Stunning Affordable Luxury Furnished (Unfurnished) Rentals!

Rentals include Security Orbs, TV/Media, Beautiful Beach Hangout for Residents, Full PRIVACY from other avatars.

Welcome home @ Spencers!

For more information, please DM or NC ParkerSpencer Resident

Come Visit at - maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Anubis/57/223/2502

This beautiful unit was decorated by Kee Dash of Dashing Decor!

 

Featured in this photo:

Skybox - Scarlet Creative Xander

Loft & Aria - Aspen Sectional

Loft & Aria - Aspen Diamond Cut Table

Fancy Decor: Bradley Chaise

Fancy Decor: Briar Rug

Apple Fall Books - Arrangement 8

-CENES- Bella Fireplace

Includes colour hud with 16 colour choices. Comes in mesh sizes Maitreya, Slink, Belleza & TMP

marketplace.secondlife.com/p/LD-Studded-Tassel-Heels-MAIT...

 

More apartments under construction on the former low grade industrial land near the mouth of the Adur.

Italian postcard by SAG, Trieste, Serie, no. 10.

 

Italian actress Claudia Cardinale (1938) is one of Europe's iconic and most versatile film stars. The combination of her beauty, dark, flashing eyes, explosive sexuality and genuine acting talent virtually guaranteed her stardom. Her most notable films include 8½ (Federico Fellini, 1963), Il Gattopardo/The Leopard (Luchino Visconti, 1963) and Once Upon a Time in the West (Sergio Leone, 1968).

 

Claude Joséphine Rose Cardinale was born in La Goulette in Tunisia in 1938 (some sources claim 1939). Her mother, Yolande Greco, was born in Tunisia to Italian (Sicilian) emigrants from Trapani, Italy. Her father was an Italian (Sicilian) railway worker, born in Gela, Italy. Her native languages were Tunisian Arabic and French. She received a French education and she had to learn Italian once she pursued her acting career. She had her break in films after she was voted the most beautiful Italian girl in Tunisia in 1957. The contest of the Italian embassy had as a prize a trip to the Venice Film Festival. She made her film debut in the French-Tunisian coproduction Goha (Jacques Baratier, 1958) starring Omar Sharif. After attending the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia in Rome for two months, she signed a 7-year contract with the Vides studios. The contract forbade her to cut her hair, to marry or to gain weight. Later that year she had a role in the heist comedy I soliti ignoti/Big Deal On Madonna Street (Mario Monicelli, 1958) with Vittorio Gassman and Renato Salvatori. The film was an international success, and her film career was off and running. At this point, the press, noting her initials, announced that CC was the natural successor to BB (Brigitte Bardot), and began beating the drum on her behalf. Dozens of alluring photographs of Claudia Cardinale were displayed in newspapers and magazines throughout the world. According to IMDb, she has appeared on more than 900 magazine covers in over 25 countries. The contrast between these pictures and those of Marilyn Monroe or Jayne Mansfield is striking. Cardinale never appeared in a nude or fully topless scene. Her pictures promoted an image of a shy family girl who just happened to have a beautiful face and a sexy body. A photograph of Cardinale was featured in the original gate fold artwork to Bob Dylan's album Blonde on Blonde (1966), but because it was used without Cardinale's permission, the photo was removed from the cover art in later pressings.

 

Claudia Cardinale's early career was largely managed producer Franco Cristaldi. Because of her film contract, she told everyone that her son Patrizio was her baby brother. He was born out of wedlock when she was 17; the father was a mysterious Frenchman. She did not reveal to the child that he was her son until he was 19 years old. In 1966, she married Cristaldi, who adopted Patrizio. In only three years she made a stream of great films. First she made three successful comedies, Un Maledetto imbroglio/The Facts of Murder (Pietro Germi, 1959), Il Bell'Antonio/Bell'Antonio (Mauro Bolognini, 1960) featuring Marcello Mastroianni, and Audace colpo dei soliti ignoti/Fiasco in Milan (Nanni Loy, 1960). Cardinale had a supporting part in the epic drama Rocco e i suoi fratelli/Rocco and His Brothers (Luchino Visconti, 1960) in which she played the sister-in-law of Alain Delon and Renato Salvatori. And then followed leading parts in La Ragazza con la valigia/Girl with a Suitcase (Valerio Zurlini, 1961), La Viaccia/The Lovemakers (Mauro Bolognini, 1961) with Jean-Paul Belmondo, and Senilità/Careless (Mauro Bolognini, 1961). Claudia Cardinale had a deep, sultry voice and spoke Italian with a heavy French accent, so her voice was dubbed in her early films. In Federico Fellini's 8½ (1963), she was finally allowed to dub her own dialogue. In the film, she plays a dream woman - a character named Claudia, who is the object of the fantasies of the director in the film, played by Marcello Mastroianni. With Fellini's surrealistic masterpiece she received her widest exposure to date with this film. That same year, she also appeared in another masterpiece of the Italian cinema, the epic Il Gattopardo/The Leopard (Luchino Visconti, 1963) with Burt Lancaster and Alain Delon. The combined success of these two classic films made her rise to the front ranks of Italian cinema. And it also piqued Hollywood's interest.

 

In 1963 Claudia Cardinale played the princess who owned the Pink Panther diamond in The Pink Panther (Blake Edwards, 1963) which was filmed in Italy. It was the first in the series of detective comedies starring Peter Sellers as bumbling French Inspector Jacques Clouseau (the mishap-prone snoop was actually a supporting player in his debut). The film was an enormous success and brought CC to English-speaking audiences. In 1964 she co-starred with John Wayne and Rita Hayworth in her first American production, Circus World (Henry Hathaway, 1964). It was another box-office hit. The following year she appeared with Rock Hudson in Blindfold (Philip Dunne, 1966), an offbeat mixture of espionage and slapstick comedy. The Professionals (Richard Brooks, 1966) is her favourite among her Hollywood films. In this Western, she is a gutsy Mexican woman married against her will to a rich American. The film received Academy Award nominations for Best Direction (Richard Brooks), Best Screenplay (Brooks again), and Best Cinematography (Conrad L. Hall). Cardinale continued dividing her time between Hollywood and Europe for the remainder of the decade. Throughout the 1960s, Claudia Cardinale also appeared in some of the best European films. In France, she appeared in the Swashbuckler Cartouche (Philippe de Broca, 1962) featuring Jean-Paul Belmondo. Back in Italy, she played in I Giorno della civetta/The Day of the Owl (Damiano Damiani, 1968) with Franco Nero, and Nell'anno del Signore/The Conspirators (Luigi Magni, 1969) with Nino Manfredi. Mesmerizing is her performance in Sandra/Vaghe stelle dell'Orsa... (Luchino Visconti, 1965) as a Holocaust survivor with an incestuous relationship with her brother (Jean Sorel). Another highlight in her career is C'era una volta il West/Once Upon a Time in the West (Sergio Leone, 1968), the ultimate Spaghetti Western. Lucia Bozzola writes in her review at AllMovie: "In Sergio Leone's epic Western, shot partly in Monument Valley, a revenge story becomes an epic contemplation of the Western past. (...) As in his 'Dollars' trilogy, Leone transforms the standard Western plot through the visual impact of widescreen landscapes and the figures therein. At its full length, Once Upon a Time in the West is Leone's operatic masterwork, worthy of its legend-making title."

 

In the following decades, Claudia Cardinale remained mainly active in European cinema. She played a small part for Visconti in Gruppo di famiglia in un interno/Conversation Piece (Luchino Visconti, 1974) starring Burt Lancaster and Silvana Mangano. She worked with other major Italian directors at Goodbye e amen (Damiano Damiani, 1977), the TV mini-series Jesus of Nazareth (Franco Zeffirelli, 1977) as the adulteress, and La Pelle/The Skin (Liliana Cavani, 1981) starring Marcello Mastroianni and based on the bitter novel by Curzio Malaparte concerning the Allied liberation of Naples. An international arthouse hit was Fitzcarraldo (Werner Herzog, 1982), the story of an obsessed impresario (Klaus Kinski) whose foremost desire in life is to bring both Enrico Caruso and an opera house to the deepest jungles of South America. In his diary of the making of Fitzcarraldo, Werner Herzog writes: "Claudia Cardinale is great help because she is such a good sport, a real trouper, and has a special radiance before the camera. In her presence, [Klaus Kinski] usually acts like a gentleman." Other interesting films include the Luigi Pirandello adaptation Enrico IV/Henry IV (Marco Bellocchio, 1984) with Marcello Mastroianni, the epic La révolution française/The French Revolution (Robert Enrico, Richard T. Heffron, 1989), the nostalgic drama Mayrig/Mother (Henri Verneuil, 1991), and the romantic thriller And now... Ladies and Gentlemen (Claude Lelouch, 2002) starring Jeremy Irons. On Television she gave another well-received performance in the TV drama La storia/History (Luigi Comencini, 1986), in which she plays a widow raising a son during World War II.

 

Claudia Cardinale is a liberal with strong political convictions. She is involved in many humanitarian causes, and pro-women and pro-gay issues, and she has frequently stated her pride in her Tunisian and Arab roots - as evidenced by her appearance as herself in the Tunisian film Un été à La Goulette/A Summer at La Goulette (Férid Boughedir, 1996). She has managed to combine her acting work with a role of goodwill ambassador for UNICEF, and advocate for the work of Luchino Visconti with whom she made four films. She wrote an autobiography, 'Moi Claudia, Toi Claudia' (Me Claudia, You Claudia). In 2005, she also published a French-language book, Mes Etoiles (My Stars), about her personal and professional relationships with many of her directors and co-stars through her nearly 50 years in show-business. In 2002, she won an honorary Golden Bear award of the Berlin Film Festival, and previously in 1993 she was awarded an honorary Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival. Cardinale works steadily on and in recent years she has also worked in the theatre. In the cinema, she appeared recently in the French-Tunisian gay drama Le fil/The String (Mehdi Ben Attia, 2009), the Algerian drama Un balcon sur la mer/A View of Love (Nicole Garcia, 2010) in which she played the mother of Jean Dujardin, and the costume drama Effie Gray (Richard Laxton, 2014) with Dakota Fanning. Claudia Cardinale currently lives in Paris. She has made over 135 films in the past 60 years and still does two or three a year.

 

Sources: Lucia Bozzola (AllMovie), Steve Rose (The Guardian), IMDb, and Wikipedia.

 

And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.

- Includes:

○ Shape

○ Eyebrows shape

○ Detailed Stylecard with landmarks, pics settings and extra info.

 

Enjoy ♡

 

○Inworld Store

○Marketplace

Down among the Bluebells at Slindon Woods

This outfit was to include a jacket. I had taken the jacket in weeks earlier to be altered to fit me better. I was hoping to pick it up two weeks prior to this picture. Each time it was not ready. I figured this time I would pick it dressed as Mandii. Still was not ready. Two weeks after this it was finally ready, but have not had a chance to try it on yet with this blouse and skirt.

For years the russian rules only used Estonia for their own profit. After the independence thecountry is catching up with the rest of Europe. That includes the tram network. In a way it's not a really big extensive network, but it more or less seems to work for the city. The city is getting brand new trams, which is a rather big change, as the city used (and still uses) some rather old fashioned trams. Quite some are second handed trams even. That includes the KT4MR series, which were rebuild out of old german trams. Although still with woden benches inside. During a rather nice but rainy evening I was able to get one of those trams, the 168 "Julius" on photo as it was on its way towards the depot at Kopli.

Elephants in the San Diego Zoo have a huge enclosure.

 

Today, seven elephants live in the Zoo’s Elephant Odyssey habitat. Its features include a state-of-the-art Elephant Care Center, helpful, as the herd is made up of older, non-breeding elephants at this time.

 

They’re enormous and intelligent, strong and sociable. Humans have been impressed by elephants for centuries, simply because they are so big—a male African elephant can weigh up to 7.5 tons (6.8 metric tons)! They also amaze us with their long and flexible noses, large and flapping ears, and loose, wrinkly skin. There are many stories about elephants—you’ve probably heard of Horton, Babar, and Dumbo. Elephants are one of the best-known animals in the world.

 

Elephants are large and gray and have big ears and long trunks, right? If all elephants seem the same to you, take a closer look. There are two elephant species that are usually recognized: the African elephant and the Asian elephant. There is some ongoing debate about how many subspecies may exist, or whether some of these might, in fact, be species in their own right. Here are a few ways to tell them apart:

 

- African elephants have large ears that are shaped like the continent of Africa, both males and females have visible tusks, their skin is very wrinkly, their back is swayed, and the end of their trunk works as if they have two fingers there to help them pick things up. African elephants are the largest mammals on land.

 

- Asian elephants have smaller ears, usually only the males have visible tusks, their skin is not as wrinkly as African elephants’, they only have one "finger" at the ends of their trunk, and their back is dome-shaped.

 

Empress and Queenie were the San Diego Zoo’s first elephants, arriving here in 1923 via train from San Francisco. After being led off the train, the two Asian elephants refused to move another step, no matter how much encouragement they received. The Zoo’s founder, Harry Wegeforth, M.D., was there to greet them, and it occurred to him that they were probably used to being ridden, so he climbed up on Empress and another staff member did the same with Queenie, and off they walked from the train station to the Zoo, gathering many astonished looks along the way!

 

Peaches was the San Diego Zoo’s first African elephant—and she made sure to be a memorable one too. When she arrived in 1953, she was three years old, smart, curious, and, as then ZOONOOZ editor Ken Stott described her, “playful as a quarter-ton kitten.” She had made the journey from Africa to San Diego with keeper Ralph “Gabe” Davis, and they got along famously—at least most of the time. When Gabe gave her breakfast, she would grumble and trumpet at him until he left her alone to eat—apparently, she was not sociable in the morning. She also showed a marked preference for men, even pushing away Zoo Executive Director Belle Benchley when she tried to say hello. Peaches did become more mellow as she grew up, but even as an adult, she still had a way of “flirting” with men while more often than not giving women a cool stare.

 

Since that time, we've had numerous elephants at our two facilities, and our first elephant birth occurred in 1981. In 1971, Asian elephant Carol became famous by appearing on The Tonight Show with the Zoo’s animal ambassador Joan Embery, to meet Johnny Carson and paint for him while millions watched nationwide!

 

Elephants have been hunted relentlessly for their tusks (even though they’re made of dentine, the same as our teeth). Elephants are now protected, but poachers still hunt them, and they face other problems, too. Because they are so big and need so much food, they can eat themselves out of “house and home.” Elephants and people often come into conflict as elephant habitats undergo dramatic reductions in size. Asian and African forest elephants are listed as endangered, primarily due to habitat loss and fragmentation. African bush elephants are threatened, primarily due to habitat loss and being poached for their tusks.

 

Elephants Without Borders has been deploying satellite-monitoring collars on elephants throughout northern Botswana since 2000, having tracked over 90 individual elephants; this is one of the longest and largest elephant movement studies in Africa. Every individual pachyderm has its unique character and intriguing story to his or her own seasonal march, preferred routes, and favored places. Each new elephant fitted with a tracking device provides new information to understand the ecology of these animals. Unpredictable individual ranging behavior coupled with a dynamic, ever-changing environment in Botswana underscore the need for long-term elephant studies. The elephants are tracked from a fixed-wing plane, which allows a visual assessment of collared elephants to determine herd structure and habitat use.

 

Conservation farming project

In collaboration with San Diego Zoo Global, Elephants Without Borders has established a conservation farming project in the Chobe Enclave in Botswana. This project is developing experimental plots with various methods of keeping elephants away from crops, including farming of specific chili species that are thought to be unpalatable to elephants and may deter them from invading crop areas. Along with aerial survey wildlife counts and satellite-collared elephant data, these projects are essential for developing community-based conservation programs to reduce human-elephant conflict and make better-informed conservation decisions for all.

 

- See more at: animals.sandiegozoo.org/animals/elephant#sthash.uFZnr8tJ....

 

THE GLOBE AND MAIL 05 MARCH 2015

The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus will phase out the show’s iconic elephants from its performances by 2018, telling Associated Press exclusively that growing public concern about how the animals are treated led to the decision.

the pond is looking good

plants include Achilles chives ajuga in both variegated and a purple leaved forms teasels pansy hardy hardy geranium sweet Williams hellebores

 

Threatening late afternoon clouds off Shoreham Beach

Tiffany Designs PROMO:: Mia Valentine Outfit [Mesh] + Lara X

 

★★★ MESH VALENTINE'S DAY OUTFIT ★★★

 

════════════════════════════════════════════════════

➣ Includes:

 

• Mesh Top

• Mesh Dress

• Mesh Boots (classic & Maze)

 

• Texture HUD Driven

 

════════════════════════════════════════════════════

➣ Compatible with:

 

➠ LARA X, Petite

➠ MAITREYA, Petite

➠ LEGACY, Perky

➠ BOMBSHELL

➠ REBORN, Waifus

➠ GENX, Curvy

➠ KUPRA

➠ ERIKA

 

════════════════════════════════════════════════════

★ Before buying, please try the free demo.

 

★ Thank you for shopping at ::TIFFANY DESIGNS:: !

 

☎ In world assistance if you need additional help - please contact LucyHope.

 

Tiffany Designs

 

LM: maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Hilton%20Villas/232/207/22

 

MP: marketplace.secondlife.com/stores/139726?

   

Includes 32 quality dance animations, including male pole dancing. 3 land impact with the base, or you can unlink the pole to use by itself and it's only 1 LI. They are copy/mod and have materials on them for added effect in advanced lighting.

 

There are also several dance sequences set, or just choose the All Dances sequence and it will cycle through all 22 female pole dances in a loop so you can dance and dance and dance!

 

See also the fantasy version!

Lara AC Outfit CHRISTMAS NANNA (Includes hair!) marketplace.secondlife.com/p/PROMO-50-OFF-Lara-AC-Outfit-...

LeLUTKA Avalon Head EvoX 4.0

REBORN By eBODY V1.69.6

VELOUR x VENUS for EBODY REBORN (SUNKISS)

VOGLIA: "AKASHA" SKIN (EvoX) - VE SUNKISS

{S&C} Free Dove Necklace Black/Gold/Silver

  

On my Right today is my gorgeous RL daughter Rochelle AKA missbitch93/ For more info, on what she is wearing, head over to her Flickr page.Thank you

 

Visit this location at Die Betrunken Maus (The Drunken Mouse) in Second Life

Updated to include new sizes. All sizes included: Lara+Petite, LaraX+Petite, Legacy+Perky, Ebody Reborn+Waifu, Gen.X Classic, Hourglass, Physique, Isis & Freya.

 

Come check them out at the new mainstore:

 

maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/fd%20mainstore/128/51/51

Includes: EF-76 Nebulon B Escort Frigate, CR-90 Corvette, X-wings, Y-wings, A-wings, U-wings, and Millenium Falcon.

Meant to be Battle of Scarif plus the Falcon. X-Wing modified from I should mention that the X-wing is based off of:

X-Wing: www.flickr.com/photos/27826007@N05/5136533693/in/photolis...

 

I plan on adding a Hammerhead Corvette and GR-75 in the next few months.

 

Any criticism/feedback is welcome

Italian postcard by Rotalfoto, Milano (Rotalcolor), no, 240.

 

Italian actress Claudia Cardinale (1938) is one of Europe's iconic and most versatile film stars. The combination of her beauty, dark, flashing eyes, explosive sexuality and genuine acting talent virtually guaranteed her stardom. Her most notable films include 8½ (Federico Fellini, 1963), Il Gattopardo/The Leopard (Luchino Visconti, 1963) and Once Upon a Time in the West (Sergio Leone, 1968).

 

Claude Joséphine Rose Cardinale was born in La Goulette in Tunisia in 1938 (some sources claim 1939). Her mother, Yolande Greco, was born in Tunisia to Italian (Sicilian) emigrants from Trapani, Italy. Her father was an Italian (Sicilian) railway worker, born in Gela, Italy. Her native languages were Tunisian Arabic and French. She received a French education and she had to learn Italian once she pursued her acting career. She had her break in films after she was voted the most beautiful Italian girl in Tunisia in 1957. The contest of the Italian embassy had as a prize a trip to the Venice Film Festival. She made her film debut in the French-Tunisian coproduction Goha (Jacques Baratier, 1958) starring Omar Sharif. After attending the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia in Rome for two months, she signed a 7-year contract with the Vides studios. The contract forbade her to cut her hair, to marry or to gain weight. Later that year she had a role in the heist comedy I soliti ignoti/Big Deal On Madonna Street (Mario Monicelli, 1958) with Vittorio Gassman and Renato Salvatori. The film was an international success, and her film career was off and running. At this point, the press, noting her initials, announced that CC was the natural successor to BB (Brigitte Bardot), and began beating the drum on her behalf. Dozens of alluring photographs of Claudia Cardinale were displayed in newspapers and magazines throughout the world. According to IMDb, she has appeared on more than 900 magazine covers in over 25 countries. The contrast between these pictures and those of Marilyn Monroe or Jayne Mansfield is striking. Cardinale never appeared in a nude or fully topless scene. Her pictures promoted an image of a shy family girl who just happened to have a beautiful face and a sexy body. A photograph of Cardinale was featured in the original gate fold artwork to Bob Dylan's album Blonde on Blonde (1966), but because it was used without Cardinale's permission, the photo was removed from the cover art in later pressings.

