Sunday, 4 December 2011

Genealogy notes 2 Dec 2011 Genealogy cruising & Melbourne adventures

There were no talks this morning due to the early arrival in Melbourne and most people were keen to go ashore. As I live in Melbourne (or at least within a 40km radius) I decided to spend the day catching up with my blogs and to also spend some time looking into the various queries people have given me on the trip so far.

Once I caught up with the last few days cruising blogs, I then put them out via Twitter, Facebook, and Google+. Having ticked off those items, it was time for a coffee and a break up on the deck. Suitably refreshed I then tackled the queries. Some people came prepared with their laptops and family history databases, others had printouts and still others were relying on memory.

In every instance I was able to suggest other avenues for them to follow up and in some instances I redid their searches looking for spelling variations etc to find elusive ancestors. I managed to turn up some references for one lady that she hadn't found although it still didn't solve the overall problem of why the family changed their name after the parents had married.

In another query I felt that the family couldn't be convicts as they weren't showing up in the usual indexes so over lunch I discussed it with Keith Johnson and the lady had also followed up my suggestion to talk to Keith so he was familiar with the query. There's probably a military connection but we would need more resources on board for that so the lady has some homework to do once back home.

All up I gave everyone a brief report/suggestions on what I would do next and I have asked them to let me know how it goes. It's always good to know if your ideas work.

After dinner when everyone was back on board, we had two talks - Jan Gow discussing various aspects of researching with FamilySearch and also a brief look at their indexing program. I gave my talk on Online Newspapers and my fondness for looking at the real estate section of modern newspapers from my research counties of interest.

Although I had had a fairly lazy day, I was still tired so I had an early night. Tomorrow is another full day at sea with a number of interesting talks to end the cruise on. I will probably be out of internet range again so this will probably be sent from Sydney and before we disembark to fly home to Melbourne. It's going to be a sad, but happy kind of day tomorrow.

Friday, 2 December 2011

Genealogy notes 1 Dec 2011 Genealogy cruising & Burnie Adventures

The last two days at sea on board the Volendam and with the Unlock the Past history and genealogy cruisers was amazing and my report of the various sessions is on my other blog SHHE Genie Rambles - read about the two days of full on genealogy here.

Today we were back in Australian waters and accordingly we had a customs inspection before we could go ashore in Burnie Tasmania. The tricky part was that our deck was being called at 7.30am and I was due to speak on Warning Warning: Tips & Tricks to Avoid Common Mistakes at 8.10am. I ended up getting to the theatre with just a few minutes to spare and this talk is also on my website under Resources and scroll down to Presentations.

Rosemary was next with a session on FindMyPast Australasia which I didn't stay for as we wanted to go into Burnie and have a look around. In the afternoon I came back to the ship to work on some of the queries I had been given over the last few days. I just did some preliminary online searches to see if I could solve some of the brickwalls but in most cases it was more a case of providing potential avenues and people will have to follow through when they get home.

Rosemary and Chris Paton gave talks to the members of the Burnie Branch of the Tasmanian Family History Society in the afternoon.

After dinner Richard Reid spoke about Not Just Ned - a True History of the Irish in Australia which was a very successful exhibition at the National Museum of Australia earlier this year. I made a last minute dash to Canberra the weekend before it closed and I'm very glad I did as it was an excellent exhibition and I even purchased the catalogue.

The final speaker of the day was Jan Gow on Checking the Big 5: Creating A Check List for UK Research and in this Jan demonstrated how she keeps track of what she has looked at when searching for various ancestors. There are so many different ways to organise your research and it is always good to see and hear about how others do it.

Afterwards I had thought I would find Max in the Casino again but he had gone to the movies (Pirates of the Caribbean) so I watched Perry and Richard for a little while on three hand poker and 21 respectively. Then it was down to the cabin and bed for me as tomorrow is Melbourne - it does seem strange to be visiting one's home town but I will be using the day to catch up on my blogs and queries while Max shows some American friends around the Queen Victoria Market and other CBD sights. 

Thursday, 1 December 2011

Genealogy note 29 Nov 2011 Day 10 genealogy cruising at Fjordland New Zealand


Today was sailing around Fjordland on the west coast of the South Island of New Zealand. Our genealogy talks and private session times were changed to fit in with the Volendam’s scenic cruising as we arrived earlier than expected.

It was truly magnificent sailing into and out of Doubtful and Milford Sounds and it is a wonder that a ship this big can even go inside them and still turn around. We also saw a few other local, small cruise boats and even a few planes flew over Milford Sound. It was very cold with strong winds blowing off the icy peaks.

To start the day we had Perry talking about The 19th Century Irish Landscape of Your Ancestors which was a slide show of various photographs with Perry outlining the significance or features within the photo. At one point Perry asked who had been to Ireland and I think I was the only one who didn’t put up their hand. So that settles it – I have to go to Ireland!

Jan Gow followed with Using the New Zealand BDM Records Online: Hints Tips & Unique Features. I have used these before but it was good to have some of the unique features explained in greater detail. For example, deaths are 50 years access or if the person was aged 80 years or over – this means you can get a death certificate for someone who died in 2011 if they were aged over 80 years.

I had three one on one sessions today and these last on average 45 minutes depending on the query but most have more than one query to ask about. The lack of internet access makes it hard to immediately give answers so I have undertaken to do a little searching once we get back to Australian waters and internet range. They are all interesting queries so I am looking forward to the challenge.

Helen Smith was due to talk about Using UK Archives for Family History and I was to do my Google Your Family Tree Talk: Tips and Tricks but that was a direct clash with Milford Sound (no contest really) so we rescheduled those talks till later in the voyage.

After dinner we listened to Chris Paton talk about Scottish Weavers (I don’t have any but still interesting to see how Chris traced his ownfamily of weavers and the sources he used). Then there was a Trivia Quiz which some people stayed for and I ended up having a drink or two with Chris and his wife Claire.

As I have just had an article published in a UK magazine it was interesting to talk to Chris about writing for the overseas market. With any interesting conversation time flies and it was well past my bedtime before I made my way back downstairs.  The only advantage was that we were to gain an additional hour of time as we started adjusting back to Australian time!

Tomorrow is totally at sea so we will have a full day of genealogy talks – hope I don’t get writer’s cramp! Yes I still use pen and notebook for my note taking. Until tomorrow.