. However, it is the largest ship that this small bear has ever been on (there are lots of images of that trip, just type Queen Mary in the search box at the top of the page).

Labels: boats, cards, models

What to post when the Oldies have stopped travelling for a while? How about some photos of how they fill in their small bits of spare time? Here's some of what Dad and I have been up to. Normally we make plastic models and had a collection of over 1300 1/72 scale aircraft before we moved into the (smaller) apartment. Dad's eldest son, my big bro Andrew, has a huge garage and the collection moved into that. Then we started on 1/700 scale ships, a real test of Dad's ageing fingers and eyes, but some photos of these (the ships that is) will appear soon. However, while reading a modelling magazine we noticed an add for card models of 4 Australian lighthouses we have visited. We always try to get to as many lighthouses as possible on our trips, as my long-time readers know, so Dad ordered the set. Before starting on them, we found a site on the web where we could get free downloads of some UK lighthouses at the same scale as the set, 1/250, to practice on. So here's the results. The first 2 images are of Cape Byron lighthouse - the real thing and our card model. This is the most easterly lighthouse in Australia. The second 2 are Green Cape light in southern NSW. This one is a the end of one of the worst roads we have ever driven.The middle row is Hornby, Mum's favourite lighthouse on the south head of Sydney harbour. The first 2 on the bottom row are of the small lighthouse at Tacking Point near Port Macquarie in northern NSW. The last image shows the difference in size of these lighthouses. This sort of comparison is the great advantage of building to the same scale, so the obvious next step for us is to build some 1/250 card ships to compare with the lighthouses.
The other thing that has been happening is another trip/adventure being organized, so we will be away again soon.

If you would like to try your hand at card models the sites we used are:
http://papermodel.com.au/  for the lighthouse set
https://www.papershipwright.co.uk/ for free downloads and lots of sets.

Labels: lighthouse, models

Last weekend we took Dad to Sydney for a real flash 3-day celebration of his passing the 3/4 century+1 birthday. There are loads of pictures of Sydney on the blog, so here's a few different ones. I like the look of the city at night, buildings like the Town Hall look great with the lights giving them a glow. Of course, it is ideal if you can sit with a great building in the background and a cocktail in the foreground. The building is the Queen Victoria Building, a restored heritage shopping mall, and the cocktails are in the Glass Brasserie, one of the top restaurants in Sydney (we fed the man steak, of course). Our hotel had an interesting spiral sculpture in the foyer and if I could have found a way to get to it I would have loved to tackle the 4-story climb to its top. The Oldies spend a bit of time shopping. I usually go with Dad as his idea of shopping involves hobby shops, much more interesting to small bears than the shops Mum goes to. Hobbyco is our favourite one in Sydney. We usually stock up on plastic kits, but have hit the stage where we have built all the interesting ones. So we started our collection of 1/76 scale fire engines. There is always something new to find in "the Big Smoke" and we thoroughly spoiled the Old Bloke.

Labels: models, New South Wales, Sydney

Mum and I are total Star Wars fans and have been pestering Dad for years to make us some models of the spacecraft used in the movies. Dad checked availability and prices and decided we could wait. In the meantime, he did find a reasonably-priced kit of the Enterprise, from that other great series, Star Trek, and you can see the result in my post from April 3, 2014. Well, we were in Sydney for a concert a weekend ago and Dad finally found a kit of the Millennium Falcon that didn't shock his wallet too much. In fact is was tiny, just over 10cm long (4" if you think non-metric). However, I have to admit that he did a great job building it, with my help of course. Here is the result, pictured on a mission to the region south of the Galactic Centre.

Labels: models

When our Wellington guide, Robbie, found out that we were very interested in military history, he added a special extra to our tour. The Dominion Museum is holding a special Great War Exhibition, telling the story of New Zealand in World War One. The exhibition was created by Sir Peter Jackson, so naturally it is spectacular and very moving. The museum is next to Wellington's cenotaph and the two are linked by a series of two-dimensional soldiers lining the entry ramp. Sir Peter's crew have really brought exhibits to life. Two that really impressed this small bear are the tank crossing a trench full of German soldiers, and a mounted troop hauling artillery to the front while a French aircraft passes overhead. The exhibit that is the most impressive that I have ever seen took up a whole room. It is a diorama of the battle of Chunuk Bair at Gallipoli. This battle has the same significance to New Zealand as the Lone Pine battle (which took place at the same time) has to Australia. The diorama contains literally thousands of small figures of New Zealand and Ottoman Turk soldiers, nearly all different. You can identify NZ Major-general Godley and his staff, NZ soldier Cyril Bassett who earned the VC for his effort laying telephone cable, and there is even a combat cameraman. Robbie told us that Sir Peter had modeled this little guy on himself. Of course, Sir Peter wasn't at Gallipoli; he was born in 1961 😜. We really enjoyed our day with Robbie. If you are ever visiting Wellington, look him up on the "Tours by Locals" web page, you won't do better. The exhibition will be open until the end of 2018.