 

Claudia Cardinale's early career was largely managed producer Franco Cristaldi. Because of her film contract, she told everyone that her son Patrizio was her baby brother. He was born out of wedlock when she was 17; the father was a mysterious Frenchman. She did not reveal to the child that he was her son until he was 19 years old. In 1966, she married Cristaldi, who adopted Patrizio. In only three years she made a stream of great films. First she made three successful comedies, Un Maledetto imbroglio/The Facts of Murder (Pietro Germi, 1959), Il Bell'Antonio/Bell'Antonio (Mauro Bolognini, 1960) featuring Marcello Mastroianni, and Audace colpo dei soliti ignoti/Fiasco in Milan (Nanni Loy, 1960). Cardinale had a supporting part in the epic drama Rocco e i suoi fratelli/Rocco and His Brothers (Luchino Visconti, 1960) in which she played the sister-in-law of Alain Delon and Renato Salvatori. And then followed leading parts in La Ragazza con la valigia/Girl with a Suitcase (Valerio Zurlini, 1961), La Viaccia/The Lovemakers (Mauro Bolognini, 1961) with Jean-Paul Belmondo, and Senilità/Careless (Mauro Bolognini, 1961). Claudia Cardinale had a deep, sultry voice and spoke Italian with a heavy French accent, so her voice was dubbed in her early films. In Federico Fellini's 8½ (1963), she was finally allowed to dub her own dialogue. In the film, she plays a dream woman - a character named Claudia, who is the object of the fantasies of the director in the film, played by Marcello Mastroianni. With Fellini's surrealistic masterpiece she received her widest exposure to date with this film. That same year, she also appeared in another masterpiece of the Italian cinema, the epic Il Gattopardo/The Leopard (Luchino Visconti, 1963) with Burt Lancaster and Alain Delon. The combined success of these two classic films made her rise to the front ranks of Italian cinema. And it also piqued Hollywood's interest.

 

In 1963 Claudia Cardinale played the princess who owned the Pink Panther diamond in The Pink Panther (Blake Edwards, 1963) which was filmed in Italy. It was the first in the series of detective comedies starring Peter Sellers as bumbling French Inspector Jacques Clouseau (the mishap-prone snoop was actually a supporting player in his debut). The film was an enormous success and brought CC to English-speaking audiences. In 1964 she co-starred with John Wayne and Rita Hayworth in her first American production, Circus World (Henry Hathaway, 1964). It was another box-office hit. The following year she appeared with Rock Hudson in Blindfold (Philip Dunne, 1966), an offbeat mixture of espionage and slapstick comedy. The Professionals (Richard Brooks, 1966) is her favourite among her Hollywood films. In this Western, she is a gutsy Mexican woman married against her will to a rich American. The film received Academy Award nominations for Best Direction (Richard Brooks), Best Screenplay (Brooks again), and Best Cinematography (Conrad L. Hall). Cardinale continued dividing her time between Hollywood and Europe for the remainder of the decade. Throughout the 1960s, Claudia Cardinale also appeared in some of the best European films. In France, she appeared in the Swashbuckler Cartouche (Philippe de Broca, 1962) featuring Jean-Paul Belmondo. Back in Italy, she played in I Giorno della civetta/The Day of the Owl (Damiano Damiani, 1968) with Franco Nero, and Nell'anno del Signore/The Conspirators (Luigi Magni, 1969) with Nino Manfredi. Mesmerizing is her performance in Sandra/Vaghe stelle dell'Orsa... (Luchino Visconti, 1965) as a Holocaust survivor with an incestuous relationship with her brother (Jean Sorel). Another highlight in her career is C'era una volta il West/Once Upon a Time in the West (Sergio Leone, 1968), the ultimate Spaghetti Western. Lucia Bozzola writes in her review at AllMovie: "In Sergio Leone's epic Western, shot partly in Monument Valley, a revenge story becomes an epic contemplation of the Western past. (...) As in his 'Dollars' trilogy, Leone transforms the standard Western plot through the visual impact of widescreen landscapes and the figures therein. At its full length, Once Upon a Time in the West is Leone's operatic masterwork, worthy of its legend-making title."

 

In the following decades, Claudia Cardinale remained mainly active in European cinema. She played a small part for Visconti in Gruppo di famiglia in un interno/Conversation Piece (Luchino Visconti, 1974) starring Burt Lancaster and Silvana Mangano. She worked with other major Italian directors at Goodbye e amen (Damiano Damiani, 1977), the TV mini-series Jesus of Nazareth (Franco Zeffirelli, 1977) as the adulteress, and La Pelle/The Skin (Liliana Cavani, 1981) starring Marcello Mastroianni and based on the bitter novel by Curzio Malaparte concerning the Allied liberation of Naples. An international arthouse hit was Fitzcarraldo (Werner Herzog, 1982), the story of an obsessed impresario (Klaus Kinski) whose foremost desire in life is to bring both Enrico Caruso and an opera house to the deepest jungles of South America. In his diary of the making of Fitzcarraldo, Werner Herzog writes: "Claudia Cardinale is great help because she is such a good sport, a real trouper, and has a special radiance before the camera. In her presence, [Klaus Kinski] usually acts like a gentleman." Other interesting films include the Luigi Pirandello adaptation Enrico IV/Henry IV (Marco Bellocchio, 1984) with Marcello Mastroianni, the epic La révolution française/The French Revolution (Robert Enrico, Richard T. Heffron, 1989), the nostalgic drama Mayrig/Mother (Henri Verneuil, 1991), and the romantic thriller And now... Ladies and Gentlemen (Claude Lelouch, 2002) starring Jeremy Irons. On Television she gave another well-received performance in the TV drama La storia/History (Luigi Comencini, 1986), in which she plays a widow raising a son during World War II.

 

Claudia Cardinale is a liberal with strong political convictions. She is involved in many humanitarian causes, and pro-women and pro-gay issues, and she has frequently stated her pride in her Tunisian and Arab roots - as evidenced by her appearance as herself in the Tunisian film Un été à La Goulette/A Summer at La Goulette (Férid Boughedir, 1996). She has managed to combine her acting work with a role of goodwill ambassador for UNICEF, and advocate for the work of Luchino Visconti with whom she made four films. She wrote an autobiography, 'Moi Claudia, Toi Claudia' (Me Claudia, You Claudia). In 2005, she also published a French-language book, Mes Etoiles (My Stars), about her personal and professional relationships with many of her directors and co-stars through her nearly 50 years in show-business. In 2002, she won an honorary Golden Bear award of the Berlin Film Festival, and previously in 1993 she was awarded an honorary Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival. Cardinale works steadily on and in recent years she has also worked in the theatre. In the cinema, she appeared recently in the French-Tunisian gay drama Le fil/The String (Mehdi Ben Attia, 2009), the Algerian drama Un balcon sur la mer/A View of Love (Nicole Garcia, 2010) in which she played the mother of Jean Dujardin, and the costume drama Effie Gray (Richard Laxton, 2014) with Dakota Fanning. Claudia Cardinale currently lives in Paris. She has made over 135 films in the past 60 years and still does two or three a year.

 

Sources: Lucia Bozzola (AllMovie), Steve Rose (The Guardian), IMDb, and Wikipedia.

 

And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.

Includes teams from O'Gorman, Yankton, Pierre T.F. Riggs, Huron. Permission granted for journalism outlets and educational purposes. Not for commercial use. Must be credited. Photo courtesy of South Dakota Public Broadcasting.

©2021 SDPB

 

++++ from WIKIPEDIA ++++++

 

Abruzzo (UK: /æˈbrʊtsoʊ/,[5] US: /ɑːˈbruːtsoʊ, əˈ-/; Italian: [aˈbruttso]; Abbrùzze [abˈbruttsə], Abbrìzze [abˈbrittsə] or Abbrèzze [abˈbrɛttsə] in Neapolitan Abruzzese; Aquilano: Abbrùzzu) or Abruzzi is a region of Southern Italy with an area of 10,763 square km (4,156 sq mi) and a population of 1.3 million. It is divided into four provinces: L'Aquila, Teramo, Pescara, and Chieti. Its western border lies 80 km (50 mi) east of Rome. Abruzzo borders the region of Marche to the north, Lazio to the west and south-west, Molise to the south-east, and the Adriatic Sea to the east. Geographically, Abruzzo is divided into a mountainous area in the west, which includes the Gran Sasso d'Italia, and a coastal area in the east with beaches on the Adriatic Sea.

 

Abruzzo is considered a region of Southern Italy in terms of its culture, language, history and economy, although geographically it may also be considered central.[8] The Italian Statistical Authority (ISTAT) also deems it to be part of Southern Italy, partly because of Abruzzo's historic association with the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies.

 

Abruzzo is known as "the greenest region in Europe" as almost half of its territory, the largest in Europe,[9] is set aside as national parks and protected nature reserves. There are three national parks, one regional park, and 38 protected nature reserves. These ensure the survival of 75% of Europe's living species, including rare species such as the golden eagle, the Abruzzo (or Abruzzese) chamois, the Apennine wolf and the Marsican brown bear.[10] Abruzzo is also home to Calderone, Europe's southernmost glacier.

 

The visiting nineteenth-century Italian diplomat and journalist Primo Levi (1853–1917) said that the adjectives "forte e gentile" (strong and kind) best describe the beauty of the region and the character of its people. "Forte e gentile" has since become the motto of the region and its inhabitants.

 

Provinces and politics

Abruzzo provinces

Provinces

 

Abruzzo is divided into four administrative provinces:

Province Area (km2) Population Density (inh./km2)

Chieti 2,588 396,190 153.1

L'Aquila 5,034 308,876 61.3

Pescara 1,225 318,701 260.1

Teramo 1,948 308,769 158.5

Politics

 

History

Human settlements in Abruzzo have existed since at least the Neolithic times. A skeleton from Lama dei Peligni in the province of Chieti dates back to 6,540 BC under radiometric dating.[13] The name Abruzzo appears to be derivative of the Latin word "Aprutium". In Roman times, the region was known as Picenum, Sabina et Samnium, Flaminia et Picenum, and Campania et Samnium.[14] The region was known as Aprutium in the Middle Ages, arising from four possible sources: it is a combination of Praetutium, or rather of the name of the people Praetutii, applied to their chief city, Interamnia, the old Teramo.

 

Many cities in Abruzzo date back to ancient times. Corfinio was known as Corfinium when it was the chief city of the Paeligni, and later was renamed Pentima by the Romans. Chieti is built on the site of the ancient city of Teate, Atri was known as Adria. Teramo, known variously in ancient times as Interamnia and Teramne, has Roman ruins which attract tourists.

 

After the fall of the Roman Empire, a string of invasions and rulers dominated the region, including the Lombards, Byzantines, and Hungarians. Between the 9th and 12th centuries, the region was dominated by the popes. Subsequently, the Normans took over, and Abruzzo became part of the Kingdom of Sicily, later the Kingdom of Naples. Spain ruled the kingdom from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries. The French Bourbon dynasty took over in 1815, establishing the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, and ruled until Italian unification (also known as the Risorgimento) in 1860.

 

Until 1963, Abruzzo was part of the combined Abruzzi e Molise region. The term Abruzzi (plural of Abruzzo) derives from the time when the region was part of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. The territory was administered as Abruzzo Citeriore (nearer Abruzzo) and Abruzzo Ulteriore I and II (farther Abruzzo I and II) from Naples, the capital of the kingdom.[14] Abruzzo Citeriore is now Chieti province. Teramo and Pescara provinces now comprise what was Abruzzo Ulteriore I. Abruzzo Ulteriore II is now the province of L'Aquila.

 

In the twentieth century, war had a great impact on the region. During the Second World War, Abruzzo was on the Gustav Line, part of the German's Winter Line. One of the most brutal battles was the Battle of Ortona. Abruzzo was the location of two prisoner of war camps, Campo 21 in Chieti,[18] and Campo 78 in Sulmona. The Sulmona camp also served as a POW camp in World War 1; much of the facility is still intact and attracts tourists interested in military history.

 

Geography

Geographically, Abruzzo is located in central Italy and southern Italy, stretching from the heart of the Apennines to the Adriatic Sea, and includes mainly mountainous and wild land. The mountainous land is occupied by a vast plateau, including Gran Sasso, at 2,912 metres (9,554 ft) the highest peak of the Apennines, and Mount Majella at 2,793 metres (9,163 ft). The Adriatic coastline is characterized by long sandy beaches to the North and pebbly beaches to the South. Abruzzo is well known for its landscapes and natural environment, parks and nature reserves, characteristic hillside areas rich in vineyards and olive groves, and one of the highest densities of Blue Flag beaches.

 

Climate

The Abruzzo region has two types of climate that are strongly influenced by the Apennine Mountains, dividing the climate of the coastal and sub-Apennine hills from the interior's high mountain ranges. Coastal areas have a Mediterranean climate with hot dry summers and mild winters and rainy hills with a sublittoral climate where temperatures decrease progressively with increasing altitude and precipitation with altitude. Precipitation is also strongly affected by the presence of the Apennines mountain ridges of the region; it increases with the proportion being more abundant in the field and on the slopes exposed to the west, instead of decreasing towards the east and east-facing slopes. Often the Adriatic coast are sidelined rainfall from the west to the barrier effect of the Apennines undergoing the action of gentle winds descending from it (or Libeccio).[21] The minimum annual rainfall, however, is found in some inland valleys, sheltered from much disturbance to the blocking action of mountain ridges, such as the Peligna Valley, or the valley of the river Tirino, which in some places (Ofena, Capestrano) showed barely 500 millimetres (19.7 inches), and not along the coast where it never falls below 600 millimetres (23.6 inches); for if Teramo is relatively little watered by rain (Teramo less than 800 millimetres (31.5 inches)), the metre is exceeded in Chieti, reaching maximum levels in the Adriatic, while between Ortona and Vasto in Costa dei Trabocchi decrease again.[21] The highest rainfall occurs in upland areas on the border with Lazio; they are especially vulnerable to Atlantic disturbances. Around 1,500 to 2,000 millimetres (59 to 79 inches) of precipitation is typical (Pescara in 2010 showed a value close to 2,800 millimetres (110.2 inches)).

 

Flora and fauna

As with many Mediterranean regions, Abruzzo's vegetation is characterized by different Mediterranean ecosystems. The coast and the surrounding areas are characterized by the presence of typical plants of Mediterranean shrubland, such as myrtle, heather and mastic, while in the hilly areas other species grow, including olive, pine, willow, oak, poplar, alder, arbutus, broom, acacia, capers, rosemary, hawthorn, licorice and almond trees, interspersed with oak trees. At elevations between 600 and 1,000 metres (2,000 and 3,300 ft) there is sub-montane vegetation, mainly characterized by mixed forests of oak and turkey oak, maple and hornbeam; shrubs include dog rose and red juniper. Elevations between 1,000 and 1,900 metres (3,300 and 6,200 ft) are dominated by beech trees. In the Apennine Mountains at elevations above 2,000 metres (6,600 ft) species include alpine orchid, mountain juniper, silver fir, black cranberry and the Abruzzo edelweiss.

 

The fauna of Abruzzo is highly varied, including the region's symbol, the Abruzzo chamois (Rupicapra pyrenaica ornata), which has recovered from near-extinction. Animals typical of this region include: marsican brown bear, along with Italian wolf, deer, lynx, roe deer, snow vole, fox, porcupine, wild cat, wild boar, badger, otter, and viper.

 

The natural parks of the region include the Abruzzo National Park, the Gran Sasso and Monti della Laga National Park,[24] the Maiella National Park and the Sirente-Velino Regional Park, as well as many other natural reserves and protected areas.

 

Economy

Until a few decades ago, Abruzzo was a region of poverty in Southern Italy; over the past decades, however, it has developed to such an extent that it has escaped from the spiral of underdevelopment to become the 'first' region of the 'Italian Mezzogiorno'. This confirms its pivotal role in the national economic system. Since the 1950s, Abruzzo has had steady economic growth. In 1951, Abruzzo per capita income or GDP was 53% of that of Northern Italy, the nation's richest region. By 1971, Abruzzo was at 65% and, by 1994, per capita income was at 76% of Northern Italy's per capita income, giving Abruzzo the highest per capita GDP of Southern Italy and surpassing the growth of every other region of Italy. The construction of autostrade (motorways) from Rome to Teramo (A24) and Rome to Pescara (A25) opened Abruzzo to easy access. State and private investment in the region increased, and Abruzzo attained higher per capita education levels and greater productivity growth than the rest of the South. As of 2003, Abruzzo's per capita GDP was €19,506 or 84% of the national average of €23,181 and well outpacing that of the South (€15,808). The region's average GDP per capita was approximately 20,100 EUR.

 

The 2009 L'Aquila earthquake led to a sharp economic slowdown. However, according to statistics at the end of 2010, it seems that the economy of Abruzzo is recovering, despite the negative on regarding employment.[28] In fact, at the end of 2010, Abruzzo's growth was 1.47%, which placed it fourth among the Italian regions with the highest annual growth rates after Lazio, Lombardy and Calabria.[30] In 2011 Abruzzo's economic growth was +2.3%, the highest percentage among the regions of Southern Italy.[31] The region is also the richest region of Southern Italy, with a GDP per capita of €25,700.[21]

Travel poster from the 1920s.

 

Abruzzo's industrial sector expanded rapidly, especially in mechanical engineering, transportation equipment and telecommunications. The structure of production in the region reflects the transformation of the economy from agriculture to industry and services. Although industry has developed strongly, it retains weak points due to the existence of only a few large businesses alongside a huge fabric of small and medium-sized businesses. Both pure and applied research are carried out in the region, where there are major institutes and factories involved in research in the fields of pharmaceutics, biomedicine, electronics, aerospace and nuclear physics. The industrial infrastructure is spread throughout the region in industrial zones. The most important of these are: Val Pescara, Val Sangro, Val Trigno, Val Vibrata and Conca del Fucino. A further activity worthy of note is seaside and mountain tourism, which is of considerable importance to the economy of the region.[33] Agriculture, involving small holdings, has succeeded in modernising and offering high-quality products. The mostly small, agricultural holdings produce: wine, cereals, sugar beet, potatoes, olives, vegetables, fruit and dairy products. Traditional products are saffron and liquorice. Most famous in the world is Abruzzo's wine Montepulciano d'Abruzzo; in the late 20th and early 21st century, Montepulciano d'Abruzzo earned a reputation as being one of the most widely exported DOC classed wine in Italy.[34]

 

In the past decade, tourism has increased, in particular by internal and European arrivals. Abruzzo is world-famous for its wildlife parks (Abruzzo National Park, Gran Sasso and Monti della Laga National Park, Maiella National Park) and regional park (Sirente Velino), and 38 protected areas between oasis, regional reserves, and state reserves. The inland mountainous region contains several ski resorts, and coastal tourism is also well-developed, in particular, the Trabocchi Coast. Abruzzo's castles and medieval towns, especially around the town of L'Aquila, have earned it in some quarters the nickname of "Abruzzoshire", by analogy with the "Chiantishire", nickname sometimes used to refer to the Chianti area of Tuscany, but Abruzzo is still off the beaten path for most visitors to Italy.[35]

 

Chieti

Although the population density of Abruzzo has increased over recent decades, it is still well below the Italian national average: in 2008, 123.4 inhabitants per km2, compared to 198.8. In the provinces, the density varies: as of 2008 Pescara is the most densely populated with 260.1 inhabitants per km2, whereas L'Aquila is the least densely populated with 61.3 inhabitants per km2, although it has the largest area. After decades of emigration from the region, the main feature of the 1980s is immigration from third world countries. The population increase is due to the positive net migration. Since 1991 more deaths than births were registered in Abruzzo (except for 1999, when their numbers were equal).[36] In 2008, the Italian national institute of statistics ISTAT estimated that 59,749 foreign-born immigrants live in Abruzzo, equal to 4.5% of the total regional population.

 

The most serious demographic imbalance is between the mountainous areas of the interior and the coastal strip. The largest province, L'Aquila, is situated entirely in the interior and has the lowest population density. The movement of the population of Abruzzo from the mountains to the sea has led to the almost complete urbanization of the entire coastal strip especially in the province of Teramo and Chieti. The effects on the interior have been impoverishment and demographic aging, reflected by an activity rate in the province of L'Aquila which is the lowest among the provinces in Abruzzo – accompanied by geological degradation as a result of the absence of conservation measures. In the coastal strip, however, there is such a jumble of accommodations and activities that the environment has been negatively affected. The policy of providing incentives for development has resulted in the setting-up of industrial zones, some of which (Vasto, Avezzano, Carsoli, Gissi, Val Vibrata, Val di Sangro) have made genuine progress, while others (Val Pescara, L'Aquila) have run into trouble after their initial success. The zones of Sulmona and Guardiagrele have turned out to be more or less failures. Outside these zones, the main activities are agriculture and tourism.

