Pooh's Corner

This is more for the story than the quality of the images (a second in the note). I'd suggest playing this music as background.

Today we have taken a return drive to Canberra, Australia's capital city, up the King's Highway. Even now, it is a narrow winding road with a steep section climbing almost 1000 metres up the escarpment of the coastal ranges. In one hairpin bend, there is a little cave in the cliff, loved by kids for many years because it is "Pooh's Corner" (or, as the sign now has it, "Pooh Bear's Corner"). Teddy bears and stuffed toys are always being left there (see note) and from time to time are removed by the Council when too many accumulate. I was glad to see today that the graffiti also has been removed.

It's an unlikely thing and place, but our kids used to love it and, like most people, we just accepted it as a curiousity, without asking ourselves "why?". Some years back, a historian gave the background in the Canberra paper, though I'm sure few people saw or remembered it.

Let's go back for a little history. Yesterday, 8 May, was the 74th anniversary of the Battle of the Coral Sea, a major sea battle that stopped the Japanese naval expansion southwards. Interestingly, it was the first naval battle entirely by carrier fleets, with the opposing ships never seeing each other. Times were bleak in 1941, with a very real fear that Japan's forces might invade Australia.

As I noted earlier, the King's Highway links our national capital with the coast. Military planners were concerned that, just possibly, Japanese forces might try landing at the coast and take the road up the hill. In those days the road was far less developed, but the only direct road nonetheless. So they decided to station a local militia group on the road to defend it. As part of that defensive process, the militia dug a cave into the side of the cliff at road level and filled it full of explosives, with a view to dropping the cliff across the road to block it to any invading force, should the need arise. And that explains how Pooh's Corner came to have the famous cave.

But how did it come to be "Pooh's Corner"? I hear you all cry. Well, a group of people do indeed need to have toilets available, as of course did the military people. And the toilets for the military people were directly above the area of the cliff where the cave had been dug. So that area came to be known as "Poo Corner". Maybe it's as well the origins of the cave and the name have been forgotten. :-))

Explored.