Falling rocks

Work has just been completed on the road widening at corner of Memorial Drive and Maitland Bay Drive , the road has been moved away a bit from the crumbling hillside , there are some big rocks up there about to come tumbling down one day......
The section of the mountain here was not always like that , in fact you may have noticed a few areas where man has taken chunks out of the hill side along Memorial Drive.
Ever since the Peninsula was settled people have quarried sandstone and fill materials from the sides of the hill , the area being made up of old sand dunes needed a solid base before you could build on it , some of the older houses in the area sit on stumps made from solid chunks of sandstone quarried from Blackwall Mountains edges.
The old Woy Woy Shire Council used it as a quarry for years , most of the mountain lays in landfills at Woy Woy Oval at the waterfront when the lagoon was reclaimed .
The section in question today actually has been recorded as being the area where the sandstone was quarried for the construction of Ettalong Hall for Mrs Cox way back in the 1800's , a gang of workers camped at the base of the hill for the duration of its construction.
Another feature nearby is the Railway Workers Cave just up the hill a bit round the corner , during the construction of Woy Woy Tunnel , workers travelling to and from the main wharf at Blackwall and the tunnel site would stay overnight in the shelter of this large natural cave.