036 Check the forecast on the world’s largest barometer

When Bert Bolle migrated from the Netherlands to Denmark, WA, he couldn’t stand to be parted from one of his creations.

Bert Bolle is a multi-skilled Dutch-born writer. When he and his artist wife Ethne migrated to Denmark in southwest WA, he couldn’t be parted from one of his creations. It must have made for a bulky bit of luggage because the unique water barometer that Bert designed and built himself in 1985 is 12m long. Today it occupies pride of place in the Barometer Tower of the Denmark Visitor Centre, and is also named in the Guinness Book as the world’s largest.

The Bolle’s history with barometers goes back to the Netherlands where they ran the Barometer Museum in their 18th Century country house at Maartensdijk. There the barometer was the main (and of course the biggest) attraction among hundreds of other weather instruments.

Visitors to Denmark today can climb to a platform inside the Visitors’ Centre and take a barometer reading. Better still they can witness the strange but true phenomenon of water boiling at 20ºC.

Where // Denmark is 423km south of Perth. The barometer is in the Denmark Visitor Centre. www.bertbolle.com

Did you know? // WA’s town of Denmark has nothing to do with the country of Denmark. The river by which the town is built was named in 1829 for Dr Alexander Denmark, a British Fleet physician.