Point Henry near Geelong

from w
We went on a drive and picnic today, first stop-over was a very unloved kind of seafront near Alcoa, the giant aluminium plant. No one swims here but there are sometimes a few wind-surfers. We did some sketches anyway as I was interested in the long lines of seaweed. Pastel and pencil and A4 in size.

Not everyone is impressed with Alcoa, though they do have many excellent community projects but one website notices their need for electricity.

Rating the Geelong suburbs

Picture is part of the Geelong bus routes - East of the city.

from w
I found an interesting group of posts when I googled 'Geelong suburbs' as writers listed their favourite and not so favourite parts of Geelong to live in. The stereotypes are obvious as many of them pick on Corio and Whittington as the pits - which is unfair. I've deleted irrelevant stuff, but it's an interesting discussion. We live in Newcomb but across the road is East Geelong which has a higher status!
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Philmeup_s13
Feb 24 2008, 03:01 PM
Post #1
Starting to look into buying a house in the geelong area, at this stage its just pictures and prices. As im not a local I was just wondering if anyone could give me some advice on areas, rental prices etc. Basically, where do you live in geelong, do you like it, is rent cheap/expensive, is it a good neigbourhood, have house prices gone up alot in your area.
Area:
East geelong
West geelong
Manifold heights
thomson
whittington
south geelong
belmont
north shore
bell park
corio
And yeah, any other areas

Im going to make a trip down there soon but I figured any advice from people local to geelong would be good advice. Cheers for your help guys!

This post has been edited by Philmeup_s13: Feb 25 2008, 09:34 AM
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180sx_luva
Feb 24 2008, 03:38 PM
Post #2
Phil- kate's parents live and have propertys down there, so let us know if you need help.
East geelong- NICE, not the cheapest area, rent is melbournesque
West geelong- dunno, i'll ask next time i'm down, think its NTB
Manifold heights-okay
thomson-maybe
whittington- scum
south geelong- okay-ish
belmont- Seems niceish
north shore-NO
bell park- NO
corio- scum
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ZeroFallen
Feb 24 2008, 03:40 PM
Post #3
I lived in Geelong for three years back from 2002 till 2005... Spent two of those years in a two bedroom unit in Wellington St in Geelong West. Really nice place, but was paying $215 a week. I have a mate who lives in Herne Hill now and that's not too bad either... Not too sure what they're paying, but for a similarily sized place (older though) the rent is cheaper.

Pretty much anything West of Geelong, so West Geelong, Herne Hill and that sort of area is good to live in.

Corio (comment deleted as rather crude.)

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spudnic
Feb 24 2008, 07:03 PM
Post #4
i live in geelong in old school area... and trust me its some of the nicest house you will find but there are some dodgy areas near the high school, east geeling isnt the best but it does ahve some nice homes newtown is the top of the town if you head up from chilwill north along packo, also family has a few rentals in the geelong area and (south and east) south pulls in more money and attracks more the the melbourne people.

if your looking to settle down maybe the back of waurn ponds in the new houseing estate but belmont for a good house your looking at 500k+...LOL and hern hill was a comission area LOL..... same with westenhights, the back part of bellpark and i ahte to say the hill part of corio is part of the boom area as well as waurn ponds.

got any direct questions just ask...

whittington is a place to stear well clear of, worse then corio...anyone with have a brain in geelong knows this..
Area:
East geelong - good
West geelong - good
Manifold heights - average
thomson - no
whittington - THIS SI A HELL NO, unless you want to get gang raped but 6 year olds and stabbed everytime you walk to your car that has been stripped in the street, no offence to people that live their.
couth geelong - ?
belmont - depends what area, some are ok some are extremely good
north shore - no
bell park - some parts
corio - 1 part is ok..

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jase.s15
Feb 24 2008, 07:11 PM
Post #5
cant go wrong with newtown mate or east Geelong .. well situated! will be abit more costly tho!
I live in Bell Post Hill (in a new estate) its rather nice!
rjr666

