Lomography

Hanging Rock, Victoria
written by kirri-joy on January 22nd, 2009 , 4 comments (2 votes)

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Hanging Rock is situated in the Macedon Ranges in Victoria, about an hour out of Melbourne. It is an ‘all-rounder’ tourist spot – there is a long history attached to it that pre-dates European Settlement, it is a rare volcanic formation, its great for walking and scrambling over rocks, the views are fantastic and it’s also the spot where, fictionally, a group of schoolgirls went mysteriously missing in 1900 while on a picnic excursion.

The story of these schoolgirls is found in the novel and movie- “Picnic at Hanging Rock”, which was written in 1967 by Joan Lindsay, and the film was made in 1975, directed by Peter Weir. In the book/movie, the schoolgirls’ watches stop at noon, and then the eerie stuff starts to happen. Interestingly enough, while they filmed the movie, the casts’ and film crew’s watches also stopped erratically throughout the day. A bit spooky. The movie is an Australian classic.

I went with my family and they actually left me at the top by myself, without me realizing that they had left. Yeah, so I didn’t have a picnic there, but I sure had my fair share of calling out in panic into the bush, “Mum”.

(The facilities are also great. Camping grounds, a large oval, barbeque’s, a coffee shop…and an amiable Park Ranger whom my uncles chatted with for ages.)