Kate's (Last) Picture Scavenger Hunt .26/13/2021

Sadly this is to be Kate's final Picture Scavenger Hunt due to her very busy life these days.  It has been fun though I did find Fridays came around very quickly!! Good job Threads through my Life aka Lovely Lady kept me on my toes.   

My selection of pictures seem to  be more black/white than light/dark, or maybe there is not too big a difference.   Anyway, here goes...........

LIGHT/DARK 

On one visit to  our son and daughter-in-law in Scotland they took us to see The Kelpies near Falkirk, the largest equine sculpture in the world. They are 30 metres high and are a monument to Scotland's horse powered industrial heritage.  For those who do not know what a Kelpie is (I didn't)  they are a shape-changing aquatic spirit of Scottish legend. They are said to haunt rivers and streams, usually in the shape of a horse.

I took some lovely pictures of them, in spite of the rain that day, but on getting back to their home our son took my phone and using some app which he says is on my phone (but I have never found it again) turned all my photographs into these strange black and white pictures.  They show both dark and light of the same subject and well as a picture at the end just so you can see what they should look like.  They are amazing, makes one feel very small next to them as they are huge.

What they should really look like.  If you are ever in that part of Scotland they and the Falkirk wheel are really worth the visit - free of charge too!! 

My next Light/dark photograph is one I took over the Christmas period when we made a large silver star to hang in our window.  I fortunately found some very tiny LED lights that I could put around the edges which outlined the star beautifully.  

 The star hanging in the window with a winter sunset behind it.  It was not dark enough yet for the lights to show.

A picture I have used before but I think it shows light and dark in a most beautiful way.  A lone heron in the evening sunset at Tau Game Reserve, South Africa.

And finally......................

A saddle back stork meeting a lone buffalo at Nkorho Game Lodge Waterhole.

Hello - who are you? 

I'm off...... there are two of you!!! 

Thank you Kate for running the photo treasure hunt for so long.  It has given us nearly five years of fun searching through our archives or going out to take the relevant photographs.   We have also kept in touch with  bloggy friends and made new  ones. It has been fun and I wish Astrid of Dragon Stitches and Stuff by Astrid best of luck hosting the blog and sure she will keep it going for us to continue with our frantic searches for the relevant photographs on a Thursday night.   Good luck with all your new ventures.  Look forward to life's restrictions being lifted  so we can  say .....see ya around🧡  xxx

        Now off to see what everyone else has done this week.

Kate's One Word Scavenger Hunt 19/03/2021

 

For the third week this month Kate has selected Sunrise/Sunset.  I have so many pictures particularly of sunsets taken from our lounge window that I have had a job to choose.  We can't see sunrises from our flat windows, just too far around the corner but I have quite a few taken from different watering holes on the Africam.com site.  I take pictures off my computer screen with my smart phone.  So here are my selection for this week.

Sunrise over Tau Game Reserve, South Africa

The next set of photographs were taken out of our lounge window a few years ago.  It shows the sun gradually disappearing behind the horizon.  

 Sunset in over Weets Hill, Lancashire,  August 2013

One more week of Kate's One Word Scavenger Hunt before she hands over the reins to someone else due to her ever increasingly busy lifestyle.  Thanks again Kate for all the hours of pleasure you have given us over many years. 🧡xx 

 It will  officially be Spring by then as it is the Spring Equinox on Saturday 20th March.  So it will be all change.  See you then.  xxx  

Kate's One Word Scavenger Hunt 12/03/2021

This week's topic for our picture hunt is Look up/Look down.  This really had me thinking for a while till I realised the way I should go.  So here is my interpretation of Kate's words.  

I searched through old photographs taken whilst driving round the Panorama Route, Mpumulunga, South Africa when we lived in nearby Hazyview.  To give a brief explanation much of that part of South Africa is either Highveld or Lowveld and usually there is an easy drive down between the two.  But here the cooler Highveld towers above the much hotter and drier Lowveld below where we lived.  The Panorama Route took in many lovely sites like Bourke's Luck Potholes, Pilgrim's Rest and God's Window.   That is where the first picture was taken. 

