Glass birds come to Drysdale

Monday 3^rd December 2018 will see the opening of Glass Inspirations – an exhibition of local glass art at Drysdale’s Café Zoo with the theme “Birds of the Bellarine Peninsula”.

The exhibition is the first event in the 2019 Festival of Glass, initiated in 2011 by the Drysdale & Clifton Springs Community Association (now the Drysdale, Clifton Springs Curlewis Association). A sub-committee of the Association runs the annual Festival.

Local glass artists have created a variety of small and large pieces of glass art jewellery and sculptures for Glass Inspirations. Each piece will be unique and hand-crafted on the Peninsula, making them ideal gifts.

Visitors to Glass Inspirations can admire the pieces of glass art, identify the birds and, perhaps, buy one of these unique pieces. If the pressure of having to choose gets too much, Café Zoo can always supply a restorative snack!

Glass Inspirations will run from Monday Dec 3rd to Monday February 11th 2019, between 9.00am and 5.00pm at Café Zoo, 23 High St, Drysdale.

Bringing the springs back to life

DCSCA has proposed a joint project with the City of Greater Geelong (CoGG) to revive the mineral springs from which Clifton Springs gets its name.

Clifton Springs in its heyday 1890

We believe that at least 3 springs have their outlets between the high and low water marks on the Clifton Springs beach. Originally, they were well above the water line and were the focus of the Clifton Springs spa in the 19th and early 20th centuries, where people from the Geelong and Melbourne regions came to "take the waters" for their alleged health-giving properties.

More recently, the water from the springs has been declared unfit for drinking - ironic, given the early claims that it improved drinkers' health! For this reason, the area has been allowed to deteriorate. Coastal erosion continues to take its toll on the site (see the two photos), with the result that the springs outlets are now submerged by the incoming tide.

Spring into the future?
DCSCA would like the historic springs that gave Clifton Springs its name to “live on” and enhance the experience of visitors to the area. More specifically, we would like the spring water outlets to be revived as an historic feature, visible from the planned boardwalk that will go around the nearby promontary.

We are proposing a three-stage process to revive the springs:
1. Identify and record the location of the spring water outlet (at low tide!). Place a temporary 'collar' (e.g. a concrete tube) over each outlet, so that the spring water discharges above the high water level.
2. Ensure that the boardwalk offers suitable points from which to view all of the spring water outlets and include pointers to each spring, plus information about them, in the fabric of the boardwalk.
3. On completion of the boardwalk, replace the temporary 'collars' with more attractive structures. Invite local artists (e.g. sculptors, glass artists) to submit expressions of interest in creating one or more of these features; and invite local schools, groups, clubs and residents to suggest design ideas.

Photos:
* SpringDale Collectables on Facebook
* A. S. Miner Geotechnical (2011) Coastal erosion and stability study: Clifton Springs. Report to City of Greater Geelong . p22.

DCSCA attends Centenary Armistic Day ceremony

The Drysdale, Clifton Springs & Curlewis Association (DCSCA) was invited to be among the wreath-layers at the Centenary Armistice Day ceremony at the Drysdale cenotaph on Sunday 11 November.

The ceremony was organised and run by the Drysdale sub-branch of the Returned Services League (RSL) and between them, sub-branch President Geoff Zanker and Secretary Bob Brown ran a tight ship that enabled those present to observe a minute's silence at 11.00am.

In an especially poignant part of the ceremony, to the soft chiming of a gong, Bob Brown read out the name of each local person who had died, while local primary school children walked forward carrying a photograph of the person or, if none was available, a photo of the badge of their regiment.

DCSCA President Mercedes Drummond joined representatives from local service clubs and associations in laying a wreath to commemorate those who have lost their lives in Australia's armed forces, while around 150 people looked on. This memorial ceremony is held annually, but it has special significance this year, as November 11 2018 is one hundred years to the day since the Armistice was signed that ended World War 1.

Election Q & A in Drysdale

Candidates for the seat of Bellarine in the forthcoming state election faced questions from

around forty north Bellarine voters at a Candidates Forum in Drysdale at 10.00am on 10 November.

The Drysdale, Clifton Springs and Curlewis Community Association (DCSCA) organised and ran the Forum at SpringDale Neighbourhood Centre, 17 - 21 High Street, Drysdale.

Four candidates accepted DCSCA’s invitation to attend: Naomi Adam (Animal Justice Party); Brian McKiterick (Liberal Party); Lisa Neville MP (Labour Party); and Rachel Semmens (Greens).

(Gayle Tierney, member for Western Victoria in Victoria’s upper house, stood in for Lisa Neville who - as Minister for Police - was in Melbourne dealing with a terrorist incident there the previous day.)

From local roads to One Belt, One Road!

Each candidate was given 5 minutes to argue why they should be elected to the seat; each then answered three questions that DCSCA had sent to them beforehand; then audience members were invited to ask their questions.

A wide range of topics was addressed. Some were explicitly about the north Bellarine: a new swimming pool, an offshore sculpture/reef, traffic management and a long-term plan for the area to address what most speakers argued is its over-development.

Other topics were of broader interest: the future of the TAFE system; crime, punishment an prevention; and the Memorandum of Understanding signed recently by the Victoria state government and the Chinese government concerning the latter’s “One Belt, One Road” policy. The event finished at 11.30am.

The Drysdale Forum was the third of four such events being run across the Bellarine Peninsula by the Combined Bellarine Community Associations (CBCA), of which DCSCA is a member.

10 November: State election candidates forum