Because of one thing and another (but mainly one thing), I think it’s fair to say that posts are going to be a little erratic here for the next week at least, so please bear with me and in the meantime, enjoy a quota photo of Green Point Lighthouse:
I’ve never really understood why it is painted in garish red and white diagonal stripes.
“So that it stands out from the buildings around it,” they tell me.
Does the big, bright, rotating light on the top of it not do that adequately enough then?
And how can the crews of ships passing off the Atlantic seaboard see the stripes at night anyway? Even with very powerful binoculars, they would surely be dazzled by that big, bright, rotating light on the top of it.
And when they can see the stripes during the day, at what point is it important that they recognise the building as a lighthouse? Surely the presence of any building at all would indicate land: something which is best avoided if you are a ship – vessels which tend to prefer wet places, which land is not.
Colour me confused (but not diagonally red and white).
