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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson

@rg1.bsky.social

66 followers 47 following 157 posts

Variously a journalist, photojournalist, international development worker (SW Pacific), permaculture practitioner/educator, outdoor educator/guide. Retired but still active in these things. medium.com/pacificedge pacific-edge.info

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 20/05/2026

TALES OF MISADVENTURE… Accidents… mishaps… mysteries. They are more intriguing in the mountains because of their remoteness. This is a compilation of personal stories. READ THE STORY HERE: medium.com/pacificedge/... #bushwalking #hiking #Tasmania #searchandrescue #SAR

Misadventure in the mountains

What follows is a collections of tales about misadventure in the mountains. They come from personal experience. The stories are atypical…

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 04/02/2026

THE WILD… A walk on kunanyi-Mt Wellington's southern flank takes us high above a river to follow the route of Hobart's water supply to its source. An easy and popular walk, the Pipeline Track takes you through cool temperate rainforest. READ THE STORY HERE… medium.com/pacificedge/...

Along the Pipeline

A walk on kunanyi-Mt Wellington’s southern flank takes us high above a river to follow the route of Hobart’s water supply to its source. An…

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 25/01/2026

"How does it feel… to be on your own… a complete unknown…." I'm quoting Dylan. The words carry a tone of resignation… of a lack of direction in life. That's what this story is about. READ THE STORY HERE: medium.com/pacificedge/... #journalism #writing #writinglife #driftinginlife #personalgoals

This is a short piece for a writer’s website now long gone. Like water around a rock in a creek, the piece flows around the idea of…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 23/01/2026

THINKING ABOUT PERMACULTURE… Permaculture. Marxism. The metabolic rift. What is the conversation about? READ WHAT IS OVERHEARD HERE: The metabolic rift and how to heal it: eavesdropping on a conversation medium.com/permaculture... #permaculture #politics #politicaltheory

The metabolic rift and how to heal it: eavesdropping on a conversation

Political philosophies are serious things but they can be fun to play with. Do they have an influnce in permaculture? They do. The evidence…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 18/01/2026

Speculative fiction offers us an alternative literary vehicle with which to explore 'what if' scenarios. It frees the imagination from normal journalistic formats. It can be more engaging to read. This is a scenario that could easily become reality. russgrayson-au.medium.com/24bc0f9cca2c...

russgrayson-au.medium.com

A crisis. A vulnerability. A society reconfigures

I told the story of Australia’s liquid fuel vulnerability after the Defence Department and others highlighted it in a report. That was a…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 11/01/2026

open.substack.com/pub/russgray...

open.substack.com

The US threat to Greenland

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 07/12/2025

THE SHED… Sheds… what you don't see when you open the door and walk in are the hidden human stories they contain. What were the stories this old shed atop the ridge contained ? READ here: medium.com/pacificedge/... #sheds #shacks #Tasmania

For decades it stood… neglected, unnoticed. Summers came and went, drying its timbers. Winters came with rain and wind to rattle loose…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 27/11/2025

A new cookbook for healthy, balanced meals in the Solomon Islands has been released by the Kastom Gaden association. Lyndellar Sanau compiled the recipes. The book was designed by Fiona Campbell of development consultancy TerraCircle. Download: kastomgaden.org/projects/hel...

kastomgaden.org

Helti Kaikai Cookbook - Kastom Gaden

Helti Kaikai Cookbook was published by Kastom Garden Association, Honiara, Solomon Islands, November 2025.

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 08/11/2025

It’s another edible gift of South American farmers of times long gone. In the loam beneath our feet, its orange heart thickens in silence, storing sunlight and memory and carrying whispers of ancient terraces in distant mountains… russgrayson-au.medium.com/from-distant...

russgrayson-au.medium.com

From distant shores

It is a story from a distant time, the old man says.

