The main highway between Sydney and Canberra allow cars to speed from one city to the other - bypassing quite a few pretty country towns. Perhaps it was a blessing for those towns, for they have been able to retain their country charm.
Last weekend our band of bell ringers from Christ Church St Lawrence paid a visit to Menangle's St James Anglican Church and Camden's St Paul's Catholic Church, to ring at their bell towers, and we discovered that towns are hidden gems.
Last weekend our band of bell ringers from Christ Church St Lawrence paid a visit to Menangle's St James Anglican Church and Camden's St Paul's Catholic Church, to ring at their bell towers, and we discovered that towns are hidden gems.
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| St James, Menangle |
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| Bell ringers at St James. |
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| St Paul's at Camden |
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| Inside Camden's very modern St Paul's. |
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| Bell ringers getting ready at St Paul's. |
Hi Kan, I mentioned at the camino dinner that I visited an interesting museum of bells in Holland. This is their website, I could not find an English site
ReplyDeletehttp://www.museumklokenpeel.nl/nl/
The museum is called "Kolk n Peel" and is in the small town of Astn in the south of Holland, 15km from Eindhoven. It is connected with the Royal Eijsbouts bell foundry in the town, which makes bells for church towers, and a few years ago made a bell for Notre Dame in Paris, and exports bells to China!!
The museum has displays about how bells are made, and the mechanisms for bells (mostly carillions, I think). There are other exhibits of clocks and natural history and other things. It is very interesting, but difficult to get to without a car.
Thanks Paul, unfortunately my knowledge of Dutch is zilch, and I don't think that's a Dutch word. From the photos they certainly looked impressive. Of course while the Europeans can make amazing bells, they don't have the British tradition of ringing them; change and Method ringing dates back to the 17th century I think. Today new bells are still being installed in Australia but they often come as reconditioned second-hand bells from England where many have gone into disuse.
DeleteBTW the automatic online translation by Google worked pretty well.
DeleteBTW the automatic online translation by Google worked pretty well.
DeleteHi Kan, I just looked up the website of the Eijsbouts bell foundry, and they have an English option
Deletehttp://www.eijsbouts.com/index.php
It looks like some of their business is restoration, but they do make new bells for European countries, and also export to the US and Asia. Its good to think that a business like this can work.