Well seeing that all my pretty shots of the foreshore and promenades that surround the foreshore have been banned I chose this one.
Newcastle used to be the second largest steel producing city in Australia , but the steelworks was eventually closed down only a few years ago throwing thousands out of work with very few job prospects on the horizon.
This left a major depression in the town with high unemployment.
The city itself is going through a regeneration with millions being spent on foreshore development and inner city accommodation making a major revival around the adjoining city beaches and harbour.
With the Hunter Valley Vineyards only forty minutes away and Nelson Bay or "the Bay" as locals call another 40 minutes from Newcastle, both being major tourist attractions in the state of New South Wales, Newcastle had to reinvent itself and try and secure some of those tourist dollars back into the town.

To this day the port of Newcastle is the Major coal exporting port in Australia and it is not unusual to see up to thirty coal carriers standing off to sea waiting for a berth to load their shipments.
The port is shallow and requires vessels to leave and arrive on the tides and to navigate a narrow channel which is being continually dredged because of the silt build up as the Hunter River empties into this Harbour.

So I think this is probably a pretty typical scene which epitomizers what the town is all about,sleeves rolled up and plenty of hard work.
Gee....I would have loved to show you what the town is becoming but those shots were way to pretty and I just could not bring myself to show the "real downsides" as that would have been negative and
destructive.