Summit Walk and Commandant’s Dinner

Started the day with a walk from Mt Pitt to Mt Bates. I had originally planned to do this on Saturday but couldn’t find the start of the walk. Discovered today I did actually find the beginning of the walk, I just thought it had a different name. I thought I’d have great views but it was more glimpses as the vegetation was quite dense. Still a good walk though.

I’ve finished all the food I had bought to cook at home so went into town for lunch. Cute little cafe with a lovely fish dish that had lemon tomato butter as a sauce. I don’t think I’ve ever had this sauce before, definitely never cooked it but will be making it at some point in the future.

Wednesday seems to be early closing on Norfolk Island so instead of visiting some of the shops I went back to Kingston. I had intended to go through the Commissariat this afternoon but it was closed due to unexpected circumstances. So I went down to the cemetery. It’s one of the few places where convicts were buried alongside settlers and military. Lots of interesting headstones, the cemetery is still in use today.
I also visited one half of the duplex on Quality Row. It’s basically a ruin that they’ve put a roof on and windows in. Like a lot of places here it wasn’t locked, just signs asking you to shut the door.
I had another go at visiting the eastern side of the island, there aren’t many roads at there and a couple I found were really tracks.

This evening I went to The Commandant’s Dinner. It was a dinner and show. Three commandants were present: Philip Ridley King who was the first commandant, James Morisett a very harsh commandant and Alexander Maconochie who was a reformer.
It was really well done, if a little bawdy. Each of the actors joined us at the table throughout the meal. One mentioned when they started it was a lot more serious but they realised they needed to add some humour as the subject matter is quite grim.
I sat with a nice group of people, we all swapped travel stories. Some had just arrived on the island, others like me are about to leave.
The room we were in was the Sirius room and had some great paintings telling the Bounty story.Read more