 

Main settlements

L'Aquila is both the capital city of the Abruzzo region and of the Province of L'Aquila and second largest city (pop. 73,000). L'Aquila was hit by an earthquake on 6 April 2009, which destroyed much of the city centre. The other provincial capitals are Pescara, which is Abruzzo's largest city and major port (pop. 123,000); Teramo (pop. 55,000) and Chieti (pop. 55,000). Other large municipalities in Abruzzo include the industrial and high tech center Avezzano (pop. 41,000), as well as three important industrial and touristic centers such as Vasto (pop. 40,636), Lanciano (pop. 36,000), and Sulmona (pop. 25,000).

 

Transport

Airports

 

Abruzzo International Airport is the only international airport in the region. Open to civilian traffic since 1996, the number of passengers has increased over the years because of low-cost air carriers' use of the facility. Today, the airport has a catchment area of over 500,000 passengers annually and connects the city of Pescara and the entire region with many Italian and Europe destinations.

L'Aquila-Preturo Airport is located in the nearby village of Courts and was recently renovated and modernized to accommodate presidential flights for G8 activities.

 

Ports

There are four main ports in Abruzzo: Pescara, Ortona, Vasto and Giulianova.

 

Over the years the Port of Pescara became one of the most important tourist ports of Italy and the Adriatic Sea. Heavily damaged in World War II, it underwent some sixty years of major restoration and was reborn as a modern marina with advanced moorings and shipbuilding facilities. It has been honored with the European Union's blue flag for the quality of services offered. The port of Pescara has lost passenger traffic because of its shallowness and silting, but its fishery and aquaculture activities are thriving.[38]

Railways

 

There is a significant disparity between the railways of the Abruzzo coast and the inland areas, which badly need modernization to improve the service, in particular, the Rome-Pescara line.

 

Existing railway lines:

Adriatic railway runs through the whole of Italy from north to south, along the Adriatic Sea.

Train Rome – Sulmona – Pescara

Sulmona – Carpinone

Sulmona–Terni railway

Avezzano railroad – Roccasecca

Giulianova – Teramo

Sangritana (Lanciano – Castel di Sangro)

 

Highways

There are three highways that serve the region:

 

Highway A24 Rome – L'Aquila – Teramo, was built in the 1970s and connects Rome with Lazio and more specifically to the Abruzzo Teramo via L'Aquila. It performs an important liaison function of the region, both Tyrrhenian to the Adriatic, due to the presence of several interchanges of connecting roads and highways. The Gran Sasso tunnel, the longest road tunnel entirely on Italian territory, was opened in 1984. It connects L'Aquila and Teramo on the A24 making the northern Abruzzo coast reachable within two hours from Rome.

 

Highway A25 Turin – Avezzano – Pescara makes the connection between Rome and Pescara. The road running out of Turin begins its journey where it branches off the A24, runs into the Conca del Fucino, crosses the Abruzzo Apennines, comes to the valley of Peligna, and ends at the exit for Pescara-Villanova to join the A14.

Motorway A14 Bologna – Taranto known as the A14 "Adriatica", includes 743 km (461.68 mi) of road, including lengths in the cities of Bologna and Taranto. Opened to traffic in 1965, it is now a major tourist road, running through the coastal towns of Emilia Romagna, Marche, Abruzzo, Molise, and Apulia.

 

Culture

Castel del Monte, one of Abruzzo's little-known hill towns

Gabriele d'Annunzio from Pescara

Abbazia di San Liberatore a Majella (Serramonacesca)

Ovid from Sulmona

Cathedral of San Giustino (Chieti)

Fishing trabucco of San Vito Chietino

 

The museum Museo Archeologico Nazionale d'Abruzzo in Chieti houses the famed warrior statue Warrior of Capestrano which was found in a necropolis from 6th century B.C. Of cultural importance are: Teramo Cathedral, its archeological museum and Roman theater, the Castello della Monica, the Collurania-Teramo Observatory, the famous L'Aquila Basilica of Santa Maria di Collemaggio (which holds the remains of Pope Celestine V), the Museo Nazionale d'Abruzzo, Santa Maria del Suffragio, the Forte Spagnolo, the Fountain of 99 Spouts, Gabriele D'Annunzio's house in Pescara, Campli's Scala Sancta and its church, the church of Santissima Annunziata in Sulmona, the cathedrals of Chieti, Lanciano, Guardiagrele, Atri and Pescara along with the castles of Ortona, Celano and Ortucchio.

 

Every 28–29 August, L'Aquila's Santa Maria di Collemaggio commemorates the Perdonanza Celestiniana, the indulgence issued by Pope Celestine V to any who, "truly repentant and confessed" would visit that Church from the Vespers of the vigil to the vespers of 29 August.[39] Sulmona's Holy Week is commemorated with traditional celebrations and rituals, such as 'La Madonna che Scappa in Piazza', where a large statue of the Madonna, carried by a group of Sulmonesi part of Confraternities, is taken through the square towards her resurrected Son.[40] Cocullo, in the province of L'Aquila, holds the annual 'Festa dei serpari' (festival of snake handlers) in which a statue of St. Dominic, covered with live snakes, is carried in a procession through the town; it attracts thousands of Italian and foreign visitors. In many Abruzzo villages, Anthony the Great's feast is celebrated in January with massive and scenic bonfires.[41] In the past, the region of Abruzzo was well known for the transumanza, the migratory movement of sheep principally south to the region of Puglia during the cold winter months.[42] The Feast of St. Biagio, protector of wool dealers, is the most widespread in Abruzzo. On the third of February in Taranta Peligna every year since the sixteenth century an evocative ritual is carried out, entailing the distribution of panicelle, which are small loaves made of flour and water, in the shape of a blessing hand, which are distributed to the faithful.

 

Historical figures include: the Roman orator Asinius Pollio; Latin poets Sallust and Ovid, who were born in L'Aquila and Sulmona respectively, Gaius Cassius Longinus, Roman senator and leading instigator of the plot to kill Julius Caesar; and Pontius Pilate, who was born in the province of Teramo and is best known for authorizing the crucifixion of Jesus. Abruzzo's religious personalities include Saint Berardo; John of Capistrano, who led a crusade against the Ottoman Empire; Thomas of Celano, author of three hagiographies about Saint Francis of Assisi; and Alessandro Valignano, who introduced Catholicism to the Far East and Japan. The Polish Pope John Paul II loved the mountains of Abruzzo, where he would retire often and pray in the church of San Pietro della Ienca. When he died, Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz, gave the local Abruzzo community some of the late pontiff's blood as a token of the love he had felt for the mountainous area.[43] The greatest Italian poet of the 20th century Gabriele D'Annunzio was from Pescara; other notable Abruzzo personalities in the field of humanities include: poet Ignazio Silone, director Ennio Flaiano who co-wrote La dolce vita, philosopher Benedetto Croce, composer Sir Paolo Tosti and the sculptor Venanzo Crocetti.

 

American artists and celebrities such as: Madonna, Dean Martin, Bradley Cooper, Perry Como, Henry Mancini, Nancy Pelosi, Rocky Marciano, Rocky Mattioli, Bruno Sammartino, Mario Batali, John and Dan Fante, Tommy Lasorda, Dan Marino, Mario Lanza, Garry Marshall, Penny Marshall, Al Martino, Ariana Grande and Canadian Michael Bublé have Abruzzo origins.

 

Some international movies shot in Abruzzo include The American, Jean-Jacques Annaud's The Name of the Rose, Fellini's La Strada and I Vitelloni, Schwarzenegger's Red Sonja, Ladyhawke, King David, Francesco, Keoma, The Barbarians, The Fox and the Child and Krull.

Medieval and Renaissance hill towns

The fortress of Civitella is the most visited monument in Abruzzo

 

For most of its history, a large number of the Abruzzese people have been hill people, often working as shepherds in mountainous areas, or establishing hill towns, especially in the parts of Abruzzo further from the Adriatic coast.[citation needed] Before the 2009 earthquake, Abruzzo was the region with the highest number of castles and hill towns in Italy, but it still holds many of Italy's best-preserved medieval and Renaissance hill towns, twenty-three of which are among The Most Beautiful Villages in Italy.[44] These awards are not only for aesthetic beauty but also for art and culture, historical importance and livability.

 

The abrupt decline of Abruzzo's agricultural economy in the early to mid-20th-century saved some of the region's historic hill towns from modern development. Many lie entirely within regional and national parks. Among the most well preserved are Castel del Monte and Santo Stefano di Sessanio, which lie in the Gran Sasso National Park on the edge of the high plain of Campo Imperatore and nestled beneath the Apennines' highest peaks. Both hill towns, which were ruled by the Medicis for over a century-and-a-half, have relatively little tourism. Between the two towns sits Rocca Calascio, the ruin of an ancient fortress popular with filmmakers. Both Monteferrante and Roccascalegna are two of the most representative Abruzzo villages in the province of Chieti. Within the Gran Sasso National Park is also found Castelli, an ancient pottery center whose artisans produced ceramics for most of the royal houses of Europe.

 

Civitella del Tronto played a crucial role in the history of the unification of Italy. The fortress of Civitella is the most visited monument in the Abruzzo region today.[45] Other medieval hill towns located fully within Abruzzo's park system are Pacentro in the Maiella National Park and Pescasseroli in the Abruzzo National Park. Pacentro, which features a 14th-century castle with two intact towers, has been little touched by modernisation. The Shrine of Gabriel of Our Lady of Sorrows, in the province of Teramo, which attracts some two million visitors per year, is one of the 15 most-visited sanctuaries in the world.[46] Capestrano, a small town in the province of L'Aquila, is the hometown of Saint John of Capistrano, Franciscan friar and Catholic priest, as well as the namesake of the Franciscan missions San Juan Capistrano in Southern California, the mission Mission San Juan Capistrano (Texas) and the city of San Juan Capistrano in Orange County. Giulianova is a notable example of a Renaissance "ideal city."

 

The proximity to Rome, the protected natural reserves and landscapes which make the region one of the greenest in Europe, the presence of some of the most beautiful Italian villages, its rich and heterogeneous gastronomy, along with a long history of deep-rooted local tradition and authentic Italian culture, make Abruzzo fifth among Italian regions for tourist visits after Calabria, Marche, Sardinia and Trentino. In 2010, visitors included 6,381,067 Italians and 925,884 foreign tourists.

 

In 2015, the American organization Live and Invest Overseas included Abruzzo on its list of World's Top 21 Overseas Retirement Havens. The study was based on such factors as climate, infrastructure, health care, safety, taxes, cost of living and more. In 2017 the Chamber of Commerce of Pescara presented Abruzzo region to the Annual conference of Live and Invest Overseas in Orlando (USA). One year later, in October 2018, Live and Invest Overseas held its first conference in Abruzzo.

 

Universities

There are three universities in the Abruzzo region:

University of L'Aquila

D'Annunzio University of Chieti–Pescara

University of Teramo

 

Harvard University bases an intensive summer Italian language and culture program in Vasto, a resort town on Abruzzo's southern coast.

 

Science

Between the province of Teramo and L'Aquila, under the Gran Sasso Tunnel, is the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso (LNGS) of the INFN, one of the three underground astroparticle laboratories in Europe.

 

The Istituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale dell'Abruzzo e del Molise "Giuseppe Caporale", which conducts research in veterinary and environmental public health, is located in Teramo.

 

The Gran Sasso Science Institute, located in L'Aquila, is an advanced research institute which offers doctorates in astroparticle physics, computer science, and mathematics as well as urban studies and regional science, and which also conducts scientific research.

Sports

 

Interamnia World Cup, the largest international youth handball competition worldwide, takes place yearly in Teramo.[51]

 

There are several football clubs in Abruzzo. Delfino Pescara 1936 is a Serie B club; based in Pescara, its home stadium is Stadio Adriatico – Giovanni Cornacchia.

Dialects

 

The regional dialects of Abruzzo include Teramano, Abruzzese Orientale Adriatico and Abruzzese Occidentale. The first two form part of the dialect of southern Italy also known simply as "Neapolitan" since the region has been part of the Kingdom of Naples and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, while Aquilano is related to the Central Italian dialects including Romanesco. The dialects spoken in the Abruzzo region can be divided into three main groups:

Sabine dialect, in the province of L'Aquila (central Italian dialects)

Abruzzo Adriatic dialect, in the province of Teramo, Pescara and Chieti, that is virtually abandoned in the province of Ascoli Piceno (southern Italian dialects)

Abruzzo western dialect, in the province of L'Aquila (southern Italian dialects)

 

Cuisine

Renowned for its variety and richness due to the heterogeneity of its territory, Abruzzo's cuisine is among the best in Italy. In 2013 an Italian organization Confesercenti survey of foreign tourists showed that Abruzzo is the best Italian region to eat in. Both the agricultural and coastal aspects of Abruzzo have contributed to its cuisine. Due to the mountains, much of Abruzzo was isolated from international influence until the 20th century. As a result, the region's cuisine remained unique.

 

Popular dishes

One of the most popular regional dishes is spaghetti alla chitarra which is made by pressing or cutting pasta through a chitarra, an implement to form long thin noodles similar to spaghetti. The pasta is served with a tomato-based sauce, often flavored with peppers, pork, goose, or lamb. This dish is complemented by regional side dishes, such as the bean and noodle soup, sagne e fagioli. This soup is traditionally flavored with tomatoes, garlic, oil, and peperoncini. In terms of common ingredients, cuisine in Abruzzo often includes:

 

Lamb and mutton, primarily in the mountains.[54] Sheep's milk (or ricotta) is an important source of Abruzzese cheese, and lamb intestines are used as sausage casing or for stuffed meat rolls.[54][55] Mountain goat meat is also common in Abruzzo.

Truffles and mushrooms, particularly wild mushrooms from the forests and hills

Garlic, especially red garlic

Rosemary

Hot chili pepper or peperoncini, regionally known as diavolilli or diavoletti, is common in Abruzzese cuisine and often used to add spice to dishes. Abruzzo residents are well known for frequently adding peperoncini, or hot peppers, to their meals.

Vegetables such as lentils, grasspeas and other legumes, artichoke, eggplant, and cauliflower[54][55][56][57]

 

Other popular dishes include:

Gnocchi carrati, flavored with bacon, eggs and pecorino cheese

Scrippelle, a rustic French-style crêpe served either mbusse (a type of soup) or used to form a sort of soufflé with some ragù and stuffed with chicken liver, meatballs, hard-boiled eggs, and cheese

Pastuccia, a polenta stew with sausage, eggs, and cheese

 

Across the region, roast lamb is enjoyed in several variations. Some of these variations include:

 

Arrosticini, a skewered lamb dish

Pecora al cotturo, lamb stuffed with a variety of mountain herbs and cooked in a copper pot

Lamb cooked whole in a bread oven

Agnello cacio e ovo, a lamb-based fricassee

Mazzerella: lamb intestines stuffed with lamb, garlic, marjoram, lettuce, and spices

Le virtù: a soup from Teramo filled with legumes, vegetables and pork, usually eaten in the spring at celebrations

Timballo abruzzese: lasagna-like dish with pasta sheets (scrippelle) layered with meat, vegetables and rice; often served for Christmas and Easter[58]

Porchetta abruzzese: moist boneless-pork roast, slow-roasted with rosemary, garlic, and pepper[58]

 

Seafood is also popular, especially in coastal areas. The variety of fish available to the area has resulted in several fish-based Brodetti (broths), coming from such places as Vasto, Giulianova, and Pescara. These broths are often made by cooking fish, flavored with tomatoes, herbs, and peperoncino, in an earthenware pot. Rustic pizzas are also very common. Some of these are:

 

Easter Pizza, a rustic cake with cheese and pepper from the Teramo area

Fiadoni from Chieti, a dough of eggs and cheese well risen, cooked in the oven in a thin casing of pastry

A rustic tart pastry filled with everything imaginable: eggs, fresh cheeses, ricotta, vegetables, and all sorts of flavorings and spices.

 

Also from Teramo are the spreadable sausages flavored with nutmeg, and liver sausages tasting of garlic and spices. The ventricina from the Vasto area is made with large pieces of fat and lean pork, pressed and seasoned with powdered sweet peppers and fennel all encased in the dehydrated stomach of the pig itself. Atri and Rivisondoli are famous for cheeses. Mozzarella, either fresh or seasoned, is made from ewe's milk, although a great number of lesser known varieties of these cheeses can be found all over Abruzzo and Molise.

Sweets

 

The Abruzzo's sweets are world-famous and include:

 

Confetti, sugar-coated almonds, from Sulmona

Torrone Nurzia, a chocolate nougat from L'Aquila

Parrozzo , a cake-like treat made from a mixture of crushed almonds, and coated in chocolate.

Ferratelle (also known as Pizzelle). A wafer cookie, often flavored with anise

Croccante, a type of nougat made from almonds and caramelized suger, often flavored with lemon[59]

 

A Montepulciano d'Abruzzo wine labelled as being made from old vines.

Olive oil

 

The extra-virgin olive oil produced in Colline Teramane (Teramo hills) is marked by the DOP.[60]

 

The region has several cultivars that includes Carboncella, Dritta (Dritta Francavillese and Dritta di Moscufo), Gentile del Chieti, Nostrana (Nostrana di Brisighella), and Sargano olive cultivars.[61]

Wines and liquors

 

Renowned wines like Montepulciano DOCG and Trebbiano d'Abruzzo DOC are judged to be amongst the world's finest.[62] In 2012, a bottle of Trebbiano d'Abruzzo ranked No. 1 in the top 50 Italian wine awards.[63] In recent decades these wines have been joined, particularly, by wines from lesser known (heritage) white grapes, such as, Pecorino, Cococciola, Passerina, Montonico Bianco and Fiano.[64]

 

The region is also well known for the production of liquors such as Centerbe, Limoncello, Ratafia and Genziana.

Common names include ragwort, common ragwort, stinking willie, tansy ragwort, benweed, St. James-wort, ragweed, stinking nanny/ninny/willy, staggerwort, dog standard, cankerwort, stammerwort, mare's fart and cushag. In the western United States it is generally known as tansy ragwort, or tansy, though its resemblance to the true tansy is superficial.

Lamington National Park includes a series of densely forested valleys and ranges rising to more than 1,100m on the crest of the McPherson Range, which marks the New South Wales--Queensland border. The park lies on the southern edge of the Scenic Rim, a chain of mountains stretching from the Gold Coast hinterland to Mount Mistake and is joined by parks, such as the Border Rangers National Park, in New South Wales.

 

First Nations people lived in this area, carefully managing and using its rich natural resources for thousands of years. Known as ‘Woonoongoora’ in the Yugambeh language, the mountains of Lamington National Park are sacred and spiritual, places to be nurtured and respected.

 

The Yugambeh family groups are identified as the Wangerriburra, Birinburra, Gugingin, Migunberri, Mununjali, Bollongin, Minjungbal and Kombumerri. They shared language, ceremonies, celebrations and economic exchange.

 

This kinship group used both the open forest and rainforest. Evidence of their occupation has been found in various parts of the park, including the ‘Kweebani’ (cooking) cave near Binna Burra. It is believed a traditional pathway passed through the southern section of Lamington National Park.

 

Lamington National Park is born—the Gazettal:

 

Lamington National Park has found a place in the hearts of many that have visited over the last 100 years. The campaign to preserve the resource-rich, mountainous land as national park began in the 1890s with a particularly passionate grazier Robert Collins, who, while travelling overseas, learned about the world’s first national park, Yellowstone, in the United States.

 

‘… within sight of Brisbane there is a fine area with a climate more equable than any New Zealand town enjoys, volcanic soil of surpassing richness, deep shady forests and scrubs, cool running streams, and splendid, bold mountain scenery.’

 

Mr Collins was elected to the Queensland Legislative Assembly in 1896 and campaigned to have the area declared a national park. While New South Wales and Victoria had successfully declared national parks by 1900, many in Queensland still saw the land as a timber supply or potential dairy farm, and opposition remained strong. Attitudes began to shift by 1906 when the Queensland Parliament passed the State Forests and National Parks Act 1906. This led to the state’s first national park, Witches Falls (Tamborine Mountain), being declared in March 1908.

 

In 1911, Romeo Lahey, the engineer son of a Canungra sawmiller, joined the campaign and continued the fight after Collins’ death in 1913. Lahey argued that an even larger parcel of land should be protected, and drummed up support from locals with ‘lantern lectures’ (slide shows) and door-knocking.

 

In July 1915, 19,035ha of mountainous, forested land was declared Lamington National Park, in honour of the past Queensland Governor Lord Lamington. It was the state’s ninth national park, accomplished by a 20-year campaign.

 

Lahey and Lamington:

 

For Romeo Lahey, the campaign to protect the area that would become Lamington National Park would be a life-long passion that would last long after gazettal. The son of a timber-getter and Canungra sawmill operator, Lahey would often explore the surrounding region. In 1911, while studying an engineering degree at Sydney University, he returned to South East Queensland with a friend, William Potts, and documented their journey up the Coomera River to the border (McPherson Range). The article set in train his concept of a larger national park on the Queensland side of the McPherson Range.

 

‘…it is a land of mountains, waterfalls, valleys, rivers, scrubs, forests, magnificent panorama and charming spots teeming with native animals and plant life. Its mountains run up to 4000ft. high, and its waterfalls are not equalled outside the State. Within a five mile radius of the head of the Coomera River, there are fifty falls from 20ft to 600ft high, some of them the finest I have ever seen’.

 

Later that year, Lahey made his first approach to the Queensland Government for a large national park in a letter to Hon. E.H. Macartney, Minister for Lands.