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 21/10/2025

The last two months have been busy for search and rescue in Tasmania. What is behind this upsurge? Is it unprepared adventure tourists going into places and into conditions they should not? Are there deeper causes? That’s what we look at in this story. russgrayson-au.medium.com/search-and-r...

russgrayson-au.medium.com

Search and rescue: the dilemma of Tasmania’s wild places

After the two recent rescues and a fatality at Cradle Mountain the online responses followed their usual pattern of blaming national park…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 16/10/2025

COMBINING ENERGY & AGRICULTURE… Agrivoltaics integrates farming with solar energy production, producing a double yield from the same field for farmers. photovoltaic panels. Research suggests panels improve livestock welfare, wool quality and some crop yields. #farmingy #photovoltaics

How agrivoltaics model permaculture

Photo source: I don’t know where this photo originally came from. A reverse image search on Firefox reveals multiple sources. My use is…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 13/10/2025

LIFE'S COMINGS AND GOINGS… People are like characters on a stage. They appear, play their role, then step off. And what are we left with? Something else that might be familiar. That hollow feeling… questions unanswered… a longing to know what became of them. READ it here: medium.com/pacificedge/...

THAT’S Todd, Dave and Melinda there on the sand. Melinda always uses her full name when she is introduced to people but all of her friends…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 12/10/2025

BUS AS HOME A couple want to live by the sea. They haven't the money to build. They do the nest-best thing. They buy a used bus and set up home in it. READ it here: open.substack.com/pub/russgray...

open.substack.com

Sometimes, home comes with wheels

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 09/09/2025

A REWILDING MOMENT… Jagged branches twist skyward, stubbornly defying the passage of the years, of the decades. Morning sun glints off of a trunk hardened and smoothed by summer sun and the winds of the Roaring 40s. #photography #blackandwhitephotography #trees #Tasmania

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 07/09/2025

FRANSTRALIE: a nation that could have been… What if the French maritime explorers who charted the Australian southeast coast had been followed by voyages of colonisation? Here’s an alternative history of our continent. READ IT HERE: russgrayson-au.medium.com/franstralie-...

russgrayson-au.medium.com

Franstralie: a nation that could have been

Terra Australie: le nouveau territoire français. It could have been. Maybe. If France’s early explorations of the Australian coast had…

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 07/09/2025

OUR LAND, OUR FOOD… You come to settle a new land you know nothing about. You carry seed to start agriculture. But will it be enough to sustain your colony? READ IT HERE: medium.com/pacificedge/...

Old land, new food: the story of what we eat

A preliminary commentary on a book still being read.

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 01/09/2025

Video of fascist blackshirts violence at yesterday's march for Australia rally in Melbourne. Just one of the violent incidents in Melbourne, Brisbane and elsewhere. www.facebook.com/share/p/19mK...

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 31/08/2025

An anti-tourism car sticker in Tasmania discloses unease over the number of tourists, most from the Australian mainland, coming into the island state in summer.

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 31/08/2025

Signs of spring: first flowers on apricot tree.

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 29/08/2025

VOYAGES OF EXPLORATION… Had the English not established a colony at Port Jackson, would we be eating croissants for breakfast instead of porridge? Perhaps, because the French were exploring the south east Australian coast before and after the English arrived. medium.com/pacificedge/...

The French in Tasmania’s maritime history

Tasmania might have been colonised by the English but it was also explored by the French. It was the English who planted the first European…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 28/08/2025

The first flowers of the season bloom on the apricot. The plum, too. Nearby, the golden spheres are Cape gooseberries (Physalis peruviana). Out front, the wattle trees are in bloom. The first sign of spring. #Gardening #Flowers #FruitTrees #permaculture #Tasmania

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 28/08/2025

A REWILDING MOMENT… From the sun A journey of eight minutes and twenty seconds Then, sunrise Golden light spreads across the land. #photons#Sunrise #Morning#Tasmania

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 10/08/2025

TALES OF THE NOT-QUITE-TRUE… Sometimes, fiction is based on fact. The characters, their actions and dialog might be made up, but the core of the story that forms the plot really did happen. So it is with this story… READ IT HERE: F: russgrayson-au.medium.com/the-pack-208...

russgrayson-au.medium.com

It is no secret that fiction writers draw on observation, on events in the real world and on their own experience to concoct their stories…

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 09/08/2025

A REWILDING MOMENT… Eucalyptus, Lewisham foreshore track, SE Tasmania. #trees #eucalypyus #tasmania #bushwalking #hiking #photography #landscapephotography

