Secrets of a Sydney past

Technically it's west of Sydney, but it's so close and so much a part of Sydney life that it gets a guernsey here.

Would you believe this was originallly a privately-funded amusement park with an ornamental (and actual bathing) lake? Later to include a Catalina flying boat (in the centre of the lake, hence the name) that was presumably trucked in?

Later still (around 1950) a motor racing circuit was built around the edge of what was known as "the Gully" north and west of this shot, to the dismay of residents, many indigenous. Thousands of years of aboriginal Australian culture was disturbed or destroyed in the process of creating a track for car racing. Great work, guys.

A shale and coal railway line also passed on the western edge of the park, providing a link from the main railway on the plateau down to the mines in the beautiful, otherwise unspoilt valleys. That was the 19th century in action I guess.