 

‘This country contains some of the most beautiful country scenery I have ever seen…and culminates in the McPherson range in peaks over 4000ft high, from which an unsurpassed panorama is obtained over NSW and SE Queensland, including Brisbane. It is an ideal place in every way for a National Park… It will make a splendid preserve for game; at present it teems with all forms of native animal and bird life, many forms of which (e.g. lyre bird) are becoming extinct.’

 

In 1913, Lahey continued to write letters promoting the area of the McPherson Range for consideration as a national park to the Lands Department and copied letters to the shire councils of Tamborine and Beaudesert and then Premier Hon. D.F. Denham. He emphasised the economic and national importance of leaving scrub in rough country and articulated the responsibility of his generation in handing down to the next the ‘great heritage’ that had been handed to them.

 

‘I implore you in the name of, and for the sake of generations yet unborn, to vote for the immediate and total reservation of that area.’

 

The Beaudesert and Tamborine councils responded favourably to the idea, with the Tamborine Council supportive of the whole area being national park while the Beaudesert Council was agreeable to setting aside around 400ha for national park.

 

When World War I (WW1) broke out in August 1914, focus shifted away from the national park proposition. Undeterred, Lahey continued the campaign and in April 1915 he wrote to the Lands Minister, Hon. James Tolmie about his exploration of the McPherson Range. By May he had used lantern lectures (slide shows) and canvassed residents around the area of the proposed park for signatures on a petition in favour of the national park. He then wrote to the Minister of Lands Department advising that 521 residents of the district, a clear majority, had signed a petition in favour. He included an 11 page letter setting out 10 reasons for reserving the proposed national park; including the health benefits, the economic benefits, and the benefit to flora and fauna species preservation.

 

‘The reserve should be set apart for ever for the use and benefit of our people as a whole and not sacrificed to the short-sighted greed of a few.’

 

Following the state election and the new TJ Ryan Labor Government in May 1915, Lahey appealed to the newly appointed Minister for Lands, Hon. John Hunter, with a letter, photographs and signed petition. On 30 July 1915, the park was proclaimed and gazetted as Lamington National Park in honour of Lord Lamington.

 

After the area was proclaimed and gazetted as Lamington National Park, Lahey continued to fight for the national park ideal. In October 1915, he delivered a lecture to the Royal Geographical Society of Australasia Queensland Branch titled ‘Some reasons why national parks should be established in Queensland, with special reference to Lamington National Park’, and called for other large areas to be reserved as national parks as well as an extension of the state forest system. While enlisted in WW1 with the 11th Field Company Engineers AIF, Lahey continued to steer discussion about the park’s management, protection of all species, its access and the naming of locations (he suggested Aboriginal words be used as placenames).

 

‘There is only one way to “improve” a national park and this is to leave it absolutely alone.’

 

Hon. J. Hunter responded:

 

‘I could wish that you were here to help with your advice and other ways on this great matter which although to-day is not of much consequence will to come generations be of the greatest moment because the preservation and value of these creations cannot be overestimated. …One thing I am quite determined upon and that is the preservation of the park—an heirloom to the State as nature left it.’

 

By September 1919, Lahey had returned to Australia and was available to act as guide for Mr J. Hunter (now Queensland Agent General elect.) on his first visit to Lamington.

 

Rangers of Lamington:

 

When Lamington National Park was first gazetted in 1915, the park was barely surveyed, and there was no protection against illegal logging and poaching. In July 1918, Lamington National Park was declared a ‘reserve for the protection and preservation of native birds and native animals’. In December that year, the Queensland Naturalists explored, collected and recorded the flora and fauna found in the remote wilderness areas of Lamington National Park. New plant species were collected and the name ‘Green Mountains’ was coined as a result of their visit.

 

The park remained largely unpatrolled apart from scientists and government surveyors, until early 1919, when the O’Reilly brothers and cousins, along with Mr George Rankin were appointed unpaid honorary rangers under The Native Animals Protection Act 1906. Later that year, Mick O’Reilly was made the first paid park ranger, for £4 a week, an above average wage for the time (the average wage then was about £3 18s 7d a week (3 pounds and 18 shillings 7 pennies)). Mick O’Reilly had recently returned from the WWI Middle East campaign and was charged with protecting the park boundaries against illegal logging and poaching and eventually commencing the access tracks to scenic locations.

 

In 1937, the Forestry Sub-Department employed Lamington’s first forest ranger, Jack Gresty, and Gus Kouskos was appointed first track sub-foreman. An official full-time national park ranger for South Queensland, George Gentry, had also been appointed. Despite the Great Depression (1929–1939), government funding was approved for construction of tracks and other facilities beginning in July 1937. With the use of relief workers, groups of up to 50 men were employed to build a large portion of the track system, much of which is still open today. It is during this time that the Main Border Track was constructed. Built in two sections; one track crew from O’Reilly’s cut their way towards a second track crew working from Binna Burra, the 21.4km Border Track cost £1080 (approx. $90,300 today) and took 17 months to construct.

 

Construction crews lived in tent-like accommodation and spent their days clearing trees, shifting large rocks and excavating and benching slopes by hand along the surveyed route.

 

Many of the techniques, such as rock wall pitching and the construction of stone inverts, are still used in track building and maintenance today.

 

Today, Lamington is the second-largest national park on the Scenic Rim, and is internationally renowned for its ecological importance and inherent beauty.

 

In 1994, Lamington was World Heritage-listed and is now part of the Gondwana Rainforests of Australia World Heritage Area that was previously known as the Central Eastern Rainforests of Australia World Heritage Area.

 

QPWS rangers continue the role of protecting and presenting this World Heritage-listed park while managing increased visitation and the demand on facilities and park infrastructure.

 

Source: Queensland Government: Parks & Forests (Department of Environment & Science)

Lavet bad tub for the castle staff , Kasteel de Haar in Utrecht near Vleuten that includes village of Haarzuilen rebuild by architect Pierre Cuyper Project , finished in 1912 took 20 years to finish , Utrecht , the Netherlands , Martin’s photographs , June 5. 2019

  

Portcullis

Drawbridge

Pulley system for portcullis or drawbridge for the castle , Kasteel de Haar

Pulley system for portcullis or a drawbridge for the castle

Pulley system for portcullis or a drawbridge

Spiral stairway

Central Station in Amsterdam , build by architect Pierre Cuyper

de Rijks Museum in Amsterdam build by architect Pierre Cuyper

de Rijks Museum in Amsterdam

Central Station in Amsterdam

Amsterdam

Lavet bad tub

Lavet bad tub and washing machine

main door

Beautiful staircase

Kasteel de Haar near the suburb of Vleuten that includes village of Haarzuilen

architect Pierre Cuyper

Martin’s photograph

Utrecht

the Netherlands

Nederland

June 2019

Favourites

IPhone 6

Village of Haarzuilen

Kasteel de Haar

Castle the Haar

Kasteel de Haar was rebuild by architect Pierre Cuyper Project was finished in around 1912 took 20 years to be finished

city of Utrecht in the province Utrecht

Beautiful staircase in Kasteel de Haar

Door knocker

Beautiful window and seating

I was caught by a lively shower of rain mixed with hail as I pedaled home from work this evening. The hail stung a bit

Tarte@fameshed

 

the little library comes in worn & old variants and includes all books & shelf decor. high chair sold separately.

   

little library: 7li

 

chair: 3li w/ animations

Updated to include new sizes. Made for: Lara+Petite, LaraX+Petite, Legacy+Perky, Ebody Reborn+Waifu, Gen.X Classic, Freya & Kupra.

 

Come try them out here:

maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/fd%20mainstore/128/51/51

The colourful buildings by the harbour at Portree, Isle of Skye.

 

Shame that the radiator on the car sprang a leak and we spent the afternoon at a garage waiting to be recovered back to Kyle of Lochalsh. Tomorrow's planned trip to Inverness will be in a recovery truck. Hopefully to get the car fixed for the start of the drive home on Saturday.

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

· ▸ Heart Socks includes:

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

ㅤㅤ• Customize HUD

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

ㅤㅤ · Fishnet version

ㅤㅤ · Sheer version

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

· ▸ Lali Sneakers includes:

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

ㅤㅤ• Customize HUD

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

· ▸ Laia Animation Set includes:

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

ㅤㅤ• 4 Static Poses & Mirrors

ㅤㅤ• 4 Breathing Stands

ㅤㅤ• 4 Breathing Animations

ㅤㅤ• Posestand

‏‏‎

· ▸ Elise Animation Set includes:

‏‏‎

ㅤㅤ• 4 Static Poses & Mirrors

ㅤㅤ• 4 Breathing Stands

ㅤㅤ• 4 Breathing Animations

ㅤㅤ• Posestand

‏‏‎

· ▸ Copy

· ▸ No Modify

· ▸ No Transfer

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

ㅤㅤｓｈｏｐ ｔｈｉｓ ａｔ ｅｑｕａｌ１０ 苛 尉 ズ ょ ド

ㅤㅤ

▸ Ｊｏｉｎ　ｕｓ　ｏｎ　Ｆａｃｅｂｏｏｋ

ㅤㅤ

▸ Ｊｏｉｎ　ｕｓ　ｏｎ　Ｉｎｓｔａｇｒａｍ

ㅤㅤ

▸ Main Sim

ㅤㅤ

▸ Cam sim 1

ㅤㅤ

▸ Cam sim 2

Tiffany Designs PROMO:: Monroe Dress Outfit

★★★ MESH CASUAL ★★★

 

════════════════════════════════════════════════════

➣ Includes:

 

• Mesh Top

• Mesh Skirt

• Mesh Belt

• Mesh Shoes

 

• Texture HUD Driven

 

════════════════════════════════════════════════════

➣ Compatible with:

 

➠ LARA X, Petite

➠ MAITREYA, Petite

➠ LEGACY, Perky

➠ BOMBSHELL

➠ REBORN, Waifus

➠ KUPRA

➠ ERIKA

 

════════════════════════════════════════════════════

★ Before buying, please try the free demo.

 

★ Thank you for shopping at ::TIFFANY DESIGNS:: !

 

☎ In world assistance if you need additional help - please contact LucyHope.

 

Tiffany Designs

 

LM: maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Hilton%20Villas/232/207/22

 

MP: marketplace.secondlife.com/stores/139726?

 

LaraX

 

WINGS DG EF1203

 

STUN Shiva (pose used)

 

*AvaWay* Felicity necklace, earrings

 

Lel EvoX Avalon

 

SWG Victoria skin rose kiss

 

lilp coffee

  

Includes teams from Brookings, SF Lincoln, SF Roosevelt, RC Central. Permission granted for journalism outlets and educational purposes. Not for commercial use. Must be credited. Photo courtesy of South Dakota Public Broadcasting.

©2021 SDPB

 

INCLUDES:

 

-Standard Communist

-Unusually Tall Communist

 

FEATURES:

 

-Stabilisers

-Artillery Mechanism

Late evening reflection on Shoreham High Street. A group of road high-viz wearing contractors were just leaving the Domino's Pizza place.

✔ Full version includes 42 Colors Hud

▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬

✔ Sizes: LoveBody & LoveMomma

▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬

 

All items InWorld have 50L$ discount for group

 

▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬

✔ The item you are purchasing is meant for MESH BODIES.

✔ This item requires a viewer that supports MESH.

✔ Auto redelivery is enabled.

✔ No refunds except on DOUBLE PURCHASES.

✔ Always, ALWAYS purchase a demo first before committing to buy.

▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬

Enjoy your purchase !

You are welcome anytime to contact me for any support needed.

You are welcome to visit any time:)

includes 24colors.

in store.

maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/SAIKIN/128/127/82

it is for 6DOO bent mesh head applier.

(I don't have a plan to make applier for ohter store's head.i will make mesh hairbase.please use it)

  

*6DOO* bento mesh head HUCI-01@SaNaRae

Jan.26th~

maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Junin/209/123/3971

Includes teams from O'Gorman, Yankton, Pierre T.F. Riggs, Huron. Permission granted for journalism outlets and educational purposes. Not for commercial use. Must be credited. Photo courtesy of South Dakota Public Broadcasting.

©2021 SDPB

 

Treasure Island Hotel and Casino (also known as Treasure Island Las Vegas and "TI") is a pirate-themed hotel and casino located on the Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada, USA. It includes 2,885 rooms and a 47,927 sq ft (4,452.6 m2) casino. The resort is owned and operated by businessman Phil Ruffin.

 

Treasure Island was developed by casino owner Steve Wynn through his company, Mirage Resorts. Project designers included Joel Bergman and Jon Jerde. Wynn announced Treasure Island in October 1991, and construction began four months later. The resort opened on October 26, 1993. Treasure Island was among several family-oriented resorts to open in Las Vegas during the 1990s, taking advantage of the growing tourist demographic. Treasure Island's facade was built with a lagoon containing two pirate ships. Free pirate battles were performed daily for spectators over the next two decades. The resort has also hosted Mystère since 1993, making it the longest-running show by Cirque du Soleil.

 

In 2000, MGM Grand Inc. acquired Mirage Resorts and was renamed MGM Mirage. Treasure Island's pirate theme was scaled back during a 2003 project aimed at attracting a more mature audience, in contrast to the family trend of the 1990s. MGM's revamp included new signage abbreviating the resort's name as "TI", while the original pirate show, Battle of Buccaneer Bay, was replaced by Sirens of TI.

 

MGM struggled financially during the Great Recession. In 2009, it sold Treasure Island to Ruffin for $755 million. Ruffin targeted a middle-class clientele, making various changes to appeal to the demographic. He added two signature restaurants: Gilley's Saloon in 2010, and Señor Frog's in 2012. The pirate shows ended the following year, although the ships remain on display.

 

History

 

In 1986, casino owner Steve Wynn purchased property on the Las Vegas Strip extending north to Spring Mountain Road. He opened a resort, The Mirage, on the southern portion of the land in 1989. Wynn had always wanted to build a second casino on the remaining acreage, which was being used as a parking lot for the Mirage.

 

Wynn's company, Mirage Resorts, announced the Treasure Island project on October 30, 1991. Like other new resorts in Las Vegas, Treasure Island was planned as a family-oriented property, taking advantage of the growing tourist demographic. It would also cater to a middle-class clientele, unlike the Mirage. Groundbreaking took place on March 2, 1992, earlier than anticipated. Construction was originally expected to cost $300 million, but the final cost rose to $430 million.

 

Employees and their families stayed at Treasure Island a couple days before the opening to put the resort through a trial run. Treasure Island opened to the public at 10:00 p.m. on October 26, 1993, following a private opening for VIPs, including Nevada governor Bob Miller. The resort's facade featured a free pirate show taking place in a man-made lagoon. Wynn's other Strip resort, the shuttered Dunes, was imploded the following night in a grand ceremony which incorporated the pirate show. One of the ships fired its cannon as the implosion began, simulating the resort's destruction by cannonballs.

 

In 1996, Treasure Island hosted a naturalization ceremony for 93 workers. It was the first Las Vegas resort to hold such an event.[

 

A man robbed the casino twice in 2000, stealing more than $30,000. He was arrested after a failed third attempt, during which he shot a security guard. He was sentenced to 130 years in prison.

 

The Prairie Island Indian Community, owners of a Treasure Island casino resort in Minnesota, filed a $250 million damages lawsuit against Mirage Resorts in May 2000. The suit alleged that Wynn violated trademark law by using the "Treasure Island" name for his own casino resort. The suit also requested that Wynn be barred from using the name, which Wynn said he registered in 1993.

 

Wynn departed Mirage Resorts in 2000, when it was acquired by MGM Grand Inc., later renamed MGM Mirage.

 

Treasure Island's family amenities included the pirate show and an arcade. However, the pirate theme and family appeal would be gradually scaled back in subsequent years. In April 2003, Treasure Island announced a major revamp to transform the resort into a more sophisticated property aimed primarily at adults, although children would still be welcomed. Describing the resort's transformation, Treasure Island president Scott Sibella said, "We've seen a return of Las Vegas to its roots as an adult destination. As the city has evolved, so too has Treasure Island." He said, "We've evolved from a yo-ho-ho feel to a more sophisticated feel. We want to change the exterior to introduce the outside to what we've already done inside." As part of the revamp, Treasure Island began using the abbreviated name "TI". Sibella described the new name as trendy and sexy, and said it was a name that residents and guests already used. He compared the abbreviated name to the former Desert Inn resort, also known as "D.I." MGM Mirage began a marketing campaign for TI in June 2003, including advertisements in various publications.

 

MGM struggled financially during the Great Recession, and businessman Phil Ruffin made an offer to buy Treasure Island. MGM accepted and announced the deal at the end of 2008. The purchase was finalized on March 20, 2009, at a cost of $755 million. At the time, Treasure Island was the only hotel-casino on the Strip to be owned by a single individual, as others are corporate-owned. Because of the sale, Treasure Island was removed from MGM's extensive customer database. Later that year, the resort joined K Hotels, a worldwide collection of approximately 50 hotels. Amid the recession, Ruffin spent $20 million on various changes to target a middle-class clientele. The hotel rooms were left untouched, as MGM had conducted a $92 million renovation of them shortly before selling the resort to Ruffin.

 

A rooftop swamp cooler caught fire in July 2012, sending smoke through hallways of the upper hotel floors, which were evacuated. The fire caused $20,000 in damage, but resulted in only minor injuries for guests.

 

Ruffin is a business partner of Donald Trump's and a supporter of his presidential campaign. Trump has held several campaign rallies at Treasure Island, including one in 2016 during which an audience member attempted to assassinate him.

 

In 2019, Treasure Island's hotel joined Radisson Hotel Group. Under the agreement, the resort kept its name and exterior signage. Room renovations began that year. State casinos were temporarily closed in 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Nevada, and the closure allowed planned renovations across the resort to accelerate. Among the additions was an expanded sportsbook.

 

Features

 

Treasure Island includes a 47,927 sq ft (4,452.6 m2) casino, and has 2,885 rooms, located in a 36-story tower. As part of the 2003 transformation, the tower was given a darker paint color, using 6,200 gallons of terra cotta/"Salmon Stream" paint, replacing an earlier pink coloring. Treasure Island received a Four Diamond Award every year from 1999 to 2013.

 

Tangerine, a nightclub featuring an orange and white interior, operated from 2004 to 2007. Fashion designer Christian Audigier opened an eponymous nightclub at Treasure Island in 2008, in partnership with Pure Management Group. The decor included rhinestone-encrusted skulls and two large tanks containing jellyfish. Audigier said, "When you're going into a club, you want to see sparkling and glitter and rhinestones". Christian Audigier did not perform as well as Ruffin would have liked, prompting its closure in 2010. Ruffin's other changes included a $3 million makeover of the spa, with renovations overseen by his wife Oleksandra Nikolayenko. At one point, Treasure Island had 18,000 sq ft (1,700 m2) of convention space, which received a $4 million renovation in 2012. Four years later, the space was expanded to 30,500 sq ft (2,830 m2).

 

In 2013, the resort announced plans to build a three-story mall, replacing the northern portion of the pirate lagoon area. It was completed two years later, and includes a CVS Pharmacy on the first floor. At the end of 2015, the resort announced that it would lease the upper floors to Victory Hill Exhibitions. In 2016, the company opened the Avengers S.T.A.T.I.O.N., an interactive self-guided exhibit based on the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

 

The Mirage-Treasure Island Tram travels between the two resorts.

 

Theme and design

 

Various themes were considered for the resort, until a friend of Wynn's suggested the name "Treasure Island", resulting in a pirate theme. It is named after the 1880s novel Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson. The resort was designed by Joel Bergman, who previously designed the Mirage. Bergman designed the Treasure Island tower with a floorplan that branched out three ways in a Y-shape, with elevators in the center. This was done for convenience to guests, making the walk to their rooms brief. The Y-shape was modeled after the Mirage hotel tower.

 

Wynn's Atlandia Design worked with Jon Jerde and Olio Design to create the pirate village and lagoon area, originally known as Buccaneer Bay, and later as Siren's Cove. During the design phase, the hotel's lobby entrance was moved to the resort's south side, in order to maintain Buccaneer Bay's location on the east side along the Strip. Jerde's assistants traveled across Europe, India and Nepal searching for historic objects such as doors and columns, which were then replicated for Buccaneer Bay. The lagoon is 65 feet deep, and originally contained 2 million gallons of water. It uses wastewater recycled from a water treatment plant located beneath the resort's parking garage. A maintenance team, including divers, works to keep the lagoon clean.

 

According to interior designer Roger Thomas, "We thought it would be great fun to create a pirate village with sinking ships and pyrotechnics. The day after it opened we all looked at each other and said, 'What have we done? This is so not us'". Executives realized that the resort's heavy pirate theme did not appeal to people interested in a weekend getaway. By 1998, efforts had begun to downplay the theme. Mirage conducted focus group testing to determine upcoming renovation plans for Treasure Island. A $60 million remodeling of the hotel rooms took place in 1999.

 

The resort initially included a roadside sign featuring an 8,000-pound pirate skull, made of fiberglass and measuring 27 1/2 feet. The skull sign was removed on July 10, 2003, in a ceremony accompanied by fireworks. Sibella said, "It's a cool sign, but it needs to complement what we're doing inside", referring to the property's revamp. The skull portion was donated to the city's Neon Museum, while much of the remaining sign was scrapped. The sign was replaced by an LED neon "TI" sign with a modern and sophisticated design. The new sign measures 137 feet high and 84 feet wide.

