Museum of Tropical Queensland

It is a shame that I haven't really taken time to visit museums and galleries in Australia. Trying to find redemption, I went last week to Tropical Museum of Queensland. It cost me 8 dollars (I pretended to be a student...which I technically am. :) ) and I spent there 3 wonderful hours. First 2 and half discovering the adventures, which took place more than 200 years just close to where I am today.

I have to give some credit for museum and the crew, who has put all this together there. This museum is the most interactive and doing a very good job telling the unfortune story of Pandora, and also the story how they had found the shipwreck in the end of 1970's, brought up many pieces of ship. Videos showed to ways, how all those nice sets of dinnerplates, compasses, bones and other stuff end up so clean from corals and sediments...it takes some time and a lot of care.. :) I think of some of the museums in Estonia, which have lots of exponates, but seem to be so dull...they should come here to learn, how to make it more "eatable" for people.

This is my recollection of the readings, videos, artefacts found from the shipwreck in last 30 years...
(There has been done 5 movies about the Mutiny of Bounty, latest one with Anthony Hopkins and Mel Gibson.)

In the end of 18th century a ship Pandora was sent to find Bounty, another ship, being taken by mutineers. Pandora sailed through Pasific Ocean, found some of the mutineers from Tahiti, who had settled down, some of them even had wifes and children..14 previous Bounty crewmen were taken as prisoners on the Pandora, which continued its search for Bounty. Prisoners were kept in a small space at the front of the ship, chained, in the terrible heat for 5 months. Their tries to find Bounty were still effortless, when they reached the Reef, which even James Cook had worned the sailors. Some of the crew were sent on a small boat to look for a safe way through the Reef.

After some days they finally found a deep enough gate in the reef for Pandora. That evening at about 7 o'clock the storm rose and currents in the sea drove Pandora on a Reef. Pandora sank at about 4 am in the morning. Some of the crew drowned. But 4 boat-full men managed to escape. Next couple of weeks they went on a terrible search for civilized islands. Men suffered from thrist and hunger, having only 150 grams of biscuits and half wine-glass amount of water for every day and sailing in the open boats suffered heavily under the burning sun.

Finally they managed to find an island north from Australia, where they met a ship from England and were taken to England. Many of the crew had died on this voyage, some had died from infections, drowned on the Reef or on the following days under the burning sun and famine.

Peter Heywood was one of the 3 of 14 mutineers, who were pardoned by King George III in 1792.
Those, who survived, including Captain Edwards, were facing the burden of their adventures.
"Captain Edwards and those of his crew who were saved from shipwreck and famine (in a voyage of 1100 miles in open boats) suffered great hardship - the effects of which he felt to the latest period of his life." - from Edwards' obituary in the Lincoln, Stamford & Mercury, 21 April 1815).


And after 2 hours I discovered that there were two more floors in the Museum. On the second section I could puzzle myself with different tasks...one of them still bothers me, becouse I didn't manage to solve it. urrr...

And at last I enjoyed the examples of all the corals on the Great Barrier Reef, videos about mangroves and all the unique flora and fauna found in Queensland...a neat collection of butterflies, incects accompanied with humorous stories.
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Kallid Sõbrad, vabandan, et ma seda teile ei tõlgi..loodan, et jaksate seda lugeda ka minu vigases inglise keeles. Lihtsalt interneti aega on vähe ja ausalt öeldes on hirmus igav kirjutada ühte sama asja kaks korda. :) Lugu on sellest, kui käisin muuseumis ja sain teada Pandora nimelise laeva õnnetust lõpust Suurel Vallrahul. Pandora oli saadetud välja ülesandega leida laev Bounty, mille osa meeskonnast hakkas Tahiti saarel mässama ning jättis karmikäelise kapteni väikesesse paati. Bounty seiklustest on tehtud kokku 5 filmi, viimases mängivad Anthony Hopkins ja Mel Gibson.