Today on our Tassie trip we visited the old lighthouse at Cape Bruny, on Bruny Island. (Bruny Island is an island off the coast of an island, which is itself off the coast of an island...)
We had a fascinating tour of the lighthouse, which is no longer in use after it was replaced by a solar-powered, automatic LED one nearby. The tour company lease it off the national park, allowing the park to use money on its upkeep, and the tour people to show visitors around. It's was the fourth lighthouse build in Australia, and is the second oldest still standing. The iron stairs were put in to replace wooden ones.
That hole right in the centre is where the clockwork weight dropped to keep the light turning. It weighed 300kg, and had to be wound up every 30 mins through the night. Originally the light was from 15 sperm-whale oil lamps, later replaced by kerosene and eventually electricity, before the whole structure was ultimately replaced by an automated one nearby.