Labels: aircraft, models, New Zealand

Everybody gets a little lost during their first days on a new cruise ship. Mum takes a while to sort out which is the pointy end of the ship and Dad is hopeless at remembering what deck things are on. Well, "Radiance of the Seas" has that covered. In the lift foyers on every deck right in the centre, is a podium holding a deck plan with everything labelled and a cutaway section of the ship showing which deck it is that you are on. It is also lined up so that you can see at a glance which way the pointy end is, and even has lift call buttons, just in case you have got out on the wrong deck. Here are Scruffy, Milkshake and I using the plan on deck 11. Behind the podium on deck 11 is a bust of one of my heroes, Admiral Lord Nelson. If I was in charge I would wire it up so that you could ask him for directions and he would answer. One person that you wouldn't ask for directions is Dad. Here's a photo of him trying to put on a rain poncho and he can't even find the arm and head holes without help. This was on Isle of Pines; it was sprinkling and very windy and Dad was eventually "rescued" by some ladies. Mum was too helpless with laughter to help him. I really did want a model of the ship, but most of the ones on sale were too big for a small bear. I did find a way round that, and here's a hint I offer to other small critters; most ships sell key rings with a small ship dingle-dangle on them. Get one of them, toss the key ring away and get your dad to cut and smooth the attachment and touch up the paint and you have a great small critter size model.

Labels: boats, cruising, heroes, models

Mum and I are devoted Trekkies. Mum has seen every episode and film from way back when Star Trek first showed in Australia. Dad used to watch the TV series during long, cold nights at the telescope. We have all seen the various Star Trek movies. So it is only natural that eventually Dad and I would build a model of the USS Enterprise, particularly after the last two movies. Actually we already have a USS Enterprise in our model collection, the WW2 aircraft carrier, but that's another story. Anyhow, the starship model had to be the original NCC-1701 and it took a lot of searching of hobby shops to find a model of it. The one we eventually found was ancient, dating back to 1987. In modelling terms, it was a filler queen, i.e. the parts had loads of flash to be trimmed, the fit of parts was atrocious, lots of filler had to be poured into the seams to fill them  and much sanding was needed to smooth the joins. It took lots of work, but as you can see the finished model is OK. For its first mission we sent it exploring out toward the Southern Cross, courtesy of Photoshop and an image from the Stromlo Observatory archive. Not a bad effort for a small bear and an ancient Dad.

Labels: models

Dad & I have just finished that big job of dusting, repairing and shelving 1300+ model aircraft. It is amazing how many small bits get broken, eaten or otherwise lost when models are left sitting for years. Anyhow, it is done and they are all stored on view, behind clear plastic sheeting. I found 2 models there that I really liked, because they are of an aircraft named after the city I live in. They are models of the English Electric Canberra and the US version, the B-57. If you look carefully at the middle picture you will see some obvious changes that the Americans made when they produced their licence-built version (that's the black model). It mainly shows in the area of the cockpit canopy and nose. The other model is the Australian version; yes, we built them in Melbourne. The model is of a Canberra that I have seen flying at the Temora Aviation Museum. You can see the real 'plane in the top and bottom pictures. I have been allowed to see into the cockpit of the real one, but not to run around in there. The other aeroplane in the bottom picture is a De Havilland Vampire, and yes, we have models of several versions of that as well. I love aeroplanes and it's great building models of ones that I've seen. It's also very special to have an aircraft named after the city you live in. There have many ships named after Australian cities, but not many 'planes.

Our next big job is getting ready for our next big trip. Dad is the Enrichment Speaker on "Celebrity Millenium", sailing from Hawaii to Sydney in November, talking Astronomy of course.

