Benjamin B.
Yelp
THIS.
This clifftop glory.
This beautiful boneyard.
What a find. What a wonderful, enchanting find. I haven't been so excited about anything since Blink 182 reformed a few years back. Where has this pocket of European-inspired class been hiding? And why do more people not know about it? Maybe the whole graveyard thing puts them off. Fools. They're missing out.
Go on a wild, woolly, overcast day, when clouds bunch like anvils on the horizon and the screams of the crows are ripped from their beaks by a howling, petulant wind that's out to break things.
It's a little bit macabre and a lot beautiful, the graves sprawl from a hilltop that runs down to a cliff overlooking the churning ocean. What I like about the whole place is the mess: there are rows, but they're not super ordered, and everything has that look of aesthetic decay - shattered marble, broken headstones, spurts of ivy and rust so old and deep it runs back and purple. Jesus weeps, cherubs float, angels implore the heavens. Spectacular.
This damn thing was opened in 1877, gets no funding from the government, and is still a functioning cemetery. Plus I found the grave of one Victor Trumper, which thrilled me to bits . . . I don't know if it's THE Victor Trumper, Victorian cricketing hero and master of the bushranger beard, but I like to think it is.