Sunday, August 30, 2009

Visit to Narnia (South East Queensland version)

Of course, I had to make the trip to Cleveland Point to have a look at the full-scale Dawn Treader, built for the third Narnia movie. It turned out to be a very pleasant family afternoon out.

Cleveland and the southern bayside parts of Greater Brisbane are not areas I get to all that often, but it is a very pleasant area for a drive. Lunch was had at a much better-than-average quality fish and chip place at Raby Bay, which has a row of nice looking outdoor/indoor eateries overlooking the boat harbour. Most satisfactory.

Then it was onto Cleveland Point. You can get very close to the ship:

and there are a lot of people making the trip to have a look.

Filming has not yet started on the ship, so I don't know how close people will be allowed when that happens.

Here is a better side view of the ship, although there is a fair bit of machinery in the way (as always, click to enlarge):


As you can see from the men standing on the ground on the far side of it, it's really full scale. Compared to the various book cover illustrations over the years, it certainly lives up to expectations.

You can't see it so clearly in the photo, but there does appear to be a purple furled sail on board now.

They were apparently testing the rocking mechanism for the ship today, as you can see from the (rather poor quality Blogger-ified) video below:



All terribly interesting, at least for someone who holds the Narnia films in high regard.

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