Labels: aircraft, Canberra, models, Temora

Here are some interesting critters that I met in the Museum of Tropical Queensland in Townsville. This museum is a "must visit" place when you are in Townsville. It is full of stuff that explains the history and critters of the tropical north of eastern Australia. One section is on maritime history and has a big display about shipwrecks. The most fun thing in that section is this monster-size sea captain. He is posed like he is taking sights with his sextant. Obviously, he would be helped enormously if he had a small bear to read the charts while he did the measurements, so that's what I am doing in the photo. There are lots of life-size models of dinosaurs that used to live in Queensland. I got Dad to take photos of me with some to give you an idea of the size of these critters. The little one looks cute and harmless and would make a great "horse" for small bears. The big guy is a different story; he is totally scary. Imagine meeting something like that while you were surfing. No, I am not scared white by the critter, that's the colour that the camera makes me when the flash is too close. What are they? I will let you Google them and find out for yourself; it's a cold, wet day in Canberra and I am off to find a warm place to hibernate for a while.

Labels: animals, models, Queensland, Townsville

I have finally got my Christmas present built. It is a model of the "helicopter" designed by my engineering hero, Leonardo Da Vinci, way back in the 15th century. Actually, Leo called it an "aerial screw" and there is no record of his having built it. Leo was an ideas man. I had a bit of trouble building this model, all my fault, because I was in a hurry and didn't read the instructions carefully. I ended up with the holes for the drive shafts 180 degrees out of alignment and had to carefully pull lots of things apart and reassemble them right way round. Leo's plan was to have men pushing on a windlass to get the screw up to speed, when it would lift off and fly. I suspect that it would have been a short and wobbly flight. Mine is driven by a small bear winding a crankhandle. I can get the rotor up to a speed where it is blowing quite a down-draft but not fast enough to lift off. Cranking is hard work, so I had to take a bear-nap after the first trials and Mum took a picture of me. She thinks it is funny that I look so flat.

Labels: aircraft, heroes, models

At last! Dad and I have been busy, whenever we have been able to find time, building the models in the big stash we have collected over the years. The problem with having lots of model kits to build is that there comes a time when there aren't any new ones being produced that you haven't already got an example of in your stash. So it's great to finally see stuff being made that you've just gotta have. I keep an eye on the model sites on the web and finally found a batch that Dad was willing to buy. They arrived in the post yesterday. I can't wait to get them out of the boxes, fondle the plastic, and get busy cutting, gluing, sanding, painting,etc. I am a very lucky small bear to have Oldies that let me help with interesting craft and hobbies.

Labels: aircraft, models

Even though Fighter World has steps near lots of the exhibits so that you can see into the cockpit, these steps are built for people. That is a bit of a problem for small bears. As you can see in the top photo, I just couldn't get high enough to show Blu and Milkshake what the inside of the Sabre looked like. Fortunately, Dad and I have several Sabres in our model collection and I could teach the others about the aircraft using one of these when we got home. The Sabre at Fighter World is a CAC Sabre, built right here in Australia in the 1950s. Although Australian Sabres look like the North American F-86 Sabre, they are much more powerful. They use a Rolls-Royce Avon engine and, to fit this engine in, the fuselage had to be redesigned. It is wider and the air intake is 25% bigger than on the F-86. The Avon Sabre also has two 30mm cannon instead of the machine guns of the American version. Sabres are superb in the air. I see the one at Temora Aviation Museum sometimes and it is almost as beautiful as the Spitfire. Our model is pretty good too, don't you think?

Labels: aircraft, models, New South Wales, Newcastle, Temora

One of the most impressive things at this year's Floriade was this model of Old Parliament House. What made it so special is that it was made entirely from sand. Now, if I was making something that would be out in the open for a month I would make it from wood or plastic or something that would not wash away in the rain. Well, it did rain a bit and some of the little building washed away. And it got fairly warm sometimes and the sand dried out and some of it blew away. That meant that the sand architect had to keep repairing it. I watched him doing it one day and was thoroughly impressed. The sand model was an exact replica of the old Parliament House. I have been there a couple of times and everything that I remember in the real building was in it's right place on the model. I wish I could build things like that in sand. Everything that I have done on the beach so far has fallen down fairly quickly (particularly when Dad's useless big feet are in the vicinity). I guess I will have to stick to building pirate forts, like the one I built with Scruffy and Milkshake on our last trip to Whitehaven Beach.

Labels: Canberra, gardens, models

This aeroplane was the reason that we decided to go to Temora for their January flying day. It is a Curtiss P-40 Kittyhawk, an aircraft type that has a special place in Australia's history. Back in World War 2, when the Japanese were moving towards Australia, the only fighter aircraft that we could get in any quantity were Kittyhawks. By that stage the Kitty was an old design, but it was tough and dependable. Even after Spitfires arrived, the Kitty remained in the front-line squadrons. They almost disappeared after the war, but now some of them are being salvaged and rebuilt. Temora is one of the places where you can see one flying whenever this one visits. Of course Dad and I have built model Kittyhawks, six of them so far, but it is really special to see a real one in the air.