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Feb 24 2008, 09:13 PM
Post #6
my family has lived here for over 60years now...the good suburbs from highest to lowest of snob-ness
Newtown + Chillwell (more heritage homes)
Highton + Wandana Heights ( some affordable older homes in highton and but alot of new homes, with views of geelong $$$)
West Geelong (Kinda trendy to live there near Pakington street cafe's and clothing shops, not that far to walk to geelong train station or city)
East Geelong (Close to the city is allright) futherout gets dodgy eg Thompson and whittington
South Geelong ( Melbourne Train line nearby, but not that bad for noise)
Belmont (not bad, pretty affordable houses) few dodgy ppl, but not overall pretty good.
Leopold (fairly far out of geelong 15min) Pretty boring place though, not much goes on there)
Lara (few scum bags, but not bad, melb trainline, closer to melb, but not alot of stuff to do out there!)
Newcomb (not that bad... pretty affordable, few dodgy ppl, but not that bad, but neighbours to whittington across the bellarine highway)
Moolap, bit industral, biger ranch style homes, but i saw a home for 350k with decent size land, and house okay)
Grovedale ( not bad, few dodgy ppl i reakon in some parts)
Waurnponds (new housing estate once the bypass goes in, getting to melb from there will be pretty good)
HerneHill, some nice houses, some older houses, pretty expensive in some parts but good area i reakon.
Hamlyheights, not bad, few rough ppl. but not that bad.
Bell park (ethnic heritage, typical wog style houses with white lions and shit on some joints, few dodgy ppl, but not that bad my gf lives there and no prbz yet and theres a 7-11near by u can chill at)
Bellpost Hill (higher class ethnic area, new area with views and $$$housing, older area pretty reasonable)
North Geelong, bit industral, few dodgys i reakon.

THe stay away zones Corio, Norlane, Whittington esp Solar Drive, st albans park (use to be called whittington, just newer homes), thompson, breakwater.

Although some places are bit dodgy, geelongs suburbs are not that bad to live in. Choose somewhere thats closeish to work, has pretty good shopping faciltys and schools.

Although living in a better area, crooks have cars and drive around stealing. Bet my stereo is now out in corio, whittington ect...

OVER DOZE RISK OF ONES LIFE - KANAGAWA JAPAN
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Philmeup_s13
Feb 25 2008, 09:54 AM
Post #7
Thanks for your help guys, i think the general consensus is stay away from whittington and most of corio and those sort of areas (I now understand why the houses are so cheap down that way)
Im probably guna make a trip up there in the next few weeks and do some house cruising.
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Hawker180
Feb 25 2008, 10:18 AM
Post #8
normally houses are cheap for a reason, hehe! good luck!
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.Martyr.
Feb 26 2008, 12:33 AM
Post #9
my family has lived here for over 60years now...
the good suburbs from highest to lowest of snob-ness
Newtown + Chillwell (more heritage homes)
Highton + Wandana Heights ( some affordable older homes in highton and but alot of new homes, with views of geelong $$$)
West Geelong (Kinda trendy to live there near Pakington street cafe's and clothing shops, not that far to walk to geelong train station or city)
East Geelong (Close to the city is allright) futherout gets dodgy eg Thompson and whittington
South Geelong ( Melbourne Train line nearby, but not that bad for noise)
Belmont (not bad, pretty affordable houses) few dodgy ppl, but not overall pretty good.
Leopold (fairly far out of geelong 15min) Pretty boring place though, not much goes on there)
Lara (few scum bags, but not bad, melb trainline, closer to melb, but not alot of stuff to do out there!)
Newcomb (not that bad... pretty affordable, few dodgy ppl, but not that bad, but neighbours to whittington across the bellarine highway)
Moolap, bit industral, biger ranch style homes, but i saw a home for 350k with decent size land, and house okay)
Grovedale ( not bad, few dodgy ppl i reakon in some parts)
Waurnponds (new housing estate once the bypass goes in, getting to melb from there will be pretty good)
HerneHill, some nice houses, some older houses, pretty expensive in some parts but good area i reakon.
Hamlyheights, not bad, few rough ppl. but not that bad.
Bell park (ethnic heritage, typical wog style houses with white lions and shit on some joints, few dodgy ppl, but not that bad my gf lives there and no prbz yet and theres a 7-11near by u can chill at)
Bellpost Hill (higher class ethnic area, new area with views and $$$housing, older area pretty reasonable)
North Geelong, bit industral, few dodgys i reakon.

THe stay away zones Corio, Norlane, Whittington esp Solar Drive, st albans park (use to be called whittington, just newer homes), thompson, breakwater.

Although some places are bit dodgy, geelongs suburbs are not that bad to live in. Choose somewhere thats closeish to work, has pretty good shopping faciltys and schools.

Although living in a better area, crooks have cars and drive around stealing. Bet my stereo is now out in corio, whittington ect...
Yep, Richie has pretty much got it nailed here.
Too right about Solar Drive in Whittington, its not called "The Bronx" for nothing!!