 

Various pirate memorabilia had been removed from the resort over the course of three years, and was auctioned in September 2003.

 

Restaurants

 

Treasure Island opened with several restaurants, including Buccaneer Bay Club, which overlooked the lagoon and its pirate shows. Its menu included steak and seafood. A fine-dining Italian restaurant, Francesco's, was added in 1998. It featured artwork by celebrities such as Tony Bennett and Phyllis Diller.

 

The arcade was replaced in 2001 by a tropical-themed restaurant and bar named Kahunaville, part of efforts to appeal to a more-adult demographic. Kahunaville included a dinner show space for live entertainment. A new buffet, Dishes, was added in 2005. An Asian restaurant known as Social House opened a year later, replacing Buccaneer Bay Club.

 

Ruffin made numerous restaurant changes upon taking ownership. In 2009, he replaced Francesco's with a pizzeria by the same name, stating, "It's quick and it's cheap and that's what people are looking for these days". Ruffin also replaced Social House with his own Asian restaurant, Khotan, featuring jade and ivory antiques from his personal collection. In 2010, he opened Gilley's Saloon, a popular Western-themed restaurant, bar and dance hall. It previously operated at Ruffin's New Frontier hotel-casino, which closed in 2007. The new location replaced Treasure Island's Mist Lounge.

 

In 2012, Ruffin opened a Señor Frog's restaurant and bar to complement Kahunaville and Gilley's. It replaced Christian Audigier and Khotan, the latter relocating elsewhere in the resort. Another new restaurant, Seafood Shack, also opened in 2012. Its interior was created with recycled materials, including reclaimed wood which lines the walls. The restaurant's centerpiece is an anchor pulled from the Atlantic Ocean. The resort also has Phil's Steak House, named after Ruffin. Kahunaville closed in 2016.

 

Live entertainment

 

Treasure Island opened with the free Battle of Buccaneer Bay pirate show, performed in the lagoon along the Strip. The 15-minute show was performed several times a day and featured 22 actors. It depicted the landing and subsequent sacking of a Caribbean village by pirates, serving to attract customers from the Strip and into the resort after each show in the same fashion as the volcano fronting the Mirage resort. Notable special effects included a full-scale, crewed British Royal Navy sailing ship that sailed nearly the full width of the property, a gas-fired "powder magazine" explosion, pyrotechnics, and the sinking of the sailing ship Brittania along with its captain.

 

Battle of Buccaneer Bay held its final performance on July 6, 2003, with a total of 16,334 shows performed over the course of nearly 10 years. It ended as part of the resort's ongoing revamp, which would include a new pirate show. Sibella described the original show as something that would be expected at Disneyland, while calling its successor a "sexy and beautiful, adult Broadway-caliber show."

 

The new Sirens of TI pirate show debuted in October 2003, marking the resort's 10th anniversary. The Buccaneer Bay was renamed Sirens' Cove and the new show utilized many of the technical elements of its predecessor. The live, free show was intended to appeal more to adults by including singing, dancing, audio-visual effects, bare-chested pirates and attractive women in the large outdoor show produced by Kenny Ortega. The original two ships were kept for the new show but repainted and altered, as well as some special effects.

 

Sirens of TI was closed on October 21, 2013. The closure was initially intended to be temporary, but was made permanent the following month, to the dismay of the show's actors. The reason cited by Treasure Island was the construction of the new retail space nearby. The shows had cost $5 million to put on annually. While Ruffin said the shows brought "a tremendous amount of attention" to Treasure Island, they amounted to minimal foot traffic inside the resort. The pirate ships remain on display in the lagoon, and are lit up at night.

 

Treasure Island is home to Cirque du Soleil's Mystère, which introduced the entertainment style of Franco Dragone. It opened on December 25, 1993, and has been voted nine times as the best production show in the city by the Las Vegas Review-Journal reader's poll. It is Cirque's longest-running Las Vegas show, reaching 13,000 performances in 2022. Mystère has been updated several times throughout its run. It takes place in a 1,600-seat theater, designed by Scéno Plus. To maximize use of the Mystère theater, Ruffin signed entertainers to perform there on nights when the show is not running. Such entertainers have included Bill Cosby, LeAnn Rimes, and Sinbad. The resort has also hosted boxing matches.

 

In popular culture

 

An hour-long promotional program, Treasure Island: The Adventure Begins, aired on NBC in January 1994. It stars Corey Carrier as a 12-year-old on vacation with his parents at the resort. There, he meets and teams up with Long John Silver (Anthony Zerbe) to find lost treasure. Mirage Resorts paid NBC $1.7 million to air the program. It was directed and produced by Scott Garen, and written by James V. Hart. The special includes an appearance by Wynn, and incorporates the Dunes' implosion as its climax. The program received low viewership ratings, and was considered an infomercial by critics, who lambasted NBC for not labeling it as such.

 

Treasure Island has been shown or referenced in other media as well:

 

In the 2004 movie Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, while Steve the Pirate is walking down Fremont Street, someone drives by yelling "Go back to Treasure Island". An alternative ending to the movie was that the Average Joes lost the dodgeball tournament, but got their money back when Steve won it at Treasure Island.

Treasure Island appears in the 2004 video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas under the name "Pirates in Men's Pants", a pun referencing Pirates of Penzance.

The resort was a major production location for the 2005 film Miss Congeniality 2, which included filming of the Sirens of TI show.

In the 2007 film Knocked Up, Ben (Seth Rogen) and Pete (Paul Rudd) see Mystère at Treasure Island during their visit to Las Vegas.

 

(Wikipedia)

 

The Venetian Las Vegas is a luxury hotel and casino resort located on the Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada, United States. It is owned by Vici Properties and operated by Apollo Global Management. It was developed by businessman Sheldon Adelson through his company, Las Vegas Sands. The Venetian was built on the former site of the Sands Hotel and Casino, which was closed and demolished in 1996.

 

Construction on the Venetian began in April 1997, and the resort opened on May 4, 1999. Some amenities had yet to be finished, with construction continuing until the end of the year. Subcontractors later filed mechanic's liens against the resort for unpaid work, leading to lengthy litigation. The Venetian also feuded with the Culinary Workers Union regarding Adelson's decision to open the property as a non-union resort.

 

The Venetian was designed by Stubbins Associates and Wimberly Allison Tong & Goo. The resort is themed after Venice and has replicas of numerous landmarks from the city, including a canal with gondola rides. The Venetian includes a 120,000 sq ft (11,000 m2) casino and opened with 3,036 suites in a 35-story tower. A 12-story tower, the Venezia, was completed in 2003, bringing the room count to 4,049. The Palazzo, a sister property with its own hotel and casino, opened north of the Venetian in 2007.

 

The Venetian was built to accommodate convention-goers in particular, as Adelson felt that this demographic was underserved in Las Vegas. The resort includes its own meeting space, as well as the adjoining Venetian Expo. The property also includes the Grand Canal Shoppes, and was home to the Guggenheim Hermitage Museum from 2001 to 2008. The Venetian has several performance venues, which have hosted entertainment such as the Blue Man Group (2005–2012), Phantom: The Las Vegas Spectacular (2006–2012), and Human Nature (2013–2020). A sphere-shaped venue and arena, known as Sphere at The Venetian Resort, is scheduled to open in September 2023.

 

By the end of 2020, Las Vegas Sands sought to focus on its Macau properties, which include The Venetian Macao. In February 2022, Apollo Global Management acquired the operations of the Venetian, Palazzo, and Venetian Expo for $2.25 billion, while Vici Properties purchased the land beneath the facilities for $4 billion.

 

History

 

Background and construction

 

The Venetian was built on land previously occupied by the Sands Hotel and Casino, which opened in 1952. Las Vegas Sands, a company founded by businessman Sheldon Adelson, purchased the Sands resort in 1989. Adelson eventually devised plans to replace the aging resort, which he felt was no longer competitive with newer properties. The Sands closed in June 1996, and was demolished five months later to make way for the Venetian.

 

Construction began on April 14, 1997, with a low-key groundbreaking ceremony. Lehrer McGovern Bovis served as the general contractor. Work began without the issuance of final permits, a strategy used by several previous resorts on the Strip. The Venetian's foundation was poured two months after groundbreaking, followed by the construction of three stories. Further work could not begin until the approval of a traffic study. An extranet was used during construction to keep the project on schedule. It contained 4,500 items, including photos, illustrations, legal documents, and budgets. Project team members, based in various locations, could access the items via the extranet, increasing efficiency.

 

A key demographic would be convention-goers, whom Adelson considered underserved in Las Vegas. At the end of 1997, the project acquired $523 million in funding through the sale of bonds. The final cost was $1.5 billion. Financial analysts were skeptical about whether the resort would be finished, while gambling executives questioned Adelson's decision to focus on business travelers and conventions. Up to that time, gambling had been the most significant revenue generator in Las Vegas. The Venetian was expected to employ more than 4,000 people, and it saw more than 100,000 applications.

 

Safety at the construction site was questioned after several incidents, including a worker death in January 1998, which occurred as the result of a fall. At the end of the year, another worker was crushed and killed by an 8,000-pound facade, which fell 32 stories while being lifted by a crane. In February 1999, a trio of workers had to be rescued from the hotel tower's exterior after a cable for their scaffolding became tangled by high winds, stranding the workers 22 stories above ground. In March 1999, a natural gas leak occurred on-site after workers accidentally struck a line, closing one block of the Strip for two hours. The following day, an electrician died after falling more than 30 feet through an open hole, marking the third death since the start of construction. Bovis had previously been fined $9,300 for safety violations which included a lack of fall protection near holes.

 

Opening

 

The opening was initially scheduled for April 21, 1999. Adelson had wanted it to open a week earlier to accommodate convention-goers who were booked at the hotel. However, both opening dates were delayed due to ongoing construction work, as well as building inspections by the county. As a result, 900 convention guests had to be transferred to other hotels.

 

A soft opening was eventually scheduled for May 3, 1999. A private opening ceremony was held that morning and attended by thousands of VIP guests, including actress Sophia Loren and more than 500 journalists from around the world. County inspections delayed the public opening until 12:45 a.m. the following day. It was one of three new resorts to open on the Strip in 1999, along with Mandalay Bay and Paris Las Vegas.

 

Because construction was still ongoing, the resort opened without all of its amenities, including a retail mall and some restaurants. Much of the hotel tower was also unavailable initially, due to the inspection work. Because of this, many guests were sent to other resorts. Hotel inspections continued for several days after the opening, with only the first six floors and 320 rooms approved to operate. Construction continued after the opening, and concluded in December 1999. The resort did not receive a permanent certificate of occupancy until June 2001.

 

Construction litigation

 

Shortly after the opening, numerous subcontractors alleged that they were owed money for work performed on the Venetian. More than $230 million in mechanic's liens were filed, including $145 million from Lehrer McGovern Bovis, which also filed a fraud lawsuit against the resort. The Venetian stated that it was not responsible for covering subcontractor costs, according to its contract with Bovis. The resort also said that, despite Adelson's request, Bovis had failed to acquire mechanics-lien waivers when hiring subcontractors. According to Bovis, the Venetian had made more than 400 design changes during the final eight months of construction, while denying requests for construction extensions.

 

In July 1999, the resort filed a $50 million federal lawsuit against Bovis over the liens, as well as breach of contract. The resort claimed that its reputation had been damaged by the scattered opening of its amenities. Bovis filed its $145 million lien the following month. Both sides subsequently agreed to try resolving the dispute out of court. However, this did not pan out. A civil jury trial eventually began in August 2002, lasting 10 months. It was the longest-running civil jury trial and the largest construction lien case in Nevada history. The trial concluded in June 2003, when jurors found both the Venetian and Bovis in breach of contract. For incomplete and defective construction work, Bovis had to pay $2.3 million in damages to the resort, which was also ordered to pay $44.2 million to Bovis. Las Vegas Sands appealed the decision, and eventually reached an agreement with Bovis in 2005.

 

Subsequent years

 

By 2002, Condé Nast Traveler had named the Venetian as one of North America's top 20 hotels. It had also received Four Diamond and Four Star ratings from American Automobile Association and Mobil Travel Guide respectively. As of 2004, the Venetian was among the most profitable resorts in Las Vegas, second to the Bellagio. A Chinese counterpart, the The Venetian Macao, opened in Macau in 2007. That year, the Las Vegas location also added a sister property, The Palazzo. In 2020, readers of USA Today ranked the Venetian and Palazzo among the 10 best casinos in Las Vegas.

 

In 2004, the Venetian agreed to pay a $1 million penalty to settle a 12-count Gaming Control Board complaint. One of the complaints alleged the resort had held a drawing for a Mercedes-Benz that was rigged to be won by a high roller who had lost a large amount in the casino. The executives involved were fired.

 

On the morning of October 10, 2012, a man entered a closed gaming area and acquired $1.6 million in casino chips from a locked box that he broke open. He left the resort unnoticed, and the theft was not discovered until the following morning. He was arrested later in the month, with authorities recovering $396,000 in chips.

 

In 2013, Las Vegas Sands reached a non-prosecution agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice, following a two-year investigation into money laundering at the Venetian. Zhenli Ye Gon, a businessman and high-stakes gambler suspected of drug trafficking, had made numerous large deposits at the casino in 2006 and 2007. Las Vegas Sands acknowledged that it failed to take the matter seriously, and agreed to pay $47.4 million to the Department of Justice.

 

Like other casinos in Nevada, the Venetian closed indefinitely in March 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and its effects on the state. The following month, the resort announced plans to incorporate emergency medical personnel and automatic camera-based body temperature scans into its eventual reopening, which occurred on June 4, 2020.

 

By the end of 2020, Las Vegas Sands wanted to focus on its operations in Macau, as Asia was expected to recover from the pandemic's impact at a faster rate. The company was in early discussions to sell the Venetian, the Palazzo, and the adjoining Sands Expo. Adelson died in January 2021, and Las Vegas Sands announced two months later that it would sell the three Las Vegas facilities for $6.25 billion. Through the deal, Vici Properties bought the land under the facilities for $4 billion, and Apollo Global Management acquired the operations for $2.25 billion as part of a triple net lease agreement with Vici.The sale was finalized in February 2022.

 

Union history

 

Background

 

Before the start of construction, Adelson indicated that the Venetian would be a non-union resort,[83] unlike the Sands. This prompted criticism from the Culinary Workers Union, which represents the majority of Strip resort workers.[86] The union wanted Adelson to rehire Sands workers without going through the application process. In March 1997, the union urged Clark County Commissioners to reject the Venetian project, citing traffic concerns if it should be built. Later that year, the union held protests in front of a Venetian preview center, which resulted in a restraining order that limited the level of noise allowed during the protests.

 

Resort executives said the property would offer a wages and benefits package matching or exceeding those offered by the union. Adelson outsourced key elements of the resort to third parties, including restaurant and retail operations. He said it would be up to employees to decide on unionization, stating that the Culinary's actions were an "attempt to intimidate employers like me into signing contracts for workers I haven't hired yet, to stop me from trying to give my future employees a chance to choose whether they want union representation, and stop me from attracting like-minded, brand-name restaurateurs who want to give their employees that same freedom to choose". The union sought assurance that the Venetian would take a neutral stance during eventual union elections. Ultimately, the resort never unionized under Las Vegas Sands' ownership.

 

1999 protests and aftermath

 

A traffic study had determined that the public sidewalk in front of the future Venetian had to be removed, allowing for a widening of Las Vegas Boulevard. In an agreement with the county, the resort built a sidewalk on its own property with the condition that it be accessible by the public. More than 1,000 Culinary members picketed on the sidewalk in front of the resort on March 1, 1999, two months prior to its opening. Resort officials accused them of trespassing and warned of arrests, although the district attorney determined the sidewalks to be public property. Georgia congressman John Lewis spoke at the rally and also attempted to meet with Adelson, who turned down the offer because Lewis wanted to include union representatives. Although the protest had a permit to proceed, the Venetian contacted the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department (LVMPD) to intervene, despite the latter stating that it would not do so. The Venetian used loudspeakers to warn union members against protesting in front of the resort, and one Venetian security guard performed a citizen's arrest on a union member.

 

Several days after the protest, the resort filed a federal lawsuit against the union, the county, the district attorney, and the LVMPD. The resort stated that the protest took place on a private walkway separate from the sidewalk, and it sought a court order declaring the former as private property. The union responded: "We've been through this before, and we'll be through it again. We've battled this guy before, and we'll battle him as long as it takes. We're never going away. It's a long way from over". A judge denied the Venetian's request for a restraining order, and thousands of Culinary members protested at the resort's grand opening. However, most tourists were reportedly unaware or uninterested in the union battle, proceeding to visit the property. The Venetian accused the union of trespassing and unlawful picketing, and filed suit to prevent such activity in the future. A district court ruled later in 1999 that the resort's sidewalks constitute a public forum where individuals can exercise their First Amendment rights. The decision was appealed but upheld in 2001.

 

After the district court ruling, the union filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in regard to the sidewalk dispute. The agency eventually determined that the resort violated the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). The Venetian appealed, but eventually lost the case when it went to the U.S. Supreme Court, which declined to hear it in 2008. However, a year later, the NLRB did withdraw its finding that the Venetian violated the NLRA when it contacted police.

 

After Apollo's purchase was announced in 2021, the Culinary union questioned the company's prior management of Caesars Entertainment, which included a workforce cut of more than 20,000 over a 10-year period. Upon taking ownership in 2022, Apollo expressed no opposition to unionization. In 2023, a card check neutrality agreement was reached between Apollo and the Culinary union, as well as other unions. Under the deal, employees would determine whether to unionize while Apollo management refrains from taking a position on the matter.

 

Design

 

The Venetian is themed after Venice during the 1400s and 1500s, and it features numerous landmarks from the city. Initially, Adelson did not plan for the resort to have a theme. His second wife, Miriam, eventually suggested theming the resort after Venice, where they had honeymooned in 1991.

 

Two architectural firms worked on the project: Stubbins Associates, and Wimberly Allison Tong & Goo. Many of the resort's landmarks and statues were created by Treadway Industries. The design project included 250 artists and sculptors. For historical authenticity, the resort hired two Venice historians, while Treadway sent a team there to photograph the city. Venice mayor Massimo Cacciari was critical of the design, calling it a "mega-galactic example of kitsch" and comparing the resort with a "street walker".

 

The exterior entrance along the Las Vegas Strip is replicated after Doge's Palace and includes a recreation of the Rialto Bridge. It also features a 315-foot-high replica of St Mark's Campanile, topped by a statue depicting Gabriel. A revolving restaurant or lounge had been considered for the top of the tower, but it was deemed too small, measuring only 40 square feet. The Grand Canal Shoppes occupy an Indoor plaza, which depicts St. Mark's Square and features a sky-painted ceiling. Another area of the resort features 21 Renaissance-era paintings that were framed and attached to the ceiling.

 

The Venetian includes a replica of Venice's Grand Canal that goes through the resort's interior and exterior. Gondolas travel throughout the canal, and visitors can ride on them for a fee. In 2013, the indoor canals were drained for a month-long renovation, the first since the resort opened. At the time, the gondolas attracted an annual 500,000 riders.

 

Features

 

Casino and hotel

 

The Venetian includes a 120,000 sq ft (11,000 m2) casino. Due to lack of demand, the resort's poker room closed in 2000, with plans to expand the race and sports book. Amid a resurgence in poker popularity, the resort added a new $2.6 million poker room in 2006, featuring 39 tables. At 11,000 sq ft (1,000 m2), it was the third largest poker room on the Strip.[125][126] The resort eventually replaced it with the larger Sands Poker Room, which debuted in 2012. It was the largest on the Strip, measuring 14,000 sq ft (1,300 m2).

 

In 2001, the Venetian announced changes aimed at accommodating high rollers. This would include expansion of the baccarat pit, modifications to 18 suites, and the addition of semi-private gaming and dining areas. In 2005, the Venetian opened the Paiza Club, a high-rise private gaming area catering to Asian high rollers. Las Vegas Sands had opened the Sands Macao in China a year earlier, building up a new customer base in Asia.

 

In 2006, Nevada became the first state to approve mobile gambling, and the Venetian reached a deal with Cantor Gaming to provide such a service at the resort. The mobile gaming devices, developed and operated by Cantor, offered games such as blackjack and video poker. They were usable in public areas of the resort such as restaurants and the pool area. The Venetian introduced the devices in 2008, becoming the first Las Vegas resort to offer them. Cantor took over the Venetian's sports book operations in 2011, and spent $30 million to renovate the facility, which measured 10,000 sq ft (930 m2). A high-limit slot salon opened in 2013, featuring 118 machines and butler service.

 

The Venetian opened with 3,036 suites. The original hotel tower is 35 stories and 480 feet in height. Plans were evaluated in 2000 for a second tower, to be built atop the resort's 10-story parking garage. Construction eventually began in July 2002. The 12-story Venezia tower opened in June 2003 and added 1,013 rooms, for a total of 4,049.