Labels: aircraft, airshow, models, New South Wales, Temora

Last Sunday we went to the Temora flying day. The Aviation Museum at Temora is a great place. They have lots of historic aircraft , and they are all in flying condition. It is the only place where you can see TWO SPITFIRES flying. There is new Sabre jet fighter there, as well as a Hudson, Canberra, Boomerang, Tiger Moth, Ryan STM, Cessna Dragonfly and Meteor. The flying days are "must be" places for small bears and Oldies. This time there were a couple of special visiting aircraft, a Curtiss Kittyhawk and a Catalina flying boat. I really like the Catalina. It is the only one flying in Australia and it belongs to the Historical Aircraft Restoration Society (HARS). Catalinas were one of the most important aircraft in WW2. They hunted enemy ships and submarines, dropped bombs, mines and supplies (not at the same time), and kept an eye on thousands of miles of ocean, keeping the convoys safe. This is one of the slowest aeroplanes that I have ever seen; it's slow but it can fly for ages. And guess what. This Catalina is marked up to represent the aircraft that Dad and I made a model of! The only differences are that the big one is still missing its nose turret, and the original OX-Y was a true flying boat and could only operate from water, while the HARS one is an amphibian and can fly from water or land. My model is like the original. I love aeroplanes and it's great when you see one that you have made a model of.

Labels: aircraft, airshow, models, New South Wales, Temora

No, I am not ancient. I certainly don't rule the seas either, but way back in the last centuries BC ships like this did. This is a model of a Carthagenian warship that Dad and I have just finished making. The real ship was 72 times bigger, just over 150 feet long. Up to the time that the Romans destroyed Carthage, these ships ruled the Mediterranean sea. Actually, the Romans only won after they had captured a Carthagenian ship and made hundreds of copies of it. Roman ships had one addition that gave them the edge in battle. The ships of Cathage used sailing skill to ram enemy ships and sink them. The Romans added a "Corvus", a sort of a drawbridge with a spike on it that they would drop onto a Carthagenian ship, locking the two ships together, and then send soldiers across to take the Carthagenian vessel. The Carthagenians were much better sailors, but the Romans were superior soldiers. The old ships of the Mediterranean, be they Carthagenian, Greek or Roman, mostly used oars to move them. The one the model is based on had 116 oars and around 400 oarsmen; the biggest oars sometimes had up to 5 rowers pulling them. Sails were used only when the wind was right because these ships couldn't tack into wind like modern sailboats do. It took Dad and I ages to build this model, because it is the first time we have tried to rig anything. Rigging is hard. As soon as you add another line, all of the ones you have put in before go too slack or too tight and you have to fiddle a lot to get everything right. Still, I reckon we didn't do too bad a job of it. I particularly like the little sailors we put on deck. Do you know that nobody can agree on what colour Carthagenians were? We took a guess and made ours a light coffee colour like the people that the Oldies saw in Egypt. Now it's back to aeroplanes, where only the old ones have rigging and in 1/72 scale you can mostly forget it.

Labels: boats, models

Wherever we travel the Oldies find their favourite sorts of shops. No problem for Mum, there are loads of jewellery and craft shops in just about any town on the planet. It is a bit tougher for Dad because he looks for hobby shops. Not just any old hobby shop, but one that is big enough to have the latest, the rarest and the "old classics" aircraft kits in stock. And they have to be 1/72 scale too. As luck would have it, there is just such a hobby shop in Newcastle. It is called Frontline Hobbies and it's in the old part of Newcastle in the main street. Actually, there is not much left in the main street, Hunter St, as Newcastle has had some tough times with a big earthquake and then the main industry (the BHP steelworks) closing down so the old part of Newcastle is a bit like a ghost town. Anyhow, Frontline Hobbies is stacked up with just about any type of modelling stuff you can think of. Dad and I were after aircraft kits. There was just one in the whole place that we haven't either built or have waiting to be built. We grabbed it. Then we saw this boat kit. It is of a lifeboat like the ones that the Oldies saw on their UK trip, so we grabbed that too. I will keep the pressure on Dad to make sure that we build these fairly quickly and will post the results soon.

Labels: aircraft, boats, models, New South Wales, Newcastle