Grovedale is not bad, i lived there for 22 years or so. Only 15 min drive from Torquay and beaches too. I lived in East Geelong for a few years, not bad there. Close to town and fair few older people, so its a quiet suburb. But does get dodgy out towards Thompson and Whittington. Someone mentioned houses in East Geelong are expensive, not true. Plenty of cheaper houses for rent/sale.
Rarely houses for rent in South Geelong compared to other suburbs, not many at all!

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spudnic
Feb 26 2008, 11:00 AM
QUOTE(.Martyr. @ Feb 26 2008, 02:03 AM)
Yep, Richie has pretty much got it nailed here.
Too right about Solar Drive in Whittington, its not called "The Bronx" for nothing!!

Grovedale is not bad, i lived there for 22 years or so. Only 15 min drive from Torquay and beaches too. I lived in East Geelong for a few years, not bad there. Close to town and fair few older people, so its a quiet suburb. But does get dodgy out towards Thompson and Whittington. Someone mentioned houses in East Geelong are expensive, not true. Plenty of cheaper houses for rent/sale.
Rarely houses for rent in South Geelong compared to other suburbs, not many at all!

We have 2 rental properties in south geelong 2 blocks from the train station... there not cheap to rent and they are in good condition, and the next street over theres a shit laod of units, couple for lease atm. as invesment properties go, geelong isnt the palce to be.

BAHHH belmonts has some awesome areas!!
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Martyr.
Yesterday, 02:13 AM
Post #11
Well, i guess things have changed since i last lived there. I haven't lived in Geelong for more than a year now.

Found a lovely book about a wombat

from w
When sorting books for Donation in Kind yesterday, I came across a children's book 'The Death of a Wombat' about the effects of bushfires on Australian flora and fauna. The illustrations were by Clifton Pugh a wonderful artist. It's an old book - 1972. I'll send it on after I read it first! Now this is what a wombat really looks like - not like that strange version I made in a post about Feb 12th.

Pako Festa

from Peceli
Once again we took part in the Pakington Street ethnic festival known as Pako. This was on last Saturday in Geelong West. Usually about 100,000 people attend. There is a huge parade then food stalls, children's entertainment, dancing and singing on stages or as roving buskers. The pictures here were taken waiting for the parade to start, one dance group, some Rotary Exchange students, and five of us from Fiji waiting for the other ten to turn up. It was a good day as usual and we met many friends there.

Birthday party

from Peceli
Saturday afternoon we attended a barbecue in the Eastern Gardens to celebrate the birthday of Esther Tali, daughter of Loloma (Tukei)Tali and Tom Tali who is from Vanuatu. Loloma is from Fiji and was once a deaconess in the Methodist Church there before she left for Vanuatu as a missionary. The family now live in Geelong and Esther is studying Hospitality in Melbourne. It was a lovely party and in one photo here you can see Loloma, Siteri, Geoff and another guest at the party.

I'm sorry Shatsi!

from w
Yesterday my friend came around with her 12 year old black cat and requested that Shatsi stay with us for several months. We had made a vague promise a few weeks ago that if all else failed we could help. Well, all else did fail, and here I was staring at this pretty cat who then prowled around the lounge room inspecting under every chair. She's not an outdoor cat and we would have to lock her inside for a few weeks. I was already starting to sniffle and sneeze before they arrived, but then my sniffles turned into full-blown hay fever. Peceli wasn't home yet and we waited for him to get back from taking a Fijian funeral in Melbourne. Okay, Peceli is a kind person, but now he firmly said, 'We can't do it! Our house is often full of visitors and also we come and go a lot.' Oh dear, poor Shatsi, no-one wants her! I'm sorry for Shatsi's owner who has the stress now of what to do, but I hope she finds a good home in the next twenty-four hours before her flight overseas.

Meanwhile I still sniffle and sneeze and can't go to the Interfaith Women's group today which would have been interesting as two of the women are going to talk about their son's weddings in Pakistan and India.

variations of oriental stall pic

from w
Ouch! Too bright! And shapes fight one another for attention! But this is a way to look at the way colour works in a picture and when it doesn't work well. I used Photo-edit at first then Picasa to make the collage. It's certainly a quick way to see how different colours might work when designing a painting instead of making mistakes that are costly in paint and energy!

I'll post something different to paintings/drawings when I get some pictures from Peceli. We've had Pako Festa lately, a 21st birthday, and Peceli is taking a Fijian funeral in Melbourne today, while I go off to a book club to discuss 'Bel Canto'.

We've been busy lately sorting out stuff for Donation in Kind, and the kindness of the local people is wonderful as people drop in boxes and bags of lovely sewing kits to send to the women of Fiji. It's a project I requested help with - from women to women. Special thanks to the ladies of St Andrew's church for their super donations.