 

The 50-story Palazzo, directly north of the Venetian, includes more than 3,000 rooms. When considered as a single property, the Venetian-Palazzo complex ranked as the world's largest hotel, with approximately 7,100 rooms. The complex has a total of 225,000 sq ft (20,900 m2) in gaming space.

 

In 2010, the Venetian and Palazzo partnered with InterContinental Hotels Group through a 10-year deal. The Venetian rooms were renovated in 2015. Two years later, the Venetian became the first Las Vegas resort to allow hotel bookings through Facebook Messenger.

 

Clubs and lounges

 

A nightclub, C2K, opened in late 1999 and was leased out to a third-party operator. The Venetian closed the club in August 2000, alleging rampant drug use and sexual activities. The closure came a month after a woman died at the club of an ecstasy overdose. It reopened two months later, under new management.

 

In its early years, the Venetian included a club known as the Venus Lounge. In 2005, Vivid Entertainment leased the space and opened it as Vivid, a 7,000 sq ft (650 m2) nightclub. Vivid closed in 2006, and sat vacant until the 2009 opening of Smokin' Hot Aces, a rock and roll bar.

 

Tao, a popular nightclub and restaurant, opened in 2005. It covers 60,000 sq ft (5,600 m2), including 12,000 sq ft (1,100 m2) for the nightclub. A dayclub, known as Tao Beach, opened in 2007.[ The five-acre Tao Beach covers the nightclub's rooftop.

 

In 2012, the Venetian opened The Bourbon Room, a 1980s-themed lounge. It took over the former La Scena lounge and accompanied the resort's new Rock of Ages show, which was performed in a separate venue. The show and lounge closed in early 2016. The Bourbon Room was replaced by the Dorsey, a cocktail bar opened later in 2016. It went on to become one of the most popular bars in Las Vegas. It is scheduled to close in June 2023, to be replaced by Juliet Cocktail Room.

 

Restaurants

 

The Venetian initially featured 15 restaurants, three of which were ready for the resort's soft opening.[ Notable chefs at the resort included Emeril Lagasse, Joachim Splichal, Stephan Pyles, and Wolfgang Puck. In contrast to most Las Vegas resorts, the Venetian opened without a buffet, as Adelson sought an upper-class clientele: "The people who want buffets are not consistent with the luxury and quality that we've put together here".

 

Tao Asian Bistro has consistently ranked as the highest-grossing independent restaurant in the U.S. since its 2005 opening, in part due to alcohol sales in its bar. The restaurant features Asian decor, including a giant Buddha statue. Another restaurant, Royal Star, also served Chinese food until its closure in 2006.

 

Bouchon, a French bistro by chef Thomas Keller, has operated since 2004. It is located in the Venezia tower and was designed by Adam Tihany. Yardbird Southern Table & Bar opened its second location in 2015, at the Venetian. Chef Mario Batali had two restaurants at the Venetian, both of which closed in 2018, after sexual misconduct allegations were made against him. Estiatorio Milos, a Greek seafood restaurant, opened in 2021.

 

Convention space

 

The resort opened with the Venetian Congress Center, offering 500,000 sq ft (46,000 m2) of meeting space, in addition to the adjoining Sands Expo behind the Venetian, which opened in 1990 as part of the earlier Sands resort. A 150,000 sq ft (14,000 m2) expansion of the Congress Center and Sands Expo brought the resort's total meeting space to 1.9-million sq ft (180,000 m2). The expansion cost $45 million and was finished in 2003.

 

The Venetian helped popularize Las Vegas as a convention city, particularly thanks to its Sands Expo. Las Vegas Sands renamed it as the Venetian Expo in 2021, while in the process of selling the facility. The Venetian Congress Center was also renamed The Venetian Convention Center.

 

Museums

 

Two museums, affiliated with the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, opened at the Venetian on October 7, 2001. Both were designed by architect Rem Koolhaas.

 

The Guggenheim Las Vegas operated in a 63,700 sq ft (5,920 m2) building until January 2003, hosting only one exhibit up to that point: Guggenheim's The Art of the Motorcycle. The facility and exhibition cost $37 million to develop, and averaged 666 daily visitors; it needed 3,000 to 4,000 to justify operating expenses. The low attendance was partly attributed to decreased tourism brought on by the September 11 attacks. Several new exhibits had been considered as replacements, but none came to fruition due to lack of funding.[206] The Venetian announced in May 2003 that the Guggenheim Las Vegas space would become a new performance theater for the resort.

The Guggenheim Hermitage Museum operated in partnership with the State Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg. The facility measured 7,660 sq ft (712 m2) and hosted 10 exhibitions before closing in May 2008.

 

Other features

 

Since 1999, the resort has included a Madame Tussaud's wax museum, marking the first U.S. location. The resort also features the Grand Canal Shoppes, an 875,000 sq ft (81,300 m2) shopping mall. In 2000, the Venetian became the first Strip resort to open a child-care center for its employees. The Venetian opened with five pools, and the 2003 Venezia addition included another pool deck and the resort's first wedding chapel. Upon its opening, the resort also included the 63,000 sq ft (5,900 m2) Canyon Ranch SpaClub. The spa was expanded during construction of the Palazzo, bringing it to 134,000 sq ft (12,400 m2). It is among the largest spa and fitness centers in Las Vegas.

 

Entertainment venues

 

Showroom

 

The Venetian's C2K club served as the resort's original performance venue, known as the Showroom during live entertainment. It was managed by H&H; Entertainment, which leased the space from the resort and rented it out to performers. The venue struggled in its early years, and the Venetian had a strained relationship with H&H;, disagreeing with the type of shows being put on.[ Performers – such as impressionist André-Philippe Gagnon, magician Melinda Saxe, and singer Robert Goulet – also had disagreements with H&H;'s management style. In its early years, the Showroom had been host to several shows, though none garnered substantial success until the 2003 openings of Lord of the Dance and V: The Ultimate Variety Show.

 

Opaline Theatre

 

Lord of the Dance and V both closed in 2004, making way for construction of a new theater with 1,760 seats. The Blue Man Group opened in the new space in 2005, and performed there until 2012. The Blue Man Group Theatre subsequently became the Rock of Ages Theatre, hosting the Rock of Ages musical from 2012 to 2016, with more than 1,000 performances during that time. The theater sat vacant for the next year, eventually hosting Steely Dan in 2017, under the new name of Opaline Theatre. A circus-themed show by Base Entertainment, titled Revive, was being developed for the Opaline Theater, but was canceled in 2018, stalling plans to renovate the venue. Base has since used the theater as a rehearsal space for other, off-site shows. The venue remains vacant as of 2022.

 

Venetian Theatre

 

In 2003, the Venetian announced that Guggenheim Las Vegas would be converted into a second performance venue. The new theater has seating for 1,815 people. It debuted with Phantom: The Las Vegas Spectacular, a shortened, 95-minute version of The Phantom of the Opera. The theater cost $42 million to build, and the show's production cost another $35 million. The show opened in 2006, and ran for six years, ending after nearly 2,700 performances. The former Phantom Theatre has since been renamed the Venetian Theatre.

 

At the end of 2012, country singers Tim McGraw and Faith Hill took over the theater space for a 10-weekend series of concerts. In 2013, they signed on for another 10-weekend set of shows. Georgia on My Mind, a Ray Charles tribute show, ran during 2014, with Clint Holmes, Nnenna Freelon, and Take 6 as performers. Although scheduled for a six-week run, it closed two weeks early due to poor ticket sales. In 2015, after nearly five years, The Judds reunited for a series of shows at the Venetian. Singer John Fogerty also had a concert residency in the theater during 2016, in a show incorporating smoke and pyrotechnics.

 

The Summit

 

A third performance venue, the Gordie Brown Theatre, was added in October 2006, taking former ballroom space. The 742-seat venue was custom-built to host singer Gordie Brown, with a design by The Rockwell Group. In 2007, Wayne Brady also signed on to perform in the venue, which was renamed the Venetian Showroom.

 

Brown ended his run in 2008. An interactive game show, The Real Deal, ran in the Venetian Showroom later that year. The show involved certain audience members being selected to compete against professional poker players. It was produced by Merv Adelson, who was later accused by the resort of stopping production and thereby breaching contract. In 2009, actor Chazz Palminteri performed his one-man show, A Bronx Tale, in the showroom.

 

In 2013, pop musical group Human Nature began performing in the space, which was renamed the Sands Showroom. Human Nature ended its show in 2020, amid uncertainty regarding the COVID-19 pandemic.

 

In 2014, the resort debuted an all-female comedy series in the Sands Showroom. Puppets Up! Uncensored, an adult-oriented puppet show, opened in the showroom in July 2016. The short-lived show, created by Brian Henson and directed by Patrick Bristow, closed in September 2016.

 

In 2021, the Sands Showroom was renamed The Summit, and Derek Hough launched a dance show which continued into the following year. Lin-Manuel Miranda and his musical group Freestyle Love Supreme had a residency in the showroom from 2022 to 2023.

 

Sphere at The Venetian Resort

 

A sphere-shaped music and entertainment arena, known as Sphere at The Venetian Resort, is scheduled to open in September 2023. The arena's interior is covered in LED screens which accompany live entertainment. The venue includes seating for 17,500 people.

 

Film and television history

 

Films

 

The Venetian's casino, lobby, and exterior were among the filming locations for the 2001 film Rat Race. The hotel rooms were also portrayed in the film, although these scenes were shot on a sound stage in Canada.

The Venetian hosted the premiere of the 2003 film The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

The Venetian was a prominent filming location for the 2005 film Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous.

 

Television

 

In 2000, the cooking program Emeril Live shot several episodes in the Showroom.

By 2003, the resort had made several appearances on the television series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.

A 2005 episode of Megastructures, titled "Ultimate Casino", focuses on the resort's design and construction.

The U.S. TV series What Not to Wear shot its series finale at The Venetian and Palazzo in 2013, inviting more than 100 past contributors from the show's 10-year run to participate.

The American game show Wheel of Fortune filmed episodes for its 31st season at the Venetian and Palazzo in 2013.

 

(Wikipedia)

 

Das Treasure Island Las Vegas ist ein 4-Sterne-Hotel mit 2885 Zimmern in 36 Stockwerken in Paradise. Das Hotel liegt am Las Vegas Boulevard („Strip“) und ist durch eine Hochbahn mit dem Mirage verbunden. Das Hotel wurde 1993 vom ehemaligen Großunternehmen Mirage Resorts eröffnet. Dieses wurde später von der MGM-Mirage-Gruppe übernommen. Am 15. Dezember 2008 erfolgte der Verkauf an Phil Ruffin, den ehemaligen Besitzer des New Frontier.

 

Das Treasure Island wurde durch gefährlich-romantische Seefahrer-Abenteuer in der Karibik inspiriert. Jeden Abend wurde vor dem Hotel um 17:30, 19:00, 20:30 und 22:00 Uhr die berühmte Wassershow „Sirens of TI“ in Szene gesetzt. Als Hotelgast erhielt man Zugang zum VIP-Bereich, von welchem man die Wassershow hautnah miterleben konnte.

 

Die Show „Sirens of TI“ wurde am 21. Oktober 2013 eingestellt. Die Schließung sollte ursprünglich nur vorübergehend sein, aber im November 2013 fiel die Entscheidung die Show komplett aufzugeben. Der Grund soll der Bau von neuen Einzelhandelsflächen sein.

 

Außerdem findet im Hotel eine permanente Aufführungsserie des Programms Mystère des Cirque du Soleil statt.

 

Im Casino-Bereich befindet sich das Buffet „Dishes“.

 

(Wikipedia)

 

Das Venetian Resort Hotel ist ein Luxushotel am Las Vegas Strip, das der italienischen Stadt Venedig nachempfunden wurde.

 

Ausstattung

 

Wie die meisten Hotels am Strip liegt auch das Venetian auf der Gemarkung von Paradise (Nevada). Zu dem 4.049 Suiten umfassenden Hotel gehören achtzehn Restaurants, zahlreiche Geschäfte und Boutiquen, ein Kasino und ein Madame Tussauds-Wachsfigurenkabinett.

 

In dem Hotel sind venezianische Sehenswürdigkeiten wie die Rialtobrücke, der Markusplatz oder der Campanile wiederzuerkennen. Selbst die venezianischen Kanäle wurden im und vor dem Hotel nachgebaut (allerdings nur knietief), einschließlich Gondeln mit singenden Gondolieri.

 

Der Eigentümer Las Vegas Sands eröffnete am 28. August 2007 mit dem The Venetian Macao ein Hotel mit demselben Thema in Macau.

 

Am 30. Dezember 2007 wurde das Schwesterhotel „The Palazzo“ zwischen dem Venetian und dem Wynn eröffnet. Zusammen haben beide Hotels 7.128 Zimmer, es war somit zwischen 2008 und 2015 der größte Hotelkomplex der Welt. Mittlerweile wurde das Venetian vom First World Hotel in Malaysia (7.351 Zimmer) überholt und steht nun an zweiter Stelle der Hotels mit den meisten Zimmern.

 

Die Irish Dance Show Lord of the Dance hat eine Truppe, die nur hier auftritt.

 

Im Februar 2010 wurde im Venetian ein Pokerturnier veranstaltet, welches für ESPN aufbereitet wurde.

 

In dem Nobelhotel wurde die Actionkomödie Miss Undercover 2 – Fabelhaft und bewaffnet mit Schauspielerin Sandra Bullock von 2005 gedreht.

 

Technische Daten

 

Höhe: 145 m

Etagen (oberirdisch): 40

Fertigstellung: 1999

Architekten: The Stubbins Associates, Inc., TSA of Nevada, LLC

 

Restaurants

 

Aquaknox, ein Fischrestaurant

Bouchon, klassisches französisches Bistro

Canaletto, venezianisches Ambiente mit Grillspezialitäten.

Delmonico Steakhouse, Steakhouse mit Südstaaten-Küche

Lutece, Restaurant im New-York-Stil

Pinot Brasserie

Postrio

Royal Star

Tao

Tsunami Asian Grill, Asia-Fusion-Küche

Valentino

Zeffirino Ristorante, traditionelle italienische Küche

Canyon Ranch Cafe

Grand Lux Cafe

Noodle Asia

Taqueria Canonita

The Grill at Valentino

Tintoretto Bakery

 

(Wikipedia)

From my 7 images entered in to the IGPG Photographic Competition 2020.

 

I won the "Amateur Photographer of the Year" category

High waters at dusk at Pulborough Brooks

Part of the thrill includes potentially maiming yourself in the process of getting great photographs. That’s exactly what I tried not to do on Saturday morning. But, in the spirit of an amazing composition I climbed down some icy rocks, metal, and wooden pilings that make up the revetment at Promontory Point.

 

You may say that potentially hurting yourself is stupid and senseless for a photograph, but graffiti artists climb on everything just to tag their name, and I respect that. How many people are going to see the world from this view? That’s the classic thought that borderlines on insanity and originality. Where does the line need to be drawn? A few months ago Chicago witnessed a young photographer fall from a high place while trying to take a photograph. I respect his idea, but you still have to make sure you are in control of the situation. At work if I’m near the edge of a roof I need to be tied off. Safety first

An early start for a trip up to Bushy Park. The dawn colour was a bit disappointing.

✧ INCLUDES

 

• Style card

• Physics

• Eyebrow shape

• Extra cosmetics:

 

- HD Eyeliner

- Waterline

- Nose Highlight

- Inner Corner Highlight

 

• Windlight

• Small and curvy shapes for legacy, reborn, larax, and belleza

 

✧ IMPORTANT

 

• The avatar design was created using items from various second life stores, which need to be purchased separately to achieve the final look.

 

• Please contact me if you have any questions.

❤︎

Deutschland - Baden-Württemberg - Kaiserstuhl

 

Alt Vogtsburg

 

seen from Eichelspitze Observation Tower. In the background you can see the Vosges.

 

gesehen vom Eichelspitzturm. Im Hintergrund sieht man die Vogesen.

 

The Kaiserstuhl (German: [ˈkaɪzɐʃtuːl], lit. "Emperor’s Chair") is a range of hills in the state of Baden-Württemberg in southwest Germany with a maximum height of 556.6 metres (1,826 ft). It is of volcanic origin and located in the southwest of the state in the counties of Emmendingen and Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald. In terms of natural regions it is considered to be a part of the Upper Rhine Plain.

 

Name

 

The name "Kaiserstuhl" is believed to refer to King Otto III, who held court near Sasbach on 22 December 994. From then on, the whole hill range was called the Königsstuhl – the King’s Chair. In May 996, Otto III was crowned Emperor and the King’s Chair eventually became the Emperor’s Chair – "Kaiserstuhl". Reliable sources mention the name Kaiserstuhl only as early as 1304 and historians thus suppose that the term Kaiserstuhl was not coined until the 13th century.

 

Geography

 

Location

 

The Kaiserstuhl is situated in South Baden, mainly in Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald county or district. However, the smaller northern part belongs to Emmendingen. Within the Upper Rhine Plain it is situated about 16 km northwest of the city of Freiburg, right next to the eastern bank of the Rhine and a short distance west of the Dreisam. It reaches up to 377 metres above the level of the Rhine downstream (179.5 m a.s.l.) from the weir close to Burkheim.

 

At its greatest extent, from the Michaelsberg near Riegel in the northeast, to the Fohrenberg, by Ihringen in the southwest, the Kaiserstuhl is about 15 km long. Its maximum width is about 12.5 km.

 

Hills

 

The hills of the Kaiserstuhl include the following (sorted by height in metres above sea level):

 

Totenkopf (556.6 m), 1.9 km east of Bickensohl; with the Vogtsburg 1 telecommunication tower and Neunlinden observation tower

Eichelspitze (521.3 m), 2.8 km northwest of Bötzingen

Katharinenberg (492.4 m), 1.3 km southeast of Amoltern

Bisamberg (469.0 m), 1.2 km south of Amoltern

Staffelberg (446.0 m), 1.5 km northwest of Schelingen

Badberg (432.7 m) (protected area), 1.5 km east of Oberbergen

Holzeck (431.9 m), 1.7 km northeast of Ihringen; with tower

Hochbuck (374.8 m), 900 m south of Achkarren

Schlossberg (352.1 m), 500 m northwest of Achkarren; with Höhingen Castle ruins

Böselsberg (340.1 m), 500 m northwest of Wasenweiler

Büchsenberg (283.7 m), 1.3 km west of Achkarren

 

Geology

 

The formation of the Kaiserstuhl volcano during the Tertiary was the climax and at the same time the end of volcanic activity in the Upper Rhine Valley Rift. Volcanism started as early as the Cretaceous Period. Volcanic landforms include heavily eroded volcanic vents. The Kaiserstuhl is the only larger volcano from this period in the rift valley. Geologically the Kaiserstuhl can be divided into two parts: the sedimentary and volcanic part. Due to these peculiarities the Kaiserstuhl has been labeled one of the most important national geotopes.

 

Sedimentary base

 

The horizontal sedimentary layers forming the eastern third of the Kaiserstuhl date back to the Jurassic and the Tertiary long before the volcanic activity. Important stratigraphic outcrops include the Hauptrogenstein (local oolite) which is found mainly near the village of Riegel and the Pechelbronner Schichten (local Tertiary layers in the South German Scarplands) near Bötzingen. During the formation of the Upper Rhine Plain this part of the Kaiserstuhl sloped less in respect to its surrounding area – and thus appears as a so-called horst. In terms of its geological structure and the sequence of its escarpments, the Kaiserstuhl is comparable to the nearby Tuniberg, Nimberg and also to the Schönberg, which is situated south of the city of Freiburg.

 

Volcanic activity

 

Petrologically the volcanic Kaiserstuhl is an alkali-carbonate rock formation. The volcanic rocks making up a large part of the central and western Kaiserstuhl were the result of numerous volcanic eruptions during the Miocene, about 19 to 16 million years ago. They cover parts of the sedimentary base of the eastern Kaiserstuhl, which is why in some places changes in the base’s mineralogical composition occurred. The driving force behind this process of contact metamorphism was an increase in temperature. Due to the alternate eruption of tephra and lava flows from several vents a complex stratovolcano came into existence. Some of the rising magma solidified as volcanic intrusions below the surface – and today forms the central part of the Kaiserstuhl. Laterally rising phonolite magma also intruded into the sedimentary base of the Eastern Kaiserstuhl. Several hundred metres of the original volcano have been eroded.

Volcanic rocks

 

The entire volcanic Kaiserstuhl consists of rock types that contain feldspathoid minerals and olivine and are undersaturated with SiO2. Most igneous rocks at the surface are leucite-tephrites, with subordinate phonolites, limburgites, and olivine-nephelinites (at the Limberg Mountain near Sasbach), the last of which is rich in xenoliths from the Earth’s mantle. Carbonatite ignimbrite and lapilli are local peculiarities; they can be found in places in the western part of the Kaiserstuhl (Henkenberg near Burkheim, Kirchberg near Oberrotweil).