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

THE WILD… Crossing Tasmania's Franklin River is easier these days. An old photo reawakens memories on journeys past, and on the present state of wilderness walking. READ HERE: medium.com/pacificedge/.... #tasmania #franklinriver #rivers #bushwalking #bushwalkingaustralia #Backpacking #memoir

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 29/07/2025

THE OUTDOOR MUSEUM… Here, near the southeastern Tasmanian town of Cygnet, a rusting traction engine decays through the decades next to an early gasoline powered road roller. #Tasmania #Cygnet #Technology #machines #IndustrialRevolution

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 29/07/2025

STORIES OF THE COAST… The beach shacks at Bulgo on the Illawarra coast in NSW are typical of the informal vernacular architecture of Australian shack building… #shacks #beachshacks #huts #coastalliving #NSWAustralia #Bulgo #Bulgoshacks russgrayson-au.medium.com/shacks-on-th...

russgrayson-au.medium.com

Shacks on the seashore

IT IS DIM and still. Little light penetrates the canopy of eucalypts and cabbage tree palms. I’ve been following the rough track down…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 22/07/2025

THINGS IN THE WORLD… What does the TV series Alone have to teach us about the psychology and physical skills of survival in hostile cold and wet environments? READ THE STORY: medium.com/pacificedge/... #Alone #survival #survivalpsychology #survivalskills #survivalequipment #Tasmania #TV

Alone, and the value of bushcrafting

Finding the TV series, Alone, took me back to my experience of camping in the bush under a tarp, under what Australians know as a hoochie…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 12/07/2025

THE MOUNTAINS… When was it? some time ago now. I was looking through old photos when I came across some I took decades ago on walks into the Walls Of Jerusalem, the cluster of peaks near Tasmania's Central Plateau. READ THE STORY HERE: medium.com/pacificedge/...

Two tales of the mountains

A brief memoir of bushwalking in Tasmania’s Walls of Jerusalem in the 1970s…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 10/07/2025

THINKING ABOUT PERMACULTURE… How do permaculture practitioners deal with the deteriorating geopolitical scene forcing itself upon us today? Some are already taking action. Let's take a look at them. READ THE STORY HERE: medium.com/permaculture...

Permaculture in a time of crisis, war and displacement

We stand at a moment of crisis in our world. Wars rage in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, producing huge refugeee flows. An…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 03/07/2025

You will find this superb example of an Art Norveau doorway at the Saint Marys Hotel on Main Street, St Marys, Tasmania. The flowing line of the window frame that makes an almost-complete circle that is repeated in the surrounding brickwork. #ArtNorveau #architecture #StMarysTasmania #Tasmania

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 02/07/2025

THINGS IN THE WORLD… Nearly every morning a large, black bird with a pointed head lands on the railing, and looking inside through the window makes the same three note call. What is it after? #Birds #Wildlife #Tasmania #Tasmanian wildlife #ForestRaven

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 29/06/2025

PLANT NOTES… Maybe you have eaten chia, but have you tried growing it? We experimented with a few bushes here in our cool temperate climate and the plant did well. #chia #food #seeds #gardening #permaculture medium.com/permaculture...

Chia is one of the Central and South American food species that we can grow on Australia’s warm to cool temperate climates.

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 27/06/2025

A LITTLE FICTION… Sometimes, fiction collides with fact to collapse into a hybrid. medium.com/pacificedge/...

Much fiction is based on fact. Small things trigger stories, everyday things like walking along a short track below the trees and emerging…

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 24/06/2025

THE WILD… We were near Beatties Tarm, following the Mt Field East Track in Tasmania’s Mt Field National Park. This challenging alpine circuit reaches 1261m, it takes around 4-5 hours to walk 10.5km for a total ascent of 566m. #Tasmania #bushwalking #MtFieldTasmania #hiking

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 24/06/2025

THAT SINKING FEELING… Taking on water along Lewisham foreshore trail in Tasmania. #boats #Tasmania

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 19/06/2025

DANCING WITH HISTORIC FICTION… It is historic fiction but at the same time it's a tale of what could have been. READ IT HERE: medium.com/pacificedge/... #fiction #historicfiction #whitlam #politicalchange