At the Oriental Stall

from w
One of the sketches I made at the Quilt Expo was at one of the stalls where I was interested in the shapes of the objects, not hat I knew what they all were for - except what looked like bag handles and bolts of cloth. I thought black and red would be the most suitable colours.

The violin player

from w
A bit of colour and help from computer programs and the tone and mood of a sketch changes. Here are four variations of the pencil/pen sketch I made at the Polyglots at Pako on Thursday evening.

A string quartet steals the show

from w
Perhaps I wasn't quite in the mood for Greek poetry and translation but at the Geelong Writers' recent gig for Pako Festa I enjoyed the music by Ad Astra, the Geelong College String Quartet and I drew one of the violinists as they played Ravel's Pavane.

One of the readers, Richard Kakol, who is blind and used a machine with earphones as his prompt, read some evocative poems he had written about Greenland. His poems are always thoughtful, and visual which is unexpected. Other readings were from Maria Takolander, with references to Finland, and Ouyang Yu who migrated to Australia from China who read some of his personal poems about the transition. When Elias Maniatakis and Andrew Fraser played some boussouki music I wanted to dance but everyone sat stolidly in their seats! Readings of poetry by Sappho and Kavafis and Kolosiatou were read in Greek with some English translation and it was good to hear the different language and guess at the meaning. Polyglots at Pako is an annual event and the theme is always about the celebration of different languages and cultures.

Designing a quilt

from w
Playing around with photo-edit a bit with my drawings and a pic of gingko leaves to make a quilt design - but only in the ether, not for real. Perhaps click to look at the details. Some pics are doubled up, I know! And there's no real unity - this is just a random selection thrown together by Picasa's collage click.

(written later-Saturday evening)

Things I noticed at the exhibition. 'A girl never has too much fabric.' 'Dyed and gone to heaven'. One banner called 'Lost for Words' was about Alzheimer's and the artist even embroidered the broken script of her father. A banner/quilt that attracted a lot of attention was of mushrooms and a mouse with exquisite stitching and three-dimensional areas on the toadstools. 'Australian Bounty' was a delightful quilt on a black background with Australian animals, birds, and insects with colours graded from warm to cool.

A problem with many of the items, to me anyway, was the use of too many colours which seemed to fight against one another. Those with a limited palette seemed to work best. These craftswomen are so smart, so careful, so dedicated, yet I felt that many of the actual designs needed more thought as you don't really have make a realistic scene with stitching because the medium has other possibilities especially for fantasy. References to the real world - okay - but there's more! But overall it was a joy to walk around the exhibition to celebrate the amazing craftwork that women have been able to do with fabrics and thread.

I went to the animal fair...oops

from w
I went to the Quilt Expo in Melbourne this afternoon and what glorious colours filled the rooms, but there were so, so many people there crowding about, buying from the stalls, peering this way and that, intently studying the details of the stitching. Every second woman seemed to have a mobile phone and they were busily taking photos...but a stallholder told me in all seriousness that taking photos was banned and such people should be thrown out! Well, it's an expo and in the public so what do they expect when it's heaven for so many women. I guess the problem is copyright on designs and now any Tomasina, Delia or Arieta can use someone else's ideas. I'll write more about the quilts/banners that I really liked later on.

I did some quick black and white sketches. Click on picture to enlarge. They were actually only small, A5 in size in my little sketchbook. I really would like to do some larger paintings - perhaps flat shapes, art nouveau style using a couple of the sketches.

variations on recent drawings

One drawing was of two old trams at Federation Square Melbourne, and the other was of a derelict building and the wheat silos in North Geelong as seen from the Donation in Kind Depot near Osborne House and the Geelong Maritime Museum.
from w
Click on pictures to enlarge.

The Women's Petition continued

from w
Here are some pictures from today's event at Federation Square in Melbourne. The old trams on display show that the women's carriage was enclosed and protected and the men's carriage copped the sun and the rain! Brave sods were they? Two women dressed up as suffragettes (note the white, green and purple - the colours of International Women's Day) walked about giving out papers about the Women's Vote event, and three women from the Women's Circus walked about on stilts.

Hundreds of people watched the stage items - a girls choir, and a few speeches from politicians as expected. The lunch was a bit crowded and hot so I didn't stay long. A few of us shared photos with one another at one stage of our grans or great-grans who were the suffragettes or petition writers from the 30,000 signatories of 1891. The move allow to women the vote (and later to stand) was a long haul indeed and there was plenty of opposition. In 1900 Frank Madden MLA said 'Women's sufrage would abolish soldiers and war, also racing, hunting, football, crdicket and all such many games'. Really! And even in 1955 Marucie Duverger said 'They still have the mentality of minors.' But of course today it's really improved with many women in parliament and even Deputy Prime Minister.