 

The subvolcanic and intrusive rocks of the central Kaiserstuhl are plutonic equivalents of the erupted material (essexite, carbonatite and coarse-granular phonolite). Several local terms which do not carry official status with the International Union of Geological Sciences have been used for different varieties of the intrusive rocks. Of major scientific interest is the consolidated carbonatite near Altvogtsburg und Schelingen. It is a quite rare volcanic rock, which crystallized from a carbonate magmatic melt rather than a silicate one. Given its unusual composition for an igneous rock, the magmatic nature of the carbonatite was not proposed for a long time and remained doubtful subsequently. An alternative interpretation was that it was a metamorphically altered sedimentary rock, examples of which can be found nearby. Only in the 1950s and 1960s did research prove that it was a carbonatite; one of the clues was identification of the eruptive carbonatites found in the western part of the Kaiserstuhl. The carbonatite contains the niobium rich pyrochlore; attempts to mine the carbonatite rock for niobium were carried out in the middle of the 20th century, but the amount turned out to be too small to be economical.

 

Minerals

 

For a long time the Kaiserstuhl has been known for rare minerals. Examples include the quarries at the Limberg (zeolites), Badberg (carbonatites), Orberg and Fohberg. Well-crystallized minerals can be found predominantly in clefts or cavities in the volcanic rock.

 

Loess

 

The Kaiserstuhl is today largely covered by a Quaternary loess layer, a loosely cemented sediment. It is derived from other rocks through erosion and is then transported by the wind. The loess at the Kaiserstuhl – as in all the peripheral areas of the Upper Rhine Valley – was formed during the last Ice Age. Large parts were bare of vegetation and so loess was winnowed out from the Rhine sediments. It was then deposited in the periglacial area (i.e. ice-free, but surrounded by glaciers) at the Kaiserstuhl. The major process active here was frost weathering resulting in crushed rocks. The wind blew strongly, as there was no vegetation that could have moderated it – entraining the lightest material and depositing it at obstacles like the Kaiserstuhl. Deposition took place northeast of the Kaiserstuhl, as the winds blew from the southwest.

 

The higher the place of sedimentation, the thinner the layer of the sedimented material is. At the Kaiserstuhl the thickness of the loess layer varies between 10 and 40 metres. There are, however, also areas in the southwest where no loess has been deposited. The Northern Limestone Alps are considered the main source of the Kaiserstuhl loess. A rust-coloured band occurs at irregular intervals. It developed as a new material and did not arrive regularly but in phases of different intensities. In a phase of weak sedimentation the material on top weathered – and the calcium carbonate was washed out. It then precipitated further down and formed a particular type of soil horizon, which contains concretions of calcium carbonate.

 

The Kaiserstuhl loess soils are used for intensive farming, as they offer good aeration, high water storage capacities and good mechanical qualities. Besides, as a result of farming deep narrow ravine-like paths developed.

 

As the loess developed over time it is, furthermore, significant for flood control. Sponge-like, it absorbs and then gently releases rainfall. This quality is however lost when bulldozers, employed to construct large terraces for viticulture, compress the loess.

 

Climate

 

General

 

The Kaiserstuhl is one of the warmest regions in Germany. The winters are relatively mild for the area, and the summers are warm or even hot, with possible average temperatures of over 20 °C (68 °F) in July and August. Because of its loess covered volcanic soils it is a very good wine-producing region. The climatic situation of the Kaiserstuhl is outstanding in the area. It is rain-shadowed by the Vosges Mountains, under the climatic influence of the Belfort Gap and is characterized by a drier and hotter climate, which one would rather expect not to be typical of the area. Despite this, winters remain cold and dry, and summers wet, in comparison with Mediterranean climate (which instead has a rainfall peak during winter, which can see few frost days, and a dry season in summer).

 

Meteorological data

 

The average annual temperature is 9.9 °C (49.8 °F), with 50–60 days with a maximum temperature above 25 °C (77 °F) as well as 60–70 days with a minimum temperature below 0 °C (32 °F). This illustrates a special feature of the Kaiserstuhl: it is characterized by its relatively extreme climate. The average difference between the lowest and the highest average temperatures within one year is 18.5 °C (65.3 °F). The mean precipitation at the Kaiserstuhl is approximately 600–700 millimetres (24–28 in), with about 1,720 hours of sunshine per year.

 

Flora and fauna

 

The climate of the Kaiserstuhl also explains the vast richness of thermophile flora and fauna. The Kaiserstuhl is for example one of the places with the largest variety of orchids in Europe – more than 30 species have been recorded. Among the vines wild grape hyacinths sprawl and along acclivities iris plants blossom. Furthermore, sand lizards (lacerta bilineata) and praying mantis (Mantis religiosa) live here – species which mainly occur in the Mediterranean area. (However, according to the latest research results the sand lizard presumably belongs to the allochthonous species of the European green lizard (Lacerta viridis)). The pubescent oak (Quercus pubescens) is a Xerophyte and normally only occurs in Southern Europe, but is also able to survive at the Kaiserstuhl. This species has a disjunct distribution, which means away from its normal habitat. It is a relict of a postglacial warm period where there had been a much warmer climate around the Kaiserstuhl. After the end of the warm period only the named species were able to survive. Besides there is a larger population of the May beetle (Melolontha melolontha). In spite of protests from conservationists the May Beetle is controlled by the use of insecticides.

 

Changes in landscape

 

The terrain of the Kaiserstuhl has been altered by the people living there since it was settled. The loam there is strongly susceptible to erosion as a result of soil cultivation, thus terraces had to be added, which were then mostly used as vineyards, as well as fruit growing or for other agricultural uses. As a result, the typical small "patio" hillsides and the streaked loess sunken roads typical of the region came into being.

 

To start with, it was for this reason that smaller terraces were merged in around 1950, this resulted in large scale reallocation, which turned parts of the original landscape completely upside down.

 

The phases of this reallocation were:-

 

Small-scale realignment between 1950 and 1960. At the same time the terrain was generally modified by manual labour with the help of in-house machines. During this time approximately 950 hectares were enclosed by the farmland consolidation authority.

Between 1960 and 1970 the loess slopes were more comprehensively modified, whereby large rectangular terraced areas with corresponding high embankments were made. The terraces were arranged with mountain like slopes so that now only the multiple slope edges are visible from the valley. About 650 hectares of the surface were styled in this way.

The plans to create large-scale terraces made between 1970 and 1976 were executed with the help of heavy machinery, changing the landscape radically. Before the original, naturally formed, depressions had still been visible in the gentle hillsides with only small terraces. Natural and man-made structures existed side by side. However, these small-scale structures were then obliterated completely. Monstrous areas resembling fortresses and entirely incongruous to the region were created. The total wine-growing area of the terraces was 630 ha. As the embankments and other areas exceeded the size of the wine-growing areas, the changes affected more than twice the newly created arable area. The land reforms of Oberrotweil-Oberberg, Ihringen-Abtsweingarten, Eichstetten-Hättlinsberg and Endingen am Kaiserstuhl-Schambach are examples of this phase.

The last phase of wine-growing land reforms was realized between 1976 and 1982. Due, in part, to protests against plans for further large scale terraces the changes were not as radical as the previous phase: the maximum height for embankments was "limited" to 10 m and their shapes were "made smooth and adjusted to the landscape" (Mayer 1986, citation translated). This procedure was, for example, applied to about 330 ha of wine-growing area in Oberbergen-Baßgeige or in Bickensohl-Herrenstück.

 

From 1977 on, several longer periods of enhanced precipitation caused damage to the embankments. During one week in May 1983 for example, the amount of precipitation was so large that in some areas it was equivalent to one third of the annual average, causing great damage in the modified areas.

 

The surfaces of the acclivities often slid off together with the vegetation. Former valleys, which had been blocked due to re-allocation, were flushed out. In some terraces dramatic shear failures developed. In addition extensive, devastating frost damage occurred; due to the incline of the mountainside at the surfaces of the acclivities, cold air pockets were formed in which the vines in bloom were frostbitten. Additionally substantial frost damage occurred in the woody part of the vines, especially in the vineyards which were situated in lower regions. In earlier times fruit had mostly been grown here but later this was changed to vineyards.

 

The activity of the farmland consolidation authority was narrowed to repairing and partly to rescheduling which at least was meant to correct the most severe consequences of the transformations from 1982 on.

 

Hiking

 

There are many opportunities for hiking in the Kaiserstuhl. The best known trail is the North-South Trail (check mark: blue rhomb on yellow background) from Endingen across the Katharinenberg and the Totenkopf and the Neunlinden viewing point to Ihringen. From the trail there are panoramic views over the Black Forest, the Upper Rhine Valley and the Vosges.

 

(Wikipedia)

 

Der Kaiserstuhl ist ein bis 556,8 m ü. NHN hohes, kleines Mittelgebirge vulkanischen Ursprungs in der Oberrheinischen Tiefebene. Es erhebt sich im Südwesten von Baden-Württemberg (Deutschland), in den Landkreisen Emmendingen und Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald.

 

Namensdeutung

 

Seinen Namen hat der Kaiserstuhl vermutlich von König Otto III., der bei Sasbach am 22. Dezember 994 einen Gerichtstag abhielt. Nach diesem Gerichtstag wurde das ganze Gebirge als „Königsstuhl“ bezeichnet. Nachdem Otto III. im Mai 996 zum Kaiser gekrönt worden war, wurde aus dem „Königsstuhl“ der „Kaiserstuhl“. Nachweislich belegt ist die Bezeichnung „Kaiserstuhl“ erst seit 1304. Historiker vermuten, dass der Begriff „Kaiserstuhl“ nicht vor dem 13. Jahrhundert entstand.

 

Geographie

 

Lage

 

Naturräumlich wird der Kaiserstuhl zum Oberrheinischen Tiefland gezählt und stellt dort die Haupteinheit 203 dar. Er befindet sich in Südbaden zum Großteil im Landkreis Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald, der kleine Nordteil gehört zum Landkreis Emmendingen. Innerhalb der Oberrheinischen Tiefebene liegt er etwa 16 km nordwestlich der Großstadt Freiburg, direkt östlich des Rheins und etwas westlich der Dreisam. Er erhebt sich maximal 377,1 m über den Rhein unterhalb (179,5 m) des Stauwehrs bei Burkheim.

 

In seiner weitesten Ausdehnung vom Michaelsberg bei Riegel im Nordosten bis zum Fohrenberg bei Ihringen im Südwesten ist der Kaiserstuhl rund 15 km lang, seine größte Breite beträgt etwa 12,5 km.

 

Berge

 

Zu den Bergen, Erhebungen und deren Ausläufern des Kaiserstuhls gehören – sortiert nach Höhe in Meter (m) über Normalhöhennull[1]:

 

Totenkopf (556,8 m), 1,9 km östlich von Bickensohl; mit Fernmeldeturm Vogtsburg-Totenkopf und Aussichtsturm Neunlinden

Eichelspitze (521,3 m), 2,8 km nordwestlich von Bötzingen mit dem Eichelspitzturm

Katharinenberg (491,9 m), 1,3 km südsüdöstlich von Amoltern

Bisamberg (469,6 m), 1,2 km südlich von Amoltern

Staffelberg (447,6 m), 1,5 km nordnordwestlich von Schelingen

Badberg (432,7 m) (Naturschutzgebiet), 1,5 km östlich von Oberbergen

Holzeck (431,9 m), 1,7 km nordnordöstlich von Ihringen; mit Sendeturm

Hochbuck (375,2 m), 900 m südlich von Achkarren

Schlossberg (351,9 m), 500 m nordwestlich von Achkarren; mit Burgruine Höhingen

Böselsberg (340,1 m), 500 m nordwestlich von Wasenweiler

Hochberg, (288,7 m), 900 m nordöstlich von Jechtingen

Büchsenberg (283,7 m), 1,3 km westlich von Achkarren

 

Geologie

 

Die Entstehung des Kaiserstuhlvulkans im Tertiär stellt sowohl den Höhepunkt als auch den Schlusspunkt der vulkanischen Aktivität im Oberrheingraben dar. Diese begann schon in der Kreidezeit und zeigt sich in zahlreichen, heute tief erodierten Vulkanschloten. Der Kaiserstuhl ist der einzige größere Vulkan aus dieser Zeit im Bereich des Oberrheingrabens. Dieser trifft hier auf den Bonndorfer Graben, der über den Hegau zum Bodensee führt. Gegen Ende des Oligozäns drang Magma empor, erstarrte jedoch noch unter der Erdoberfläche. Erst im Miozän kam es zu einem Durchbruch und zu großflächigen Lavaströmen. Geologisch gesehen lässt sich der Kaiserstuhl in einen sedimentären und einen vulkanischen Teil gliedern. Aufgrund dieser Besonderheiten wurde der Kaiserstuhl als eines der bedeutendsten nationalen Geotope Deutschlands ausgezeichnet.

 

Sedimentärer Sockel

 

Die das östliche Drittel bildenden, nahezu horizontal lagernden Sedimentgesteine wurden lange vor der vulkanischen Aktivität zu Zeiten des Juras und Tertiärs gebildet. Wichtige aufgeschlossene stratigraphische Einheiten sind der Hauptrogenstein (hauptsächlich in Riegel) und die Pechelbronner Schichten (in der Gegend von Bötzingen). Dieser Teil des Kaiserstuhls wurde während der Entstehung des Oberrheingrabens weniger stark als seine Umgebung abgesenkt und stellt einen sogenannten Horst dar. Er entspricht im Aufbau und der Schichtenfolge äquivalenten Strukturen im näheren Umkreis, wie dem Tuniberg und Nimberg westlich sowie dem Schönberg südlich von Freiburg im Breisgau.

 

Vulkanismus

 

Petrologisch handelt es sich beim vulkanischen Kaiserstuhl um einen Alkaligesteins-Karbonatit-Komplex. Die den Großteil des zentralen und westlichen Kaiserstuhls aufbauenden vulkanischen Gesteine wurden vor rund 19 bis 16 Millionen Jahren im Miozän durch zahlreiche Vulkanausbrüche gebildet. Sie überlagern teilweise den sedimentären Sockel des östlichen Kaiserstuhls, wodurch dieser stellenweise kontaktmetamorph, das heißt durch Einwirkung hoher Temperatur, verändert wurde. Durch abwechselnde Eruption von Tephra und Lavaströmen aus mehreren Schloten bildete sich ein komplexer Schicht- oder Stratovulkan. Emporquellendes Magma erstarrte teilweise als subvulkanische Intrusion im Vulkangebäude und baut heute den Zentralkaiserstuhl auf. Lateral aufsteigende phonolithische Schmelzen drangen auch in den sedimentären Sockel des östlichen Kaiserstuhls. Bis heute wurden durch Erosion mehrere 100 m des ursprünglichen Vulkans abgetragen.

 

Vulkanische Gesteine

 

Der gesamte vulkanische Kaiserstuhl besteht aus Foid- und/oder Olivin-führenden, SiO2-untersättigten Gesteinen. Bei den Eruptivgesteinen handelt es sich zum größten Teil um Leucit-Tephrit, untergeordnet auch Phonolith, Limburgit und Olivin-Nephelinit (am Limberg bei Sasbach). Letzterer ist sehr reich an Xenolithen aus dem Erdmantel. Als Besonderheit bei den Eruptivgesteinen sind karbonatitische Ignimbrite und Lapilli zu nennen, die im Westkaiserstuhl an einigen Stellen (Henkenberg bei Burkheim, Kirchberg bei Oberrotweil) aufgeschlossen sind.

 

Bei den subvulkanischen Intrusionen und Ganggesteinen des zentralen Kaiserstuhls handelt es sich um die Tiefengesteinsäquivalente der Ausbruchsprodukte (Essexit, Karbonatit und grobkörnigerer Phonolith). Für verschiedene Varietäten der Ganggesteine existieren in der Literatur eine Fülle weiterer Bezeichnungen (Alvikit, Hauynophyr, Mondhaldeit, Tinguait, Monchiquit und viele andere), die aber teilweise keine allgemein anerkannten Gesteinsnamen sind. Von großem wissenschaftlichen Interesse ist der bei Altvogtsburg und Schelingen anstehende Karbonatit. Dabei handelt es sich um ein recht seltenes vulkanisches Gestein, das nicht aus einer silikatischen, sondern aus einer karbonatischen Schmelze auskristallisierte. Aufgrund dieses ungewöhnlichen Umstandes wurde die magmatische Natur des Karbonatits lange Zeit nicht erkannt oder in Zweifel gezogen. Alternative Interpretationen gingen von kontaktmetamorph veränderten Sedimentgesteinen aus, die bekanntermaßen in unmittelbarer Nähe zu finden sind. Erst in den 1950er- und 1960er-Jahren gelang es, das Gestein gesichert als Karbonatit zu identifizieren, unter anderem durch das Auffinden der eruptiven Karbonatite im westlichen Kaiserstuhl. Wegen des in ihm auftretenden Niob-Minerals Koppit wurde der Karbonatit in der Mitte des 20. Jahrhunderts versuchsweise bergmännisch abgebaut. Allerdings erwiesen sich die Gehalte als zu gering für eine Nutzung in größerem Umfang.

 

Minerale

 

Seit langer Zeit ist der Kaiserstuhl als Fundstelle für zum Teil seltene Minerale bekannt. Besondere Fundstellen sind die Steinbrüche im Limburgit des Limbergs (verschiedene Zeolithe), im Karbonatit am Badberg und Orberg (Koppit) und im Phonolith des Fohbergs und des Kirchbergs (Zeolithe, Wollastonit, Melanit). Überwiegend treten diese als Kluftminerale oder Blasenfüllungen (Mandelstein) auf.

 

Lössbedeckung

 

Der Kaiserstuhl ist heute weitgehend von einer quartären Lössschicht bedeckt. Löss ist ein Lockersediment, welches durch Erosion anderer Gesteine entsteht und durch äolischen Transport an seinen Ablagerungsort befördert wird. Der Löss entstand – wie im gesamten Randbereich der Oberrheinebene – während der letzten weitgehend vegetationsfreien Eiszeit durch Auswehung aus dem Rheinschlamm. Die Ablagerung fand im periglazialen (eisfreien, jedoch von Gletschereis umgebenen) Gebiet um den Kaiserstuhl statt. Der Hauptprozess, der in dieser Region stattfindet, ist Frostsprengung von Gestein. Da keine Vegetation vorhanden ist, die den Wind bremsen könnte, weht dieser beständig stark. Er nimmt das leichteste Material mit und lagert es an Hindernissen, beispielsweise dem Kaiserstuhl, wieder ab. Hierbei ist zu beachten, dass die Ablagerung im Lee stattfindet, im Falle des Kaiserstuhls – wo der Wind aus Südwesten wehte – also im Nordosten. Je höher der Sedimentationsort liegt, desto dünner ist die Schicht tatsächlich abgelagerten Materials. Am Kaiserstuhl liegt die Mächtigkeit der Lössschicht zwischen 10 und 40 Metern, es gibt jedoch auch Orte im Südwesten, an denen kein Löss sedimentiert wurde. Der Herkunftsort des Lösses am Kaiserstuhl lag hauptsächlich in den nördlichen Kalkalpen. Auffällig im anstehenden Löss ist ein sich in unregelmäßigen Abständen wiederholender, rostfarbener Streifen. Dieser entsteht durch die phasenweise Anlieferung neuen Materials. Während einer schwachen Sedimentationsphase verwittert das obenauf liegende Material, wobei der Kalk ausgewaschen wird. Hierbei bildet sich Lösslehm. Der ausgewaschene Kalkanteil fällt weiter unten im Bodenprofil wieder aus und bildet den sogenannten Lösskindelhorizont. Zu jedem Ausfällungshorizont gehört deshalb ein Anreicherungshorizont.

 

Die Lössböden des Kaiserstuhls werden agrarisch intensiv genutzt, da sie eine gute Belüftung bieten und eine hohe Wasserspeicherfähigkeit sowie mechanisch gute Eigenschaften besitzen. Außerdem sind im Zuge der landwirtschaftlichen Nutzung die sogenannten Lösshohlwege entstanden.

 

Der gewachsene Löss ist zudem für den Hochwasserschutz von Bedeutung, da er starke Niederschläge wie ein Schwamm aufnimmt und dann gleichmäßig wieder abgibt. Durch die Anlage von Großterrassen für den Weinbau am Kaiserstuhl wird der Löss jedoch mit Planierraupen verdichtet und verliert diese Eigenschaft.

 

Klima

 

Allgemeines

 

Klimatisch zählt der Kaiserstuhl zur temperaten (gemäßigten) Klimazone. Durch die in der Oberrheinebene vorherrschende Wärmebegünstigung gehört er jedoch zu den wärmsten Orten Deutschlands mit für Mitteleuropa vergleichsweise milden Wintern und warmen Sommern, die teilweise sogar Durchschnittstemperaturen von über 20 Grad in den Monaten Juli und August aufweisen können. Durch seine mit Löss bedeckten vulkanischen Böden ist er ein sehr gutes Weinanbaugebiet. Die klimatischen Voraussetzungen des Kaiserstuhls heben sich von seiner Umgebung deutlich ab. Er liegt im Regenschatten der Vogesen, im Einfluss der Burgundischen Pforte, und hat somit ein eher trockenes Klima.