Here we are looking east over vast forests owned and maintained by the Forestry Commission and beyond that across the town of the aptly named Hazyview and towards the Kruger National Park and eventually towards Mozambique.  I like to think this photographs shows both looking up at the clouds whose shadows make dark blotches on the forests below where your eye is drawn to look down.  We loved being up there as it was a way to escape the extreme heat of the Lowveld below. 

This next picture I took of Rosie's Pan where I think it shows both looking up and down.  The clouds above are reflected in the water below. 

  

Here a male Kudu is standing above the water with his reflection down below. 

I have more pictures 'looking up' than looking down so here is one last one of storm clouds building up over Naledi Dam as the sun was setting.  

That's it for this week.  Thanks Kate for keeping us going with your weekly picture hunt. Now off to see how everyone else has interpreted the prompt for this week.

Kate's One Word Scavenger Photo Hunt 5/03/2021

This week's choice is Signs of spring/Signs of Autumn.  I had it all sorted, just need captions when this morning, as I lay in bed thinking I should get up, it suddenly came to me.....a photograph I had taken of the gorgeous trees that had come into flower one year while we were working at Thabamoopoo Hospital in Mpumulunga, South Africa.  So I gave up all ideas of daffodils, snowdrops etc and searched for my photograph.  

Spring in Central and Southern Africa where we had always lived has a different sort of feeling to it compared to the UK.  Here it has been cold and dreary and we can't wait for signs of snowdrops and daffodils to cheer us up and give hope of soon to be arriving Spring.  In Africa we have just had a very dry and (for Africa) cold few months.  The grass is brown and dead looking,  the trees bare and everywhere is very dry.  It does not have rain all year round but for only a few months, usually October or November to April.   Then after the first rains all the wild flowers just appear and the trees burst into bloom.

In this photographs the bougainvillea  is climbing up a Jacaranda tree which is just starting to come into blossom.  The lighter purple tree in the background is different shade of Jacaranda  and the yellow tree nearer the office is a Tipuana Tipu just coming into flower.  I unfortunately can't remember the name of the yellow one.

The bougainvillea in the picture below was an enormous old one and helped make a background and cover for the outdoor stage we built for the concerts put on for the patients.  I have used this picture before so some may remember it.  The ladies in it are staff, either nurses or cleaners, dancing wearing their traditional dress.    Many tribes were represented here,   Xhosa, Pedi, Shangaan, Sotho, Tswana, Zulu and Venda.  My favourite is the Shangaan, second lady from the right.  

Looking at these pictures set me on a search for other spring flowering trees though these pictures are curtesy of Google.  So forgive me for cheating. 

The first is of Jacaranda in bloom in Pretoria, administrative capital of South Africa. **** The city is famous for nearly all its streets being lined with the beautiful Jacaranda.  It is an amazing sight in October but it has many problems, not least being the mess it  makes when the flowers drop.  It causes Jacaranda Eye, itchy eyes for sufferers (B being one of them) for as long as the flowers are out.

                     

Another favourite  is the gorgeous Flamboyant  with its tulip like flowers.   It has very long seed pods,  up to 30 cms long, that can be shaken like rattles.  They are also used in street planting and  are a wonderful sight when in flower.

North of Cape Town, on the way to Namibia, each year the arid desert bursts into bloom as soon as the rains start to fall in Spring.  Tourists come from  all over the world  to see the acres and acres of wild flowers,

Below is a selection of pictures taken from the Namaqualand web pages.  The first being of an Oryx posing in the gorgeous flowers, then there were so many pictures to choose from I just selected a variety of different coloured flowers.

. 

Yellow  Namaqualand daisies and  purple vygies or mesembryanthemums 

Acres and acres of different coloured and variety of daisies 

I could not show pictures of African spring flowers without including the Flame Lily or Gloriosa Lily.

It comes into flower as the rainy season starts and was always special to us, not only as it is a beautiful flower, lasts well in the garden and vase but is the national flower of Rhodesia and now of Zimbabwe. 

****  If you, like me, are keen on quizzes and like to know  unusual facts you may have noticed I said Pretoria was the administrative capital.  Well South Africa  has THREE capitals, Pretoria as I have already mentioned, Bloemfontein is the judicial capital and finally Capetown is the legislative capital. 

Now off to see what others have posted about Spring/Autumn.