The Women's Petition

from w
On Tuesday I'm going up to Melbourne for a women's gig for the anniversary of the women getting the vote. It's a function at the Federation Square and descendents of some of the women who signed this 30,000 plus petition in 1891 (yeah, it took 17 years to be read and put into action!) are having lunch. Frances May Hillman, y grandmother was a signatory as was her mother.

Frances was born in 1869 at Christchurch, Middlesex, England and her parents migrated to Melbourne. Her father was a gentleman's tailor in Melbourne and one of the founders of the breakaway Australian Church of Dr Charles Strong. They lived in Punt Road Richmond at the time. My grandmother was a piano teacher. She was not yet married when she signed the petition. She married Charles Edward Lay and their children were Jessie Isabel, born 1895, Charles Edward, born 1896, Norma Malvina born 1899, George Francis (my Dad) born 1901 and Harold Kingston born 1906. I knew her in the 40s and she was my first piano teacher when she lived with our family in Swan Hill during the 1940s. One photos of a Grandma, my Mum and a fat baby - well, that was me!


Frances was a quiet, gentle woman, who never ever smacked her children or grandchildren, and not a raging suffragette type at all. But she did sign it. Men at the time thought women too frail and silly to know anything about politics! Hmmm.

Saying sorry

from w
Yesterday was a super day in Australian history when the Prime Minister, Kevn Rudd, apologised to the Aboriginal people of Australia for the hurt of the past years when children of mixed race were brutally taken from their bush camp families to live in orphanages and missions. Two motives apparently - one to save them from poverty, and the the other to participate in the assimilation and disappearance of the indigenous race as government policy of the time. We now know better. Well, over the years they have survived.


For many years some artists, musicians, churchmen and women have advocated for reconciliation starting with an apology for those policies. Including the rock singer - now politician - Peter Garrett.

I scanned some photos from the Age newspaper this morning, one is of Kevin Rudd embracing an elderly woman whose story he told during his speech. The photo of the PM and some former PMs is interesting and some of them have needed to say sorry to one another. I notice that these days Gough needs to lean on his neighbour Malcolm Frazer a bit and there's some irony there.

There's a bear up there

from w
And I'm still drawing gum-trees and they are cut off a bit, but at least the doped out animals have plenty of eucalyptus leaves to feed upon. Last night Peceli's Rotary club members had a picnic at Jirrahlinga in Barwon Heads and I, like a 'good wife' of a Rotarian, tagged along. It was a pleasant evening, with a stroll around to see the koalas, the snakes (ugh!) wombats, wallabies, dingoes, foxes, cockatoos, peacocks and other creatures brought to this animal refuge for shelter. They had two baby wombats whose mothers had been runover.



I sketched the almost sleeping koalas, and might do something about colour later on. My drawing of a wombat isn't crash hot as it looks more like a fat cat!

Anyway the Rotary meeting was rather interrupted by screeching cockatoos every time someone clapped, until the main Jirrahlinga woman quietly said 'go to your naughty corner' and the noisiest white cocky just slunk into his sleeping corner! I sat near a cage of ducks that quacked like a foghorn periodically. An intersting night it was! I couldn't really hear the speeches well but the gist of it seemed to be that Jirrahlinga is a place for therapy for people with mental problems or drug problems who find the place calming.


The wildlife sanctuary website is here.

(later: I added pastels but am not happy about the pictures.)

Up a gum tree to down a gum tree

Click on picture to enlarge.

from w
Two eucalypts, about fifty years old, took three and a half hours to come down. Three men, a cherry-picker, a chain-saw, ropes, a machine with gigantic teeth, a mulcher. Here's some of the process. I missed the finale as I had to leave to do some computer work up at the church. The trees came down at the request of a neighbour who plans to build four units. The men did a careful clean job, measuring occasionally so that nothing was damaged, removed the Hills Hoist line, etc. I was rather scared though of the mulcher which just ate up most of the tree branches and they only kept a few logs to sell for firewood perhaps.

It's sad, but okay I guess, the branches may one day fall, and one tree was dying anyway.

(Later - Saturday) This morning at 9 a.m. I heard a terrific row in the back garden and the men had come back with a different machine, to dig up the tree stumps and turn them into dust. All I have left of the trees is the dust and a handful of leaves left behind after a branch came crashing down.