 

Meteorologische Daten

 

Die Jahresmitteltemperatur beträgt 9,9 °C, wobei sowohl 50 bis 60 Sommertage als auch 60 bis 70 Frosttage zu verzeichnen sind. Dies spiegelt schon ein besonderes Merkmal des Kaiserstuhls wider, denn er zeichnet sich durch recht extreme Klimaverhältnisse aus, was sich besonders in der durchschnittlichen jährlichen Temperaturschwankung von 18,5 °C ausdrückt. Der mittlere Niederschlag auf dem Kaiserstuhl beträgt etwa 600 bis 700 mm, bei jährlich rund 1.720 Stunden Sonnenschein.

 

Flora und Fauna

 

Das Klima des Kaiserstuhls erklärt auch die große Fülle an wärmeliebender Flora und Fauna. Beispielsweise ist der Kaiserstuhl einer der Orte mit der größten Orchideenvielfalt in Europa – mehr als 30 Arten wurden registriert. Zwischen den Rebstöcken wuchern wilde Traubenhyazinthen, und an Böschungen blühen Schwertlilien. Außerdem leben hier Bienenfresser, Smaragdeidechsen und Gottesanbeterinnen (Mantis religiosa) – Arten, die ihren Verbreitungsschwerpunkt im mediterranen Bereich haben (nach neuen genetischen Studien handelt es sich bei der Smaragdeidechse allerdings um eine wahrscheinlich allochthone Population der Östlichen Smaragdeidechse). Die Flaumeiche ist ein Xerophyt und kommt sonst vor allem in Südeuropa vor, am Kaiserstuhl kann sie sich jedoch vor allem im Flaumeichenwald am Büchsenberg als Niederwald halten. Diese Arten leben in einem disjunkten Areal, also von ihrem normalen Verbreitungsgebiet abgetrennt. Dies ist ein Relikt einer postglazialen Warmzeit, zu der auch im Gebiet um den Kaiserstuhl ein deutlich wärmeres Klima herrschte. Nach Ende der Warmzeit konnten die genannten Arten nur noch am Kaiserstuhl überleben. Außerdem gibt es am Kaiserstuhl größere Populationen des Maikäfers. Die Art wurde in der Vergangenheit trotz Kritik von Umweltschützern mit Insektiziden bekämpft, so etwa im Jahr 2009. Die Aktion wurde damit begründet, dass der Maikäfer ansonsten existenzbedrohende Schäden in der umliegenden Landwirtschaft auslösen könnte.

 

Landschaftsveränderung

 

Die Oberfläche des Kaiserstuhls wurde vom wirtschaftenden Menschen seit dessen Besiedlung verändert. Da Löss infolge der Bodenbearbeitung stark erosionsanfällig ist, mussten Terrassen geschaffen werden, die meist als Rebflächen, teilweise auch für Obst- oder zum Ackerbau genutzt wurden. Dadurch entstanden schon früh die typischen kleinterrassierten Hänge, die zudem von den ebenfalls durch die „Nutzung“ entstandenen Lösshohlwegen durchzogen wurden.

 

Im Sinne der Flurbereinigung wurde um 1950 damit begonnen, zunächst kleinere Terrassen zusammenzulegen; dies endete in Großumlegungen, welche die ursprüngliche Landschaft in Teilbereichen völlig umgestalteten. Diese Umgestaltung begann zwischen 1950 und 1960 mit kleinräumigen Neuordnungen. Dabei wurde das Gelände meist in Handarbeit bzw. mit Hilfe betriebseigener Maschinen umgestaltet. In dieser Zeit wurden rund 950 ha von den Flurbereinigungsbehörden flurbereinigt.

 

Zwischen 1960 und 1970 wurden die Lösshänge umfassender umgestaltet, wobei große, tiefe und möglichst rechteckige Terrassenflächen mit entsprechend hohen Böschungen entstanden. Die Terrassen wurden mit bergseitiger Neigung angelegt, so dass jetzt vom Tal aus vielfach nur noch die Kanten sichtbar sind. Auf diese Art entstanden rund 650 ha Rebfläche.

 

Mit umfassendem Maschineneinsatz wurden die Großterrassenplanungen der Jahre 1970 bis 1976 umgesetzt, die das Landschaftsbild deutlich veränderten. Vor diesen Maßnahmen zeichneten sich in den sanften Hängen, deren Oberflächen von den kleinen Terrassen überprägt waren, noch die ursprünglich natürlich entstandenen Senken ab. Statt diesem Nebeneinander von natürlichen und vom Menschen geschaffenen Strukturen nehmen die Kritiker nun festungsartige und landschaftsfremde Oberflächen wahr, die eine Gesamtgröße von ca. 630 ha Rebfläche bieten. Da die Böschungen und sonstigen Flächen größer waren als die Rebflächen, erstreckte sich die Landschaftsveränderung jeweils auf mehr als das Doppelte der neu geschaffenen nutzbaren Fläche. Beispiele für diese Phase sind die Flurbereinigungen Oberrotweil-Oberberg, Ihringen-Abtsweingarten, Eichstetten-Hättlinsberg und Endingen am Kaiserstuhl-Schambach. Inzwischen war der Großteil der Lösshohlwege durch die Flurbereinigung verschwunden, die zuvor ökologische Nischen speziell für Wildbienen und Vögel gewesen waren.

 

Die letzte Phase der Rebflurbereinigung erstreckte sich auf die Zeit zwischen 1976 und 1982, in der unter anderem wegen der Proteste gegen die Großterrassenplanungen gemäßigt vorgegangen wurde: Die Böschungshöhen wurden auf maximal 10 m „beschränkt“, der Böschungsverlauf wurde „geschwungen angelegt und der Landschaft angepasst“. Mit diesen Verfahren wurden zum Beispiel in Oberbergen-Baßgeige oder in Bickensohl-Herrenstück rund 330 ha Rebfläche bearbeitet.

 

Nachdem ab 1977 durch länger anhaltende niederschlagsreiche Perioden Böschungsschäden entstanden waren, fielen in der Pfingstwoche des Jahres 1983 Niederschlagsmengen, die teilweise ein Drittel des Jahresmittels ausmachten. Diese führten in den umgelegten Gebieten zu Schäden: Die Böschungsoberflächen rutschten vielfach mitsamt der Vegetation ab, ehemalige, durch die Umlegungen verschüttete Talzüge wurden ausgeschwemmt, in einzelnen Terrassen entstanden tiefgreifende Grundbrüche. Überdies kam es in den Folgejahren zu Frostschäden. Durch die bergseitige Neigung der Terrassenoberflächen konnten sich Kaltluftseen bilden, in denen die Reben vor allem in der Blüte erfroren.[6] Außerdem entstanden, vor allem in den niedriger gelegenen Rebflächen, in denen zuvor meist Obst angebaut worden war, erhebliche Frostschäden am Holz der Rebbestände.

 

Die Tätigkeit der Flurbereinigungsbehörden beschränkte sich in der Zeit nach 1982 auf Reparaturarbeiten und partielle Umplanungen, die zumindest die schwersten Folgen der Umgestaltungen korrigieren sollten. Inzwischen hatte man auch begonnen, die verbliebenen Lösshohlwege als Naturdenkmale auszuweisen und sie zu schützen.

 

Seit 2021 wird auf einer Fläche von etwa einem Hektar Echter Lavendel und Lavandin angebaut. Dank der Wärme und der kalkreichen Böden gedeiht er gut. Zwei der vier Felder liegen in Bischoffingen, wo es auch einen Hofladen gibt und je eines in Königschaffhausen und Burkheim. Auf letzterem wachsen neun verschiedene Sorten.

 

Wandern

 

Der bekannteste und „klassische“ Wanderweg ist der Neunlindenpfad (Nord-Süd-Weg); er ist einer von acht Themenpfaden und führt von Endingen über den Katharinenberg und den Totenkopf mit Aussichtsturm Neunlinden nach Ihringen. Von den Wegen bieten sich vielerorts Ausblicke auf den Schwarzwald, die Rheinebene und die Vogesen. Auch der Querweg Schwarzwald–Kaiserstuhl–Rhein führt über den Kaiserstuhl.

 

Als Wissenschaftlicher Lehrpfad wurde 1977 der Limberg-Weg angelegt. Er umfasst 90 Stationen zu den Themen Geologie und Mineralogie, Geschichte, Naturschutz und Landschaftspflege, Forstwirtschaft, Wein- und Obstbau, Rheinbau und Wasserwirtschaft, sowie Landeskunde.

 

Die acht Themenpfade wurden 2007 mit einer Gesamtlänge von 140 km eröffnet und in das bestehende Wanderwegenetz des Schwarzwaldvereins (Markierung: gelber Rhombus auf weißem Hintergrund) integriert. Dabei wurde das Wanderwegenetz mit 430 neuen Wegweisern ausgeschildert. Große Tafeln mit einer Übersichtskarte und mit Standortinformationen sind an zentralen Punkten wie zum Beispiel an Bahnhöfen in den von den Themenpfaden verbundenen oder durchlaufenden Ortschaften aufgestellt. Jeder Themenpfad ist durch eine eigene Farbe und ein dem Namen entsprechendes Symbol auf den Eingangsportalen und den Wegweisern optisch gekennzeichnet. Weitere 120 kleinere Thementafeln erläutern entlang der Wanderwege lokale Besonderheiten. Örtliche Pfade, wie zum Beispiel der Brunnenpfad (7 km) in Bötzingen, wurden in das neue Netz der Themenpfade integriert.

 

Die acht Themenpfade wurden 2010 durch den Kaiserstuhlpfad ergänzt, der als Prädikatswanderweg das Gütesiegel „Qualitätsweg Wanderbares Deutschland“ erhielt. Der 21,7 km lange Kaiserstuhlpfad orientiert sich mit einigen Erweiterungen am Neunlindenpfad (Nord-Süd-Weg) und führt von Endingen durch das Erletal hoch zur Katharinenkapelle, entlang der Naturschutzgebiete Badberg und Haselschacher Buck zum Eichelspitzturm, weiter über den Vogelsang-Pass zum Neunlindenturm, durch den Lößhohlweg Eichgasse nach Bickensohl und über den Kreuzenbuck durch die Lenzengasse nach Ihringen.

 

(Wikipedia)

 

Die Eichelspitze ist ein 521,3 m ü. NHN hoher Berg. Er bildet nach dem Totenkopf (556,8 m ü. NHN) die zweithöchste Erhebung des Kaiserstuhls in Baden-Württemberg. Ihr Gipfel liegt am Ostrand dieses Mittelgebirges, nahe dem Treffpunkt der Gemarkungsgrenzen von Eichstetten, Bötzingen und Vogtsburg.

 

Bruderhäusle und St. Erhardskapelle

 

Auf dem Gipfel der Eichelspitze hat sich eine spätmittelalterliche, aus Küche und Schlafraum bestehende Eremiten-Einsiedlei mit angrenzender St. Erhards-Kapelle nachweisen lassen. Nach ersten Lesefunden von Hobbyarchäologen fanden die Reste der Gebäude besondere Beachtung, als im Zuge der Errichtung eines provisorischen Aussichtsturmes weitere Funde aus dem 14. bis 16. Jahrhundert zu Tage kamen. Bei der gezielten Grabung vor der Errichtung des heutigen Eichelspitzturmes (Eröffnung im Juli 2006) kamen unter anderem zahlreiche Ofenkacheln, Bruchstücke von Geschirrkeramik, Maultrommeln und eine Ringfibel aus Bronze hinzu, die einen guten Einblick in das alltägliche Leben der vor Ort lebenden Eremiten bieten.

 

Der Gebäudekomplex war Teil des in Sichtweite, 2,1 km (Luftlinie) entfernt gelegenen St. Petersklosters auf dem Neunlinden-Buck (555 m ü. NHN; Totenkopf-Nebengipfel), das Hesso von Baden-Hachberg einigen Pauliner-Ordensbrüdern 1387 übertrug. Die St. Erhards-Kapelle wird unter anderem 1491 in einem Urbar der Eichstetter Pfarrei erwähnt, das die Einnahmen der kleinen Kirche thematisiert.

 

Da Eichstetten zur Herrschaft Hachberg gehörte und sich somit schon früh der Reformation anschloss, wurde die Einsiedelei wahrscheinlich in dieser Zeit aufgegeben. Schichten von Ofenbauteilen und Baumaterial lassen auf einen Abbruch des Gebäudes schließen. Von dem einst von einem Graben umgebenen Gebäudekomplex von ungefähr 16 auf 9 Meter (mittels Georadar nachgewiesen) ist heute noch ein Mauerrest von 4 m Breite und 2,5 m Höhe zu sehen. Die bauliche Struktur des Bruderhäusles ist seit der Eröffnung des Fundortes als Bodendenkmal durch eine Lage oberirdischer Granitblöcke nachgebildet.

 

Eichelspitzturm

 

Seit Juli 2006 steht auf der Eichelspitze der insgesamt 42,5 Meter hohe Eichelspitzturm, der in einer Gemeinschaftsaktion der Gemeinden Eichstetten, Bötzingen, Bahlingen und Vogtsburg sowie des Fördervereins Eichelspitztum e. V., des Landes Baden-Württemberg und dem Mobilfunkanbieter O2 realisiert wurde. Die Höhe der Besucherplattform beträgt 28 Meter, von dort bietet sich ein guter Rundumblick auf Kaiserstuhl, Schwarzwald und Vogesen.

 

Besichtigung der Eichelspitze

 

Die Eichelspitze ist nicht mit dem Auto befahrbar, kann aber über einen als Rundweg konzipierten Geopfad erreicht werden, der im Samengarten der Stiftung Kaiserstühler Garten in Eichstetten startet. Der gut neun Kilometer lange Weg führt in etwa 1,5 Stunden über den alten Eichstetter Steinbruch zum Gipfel. Vom Parkplatz Fohrenbuck (Eichstetten) ist es etwa ein Kilometer Fußmarsch auf die Anhöhe, die Eichelspitze ist auch gut vom Vogelsang-Pass (277 m ü. NHN) zwischen Bötzingen und Vogtsburg zu erreichen.

 

(Wikipedia)

Includes IT version

Soon at Equal10

A small gable on the roof of the Castle de Haar , Kasteel de Haar near the suburb of Vleuten that includes village of Haarzuilen rebuild by architect Pierre Cuyper Project was finished in around 1912 took 20 years to be finished , Martin’s photograph , Utrecht , the Netherlands , June 5. 2019

 

Old steam heater

A outside service walk way inside the castle

Fireplace with beautiful screen and mantel

Beautiful formal gardens with piramide shaped trees

Beautiful staircase

Beautiful staircase in castle , Kasteel de Haar

Staircase

Narrow passage inside the castle

Formal gardens

Stairway critters sculptures in Castle

Stairway sculptures

Spiral stairway

Central Station in Amsterdam , build by architect Pierre Cuyper

de Rijks Museum in Amsterdam build by architect Pierre Cuyper

de Rijks Museum in Amsterdam

Central Station in Amsterdam

Amsterdam

Lavet bad tub

Lavet bad tub and washing machine

main door

Beautiful staircase

Kasteel de Haar near the suburb of Vleuten that includes village of Haarzuilen

architect Pierre Cuyper

Martin’s photograph

Utrecht

the Netherlands

Nederland

June 2019

Favourites

IPhone 6

Village of Haarzuilen

Kasteel de Haar

Castle the Haar

Kasteel de Haar was rebuild by architect Pierre Cuyper Project was finished in around 1912 took 20 years to be finished

city of Utrecht in the province Utrecht

Beautiful staircase in Kasteel de Haar

Door knocker

Beautiful window and seating

A small gable

[Text from www.ebubeleni.com/content/113 ]

 

The word "Rondavel" is a South African word that refers to a round hut-like dwelling (usually with a thatched roof). The three well known gigantic peaks of quartzite and shale with their sheer rock walls tower more than 700m above the surrounding landscape. These peaks are named after the three most troublesome wives of Chief Maripi Mashile - they are (from left to right) Magabolle, Mogoladikwe and Maseroto.

 

Above the 700 meter 2 300 foot deep gorge behind the Three Rondavels is Maripeskop, at 1 944 meters or 6 378 foot, this is the highest peak in the Mpumalanga (Transvaal) Drakensberg. This peak is named after the Pulana chief Maripe who in the early 19th century fled with his tribe to the mountain, from which he successfully beat off attacks by the Swazis.

 

Far below the escarpment, at the inflow of the Ohrigstad River, glitters an artificial lake created by the damming of the Blyde River

 

The Blyde River Canyon, (which is Mother Nature at her best, is a fascinating display of landscapes, wildlife and geology within the canyon), is the third largest canyon worldwide, after the Grand Canyon in America and the Fish River Canyon in Namibia. This canyon is situated along the Panorama Route of Mpumalanga, which includes waterfalls, the Pinnacle, God's Window, Wonderview, Bourkes Luck Potholes and numerous viewpoints of both the canyon and the Lowveld. The Canyon itself has numerous viewpoints, whist the most famous of these being the “Three Rondavels” or sometimes referred to as the “Three Sisters”.

Sat. 2nd June 1984 1Z38 - 'The Midland Executive' railtour

A rather excellent railtour that managed to include scheduled stops at Derby and Crewe for the two works open days :)

 

The scene shortly after arrival at Crewe with celebrity Class 40 pioneer D200 (40122) running round the train before we headed off for the shuttle-bus to Crewe Works. two and a half hours later, D200 took the train south again as far as Coventry.

 

Locos Used: 33060, 40122, 56031, 73114, 73125 & 73140

Locos & Route

73114 + 73140 London Waterloo - Reading

56031 Reading - Derby

40122 Derby - Crewe

40122 Crewe - Bescot - Coventry

56031 Coventry - Reading

33060 + 73125 Reading - London Waterloo

Info.courtesy: www.sixbellsjunction.co.uk/80s/840602re.htm

 

'A day in the life' - log book update:

Sat. 2nd June 1984 1Z38 - 'The Midland Executive' railtour

56031

LEAMINGTON SPA

Hatton

Dorridge

Tyseley

Bordesley Junction, St. Andrews Junction, Landor Street Junction

Water Orton

Kingsbury

Tamworth

Wichnor Junction

Burton-on-Trent

Stenson Junction

DERBY

 

D200 / 40122

DERBY

North Stafford Junction

Tutbury

Uttoxeter

Cresswell Junction

Stoke Junction

Stoke-on-Trent

Etruria

Kidsgrove

CREWE

 

CREWE

Madeley Junction

Norton Bridge

Stafford

Bushbury Junction

Portobello Junction

Bescot

Perry Barr North Junction

Aston

Stechford

COVENTRY

 

Class 40 haulage 140 miles

 

56031

COVENTRY

Kenilworth

LEAMINGTON SPA

 

Taken with a Zenith TTL SLR camera and standard lens. Scanned from the original negative with no digital restoration

 

You can see a random selection of my railway photos here on Flickriver: www.flickriver.com/photos/themightyhood/random/

Starlings and Sparrows in my and my neighbours' front gardens this morning.

A day at the point-to-point racing at Parham

 

Apparently, the locals pronounce it as "pa-rum" not "par-ham"

Fatpack Includes:

- Sweater Vest with sleeves and bra straps

- HUD (32 fabric colors | Mix & Match options)

 

Parts are separately change color in the fatpack versions only!

 

Colors sold separately • Each single pack comes with HUD for pompoms • Sleeves and Straps are optional

 

Rigged for: eBODY Reborn | Waifu Boobs - PLEASE TRY DEMO!

 

💛 TAXI: Kustom9

 

____________________________

 

Credits:

 

Left:

Hair: Sante - "Ella" + {dm} Hairbase - Aura - Black

Skirt: Loki - Rachel Denim Skirt

Pantyhose: voodoo. Raven Pantyhose - Plain

  

Right:

Hair: VCO ~ Rosy Hair

Glasses: [Z O O M] Retro Glam Glasses

Leggings: - TRIGGERED - Karina Leggings

 

____________________________

 

Website • INWORLD • DISCORD • SL GROUP • PRIMFEED

  

 

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

· ▸ Snoozer Cruiser includes:

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

ㅤㅤ• Bumper · Fall out of Bed

ㅤㅤ• Texture HUD:

‏‏‎

ㅤㅤ · 12 color options

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

· ▸ Wear to Ride

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

· ▸ Particles & Sounds Enabled

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

· ▸ Copy

· ▸ Modify

· ▸ No Transfer

‏‏‎ ‏‏‎

ㅤㅤｓｈｏｐ ｔｈｉｓ ａｔ ｅｑｕａｌ１０ 苛 尉 ズ ょ ド

ㅤㅤ

▸ Ｊｏｉｎ　ｕｓ　ｏｎ　Ｐｒｉｍｆｅｅｄ

ㅤㅤ

▸ Ｊｏｉｎ　ｕｓ　ｏｎ　Ｆａｃｅｂｏｏｋ

ㅤㅤ

▸ Ｊｏｉｎ　ｕｓ　ｏｎ　Ｉｎｓｔａｇｒａｍ

ㅤㅤ

▸ Ｊｏｉｎ　ｕｓ　ｏｎ　Ｙｏｕｔｕｂｅ

ㅤㅤ

▸ Main Sim

ㅤㅤ

▸ Cam sim 1

ㅤㅤ

▸ Cam sim 2

Includes teams from Mitchell, Harrisburg, Watertown, Aberdeen Central. Permission granted for journalism outlets and educational purposes. Not for commercial use. Must be credited. Photo courtesy of South Dakota Public Broadcasting.

©2021 SDPB