Add a dose of fiction to a touch of reality and you have an alternative history. The genre takes something that happened and riffs a…

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 19/06/2025

THE OUTDOOR MUSEUM… The bandstand in City Park in Launceston, Tasmania, is a historic structure that has been a central feature of the park for over a century. Built in the late 19th century, the bandstand was designed as a performance space for bands. #launceston#Tasmania #photography

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 16/06/2025

Just another sunrise here on the Tasmanian coast. After a display of warm morning colour, it disappeared to replaced by the grey clouds we now have. A cloudy sky means no chance seeing an Aurora tonight, if there is one thanks to the solar geomagnetic storm. #Tasmania

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 10/06/2025

ALONG THE TRAIL… Join us for Tasmania's annual Turning of the Fagus pilgrimage. READ THE STORY HERE: medium.com/pacificedge/.... #tasmania #mtfieldnationalpark #bushwalking #hiking #hikingadventures #camping #tyennariver #hobartandbeyond

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 06/06/2025

THINGS IN THE WORLD… From traditional culture to modern culture, the tipi became a symbol of simple living close to nature. medium.com/pacificedge/... / medium.com/pacificedge/...

How a traditional shelter was adopted by a generation of seekers…

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 05/06/2025

THE WILD… They are out at this time of year, hanging on the branches of tough wiry shrubs, little dots of white that blend into the snowy terrain of the past couple days. They are another gift of edible nature to humanity. READ THE STORY HERE: Mountain snowberry medium.com/per.../mount....

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 01/06/2025

WILD FOODS OF TASMANIA… Mountain pinkberry is one of the edible berries that make their home in the chilly heights of Tasmania's mountains. You can grow out where you live by finding a Tasmanian plants nursery that stocks the shrub. READ THE PLANT NOTE HERE: medium.com/permac.../mo...?

Mountain pinkberry

It is the time of fruiting. Late-autumn has arrived and here, high on the upper slopes of Mt Field, mountain snowberry and mountain current…

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LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 01/06/2025

HERE ON THE COAST… It’s the first day of winter here in Tasmania, 6.5°C and still, as and the sun rises into a sky wispy with a thin layer of cirrus. #sunrise #photography #sunrisephotography #winter #Tasmania

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 27/05/2025

THE WILD… We read the story of the land in its rock, vegetation and terrain. That was apparent as I stood atop the high cliff above Lake Seal in Mt Field National Park in Tasmania. READ THE STORY HERE: medium.com/pacificedge/...

The glaciated land

One of the things I like about walking in the mountains is reading the landscape. I have no formal qualifications in geography, however my…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 21/05/2025

Have you ever thought about how permaculture can help us tackle the big challenges facing our world? That’s what this blog link is all about: finding the positive in the tough times. #permaculture #ThomasHomer-Dixon #environmemntalissues #socialchange medium.com/permaculture...

Permaculture: seeking solutions

Looking for the upside of down through the writing of some who have influenced the permaculture design system…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 18/05/2025

THINKING ABOUT PERMACULTURE… A story about the thinkers who influenced the early permaculture design system in Australia. READ THE STORY HERE… medium.com/permaculture... #permaculture #permaculturedesign #permaculturehistory #socialhistory #books

Thinkers of the dawn time

The permaculture design system has its feet in the work of earlier thinkers, some of whom also influenced Australia’s alternative culture…

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 12/05/2025

ALL THAT IS EDIBLE… Large and dark, the Black Russian tomato offers a sizeable feast. medium.com/permaculture...

The Black Russian

The tale of a tomato

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 12/05/2025

TODAY IN PHOTOGRAPHY… Pink, red and a touch of yellow. #photography #Tasmania #colours

LIFE AT 42°S - Russ Grayson @rg1.bsky.social · 08/05/2025

A REVIEW… Surely, we have all heard of Leonard Cohen. and, if so, we’ll all be familiar with his song, So Long Marianne. But who was Maryanne? And why did he write a song about her? That’s the theme of a TV series broadcast on SBS. Here’s a review of it. READ THE STORY: medium.com/pacificedge/...

The Hydra years: a film