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Moon - A Haiku
Melancholy night
high above the ocean moon
in your hair a pearl
A moment suspended between control and chaos.
Fire spinning against neon lights, music in the air, bodies watching in silence.
Not staged. Not clean. Just alive.
Captured in Phi Phi, where nights burn brighter than days.
📍 Phi Phi Islands, Thailand
2024
📷 Google Pixel 8 Pro (Manual Mode)
I had to wonder if men were so blinded by beauty that they would feel privileged to live their lives with an actual demon, so long as it was a beautiful demon. — Arthur Golden
Mrs. Orca having a rest before we tackled Koncheto Saddle. This was the most strenuous day of the Five Mountains Trail, in my opinion. It was only about twelve or thirteen kilometers in distance, but had very steep ascents and descents, and in between a lot of traversing steep slopes and narrow ridges, which called for a lot of concentration.
A friend of ours once sat out the night in a thunderstorm in that small metal emergency shelter (2760m) in the distance. He recalled it fondly but it was not an experience I would have cared to share. Mrs. Orca near Banski Suhodol (2884m), on the way to Koncheto Saddle, Five Mountains Trail (E4), Pirin Mountains, Bulgaria.
A Soviet Modernist metro station from the last decade of the USSR. The fountain in the center was not working when we saw it. Republic Square Metro Station, Yerevan, Armenia.
In the Ottoman Era (mid 14th to late 19th century) Plovdiv was known as Filbe (essentially Turkish for "Philip's city," after the Greek name, Philippopolis). During this time the city would have had many public bathhouses, but I believe this is the last remaining one. It was constructed with facilities for both men and women in the 16th century and functioned as a bathhouse well into the 20th, but has since been converted into a contemporary art gallery. We tried to visit several times, but always found it closed. Chifte Banya (Ancient Bathhouse), viewed from Nebet Tepe, Plovdiv, Bulgaria.
This room (the gavit, or zhamatun) is one of the unique aspects of Armenian medieval architecture. It doesn't have any western equivalent, but it is a kind of large multipurpose hall that was attached west side of the church, generally some time after the construction of the church itself. They were gathering places for monks and parishioners, work spaces and burial places (note the many gravestones above). They often have a large oculus or lightwell in the ceiling, although this particular one, unusually, did not. The early thirteenth century gavit of the St. Astvatsatsin Church (first half of tenth century), Sanahin Monastery, Armenia.
A much-graffitied Soviet-Era train still in service at the Yerevan Railway Station, Yerevan, Armenia.
Tourists visit Sanahin and Hagphat on day trips from as far away as Yerevan and Tbilsi, Georgia. So, between the pancake hour and the cocktail hour they can feel a bit like a tourist zoo, filled with hawkers and people taking selfies. In the evening, after the busses have left, they take on a much more solemn feel.
From the middle ages until modern times the Armenian Apostolic Church was the most important institution in maintaining Armenian identity through successive occupations. In 1920, when the Soviets took over and established the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic, Armenia had hundreds of active monasteries, and they quickly became the target of Soviet policy. Church land was confiscated and monks and clergy were forced to renounce their offices or else be murdered, imprisoned or shipped off to gulags.
Today Armenians are still quite religious, but little survives of monastic life except for the buildings. Religious service is kept up at the sites, however, after the touristing hours are over. We were fortunate to see an Apostolic service at Sanahin, though it was attended by no more than a half dozen parishioners. Later that night I awoke at midnight in our B&B, which was right next door, and heard the clergy singing the service again. Armenian Apostolic clergy at the tenth century Church of St. Amenaprkitch, Sanahin Monastery, Armenia.
This bridge, connecting Esztergom and Parkany, Hungary (now Sturovo, Slovakia), was completed in 1895, before the dismantling of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which is to say, at a time when the Danube was not a border separating the two cities. It was severely damaged in the aftermath of the First World War, when Hungary and newly created Czechoslovakia set upon each other in a conflict over how to draw borders. By the time it reopened Austria-Hungary no longer existed (the empire having been dissolved) and the Danube marked the boundary between the two nations.
On December 26, 1944, toward the end of the Second World War, the bridge was more comprehensively destroyed by retreating German forces, who blew it to slow the progress of the advancing Soviet Army. In the Cold War that followed Hungary and Czechoslovakia, though both communist, were not amicable, so the ruins of the bridge stood for decades as a reminder of the 20th century wars that plagued Europe.
The bridge was not rebuilt and reopened until October 11, 2001, with European Union funds and as part of European integration. The two countries officially joined the EU in 2004, and the passport control on the bridge was removed in 2007. We walked across its broad pedestrian way filled with tourists and commuters, paused to snap photos, and thought about the remarkable and ongoing, but fragile, transformation of Europe. The Maria Valeria Bridge, the Danube, and Sturovo, Slovakia, viewed through a window from Esztergom Castle, Hungary.
Macarons: A sweet cookie to try when it’s not so outrageously expensive. In France, best to try and buy outside of the tourist areas.
On the ridge above Ribni Ezera. Our guidebook described the climb of the next hour or two as the most difficult and technical section of the E4 in Bulgaria, but it didn't seem that way, perhaps because soon after I took this photo the clouds came in so thick around us that we did not see much of the terrain and it was really just a matter of one foot in front of the next. It was also supposed to be among the most scenic but, for the same reasons, that wasn't really the case. Looking down on Ribni Ezera (2230m), where we spent the previous night, on the way to Makedonia Hut, on the Five Mountains Trail (E4), Rila Mountains, Bulgaria.
This is in my mom's front yard. A flock of wild turkeys has lived in her neighborhood for the last dozen years or so. They are totally fearless. While we were there at Christmas two males stopped traffic in the middle of the road while they engaged in a prolonged standoff. The above is the only one I have seen with this very pale coloring. Wild turkey, Concord, California.
A view from Pest towards the north side of Castle Hill in Buda. The medieval-looking structures are the Matthias Church and the Fisherman's Bastion. The former was founded in the 11th century by Stephen I, the first king of Hungary, and has been the site of many royal marriages and coronations (it takes its present name for the 15th century King Matthias Corvinus, who was twice married there). It has been largely destroyed and rebuilt many times, most recently in the late 19th century, just in time for the Millennium Celebration. The Fisherman's Bastion (the white structure facing the river just below the church), like many major landmarks in the city, was built expressly for that celebration. It has great views across the Danube to the Pest side of the city and is crowded with tourists on sunny days like the one in the photo. The Chain Bridge, the Fisherman's Bastion, and the Matthias Church, Budapest, Hungary.
Artist: vale is graffiti artist from France.
Found in one of the amazing graffiti lanes in Melbourne.
Hagphat, like many medieval monasteries, collected and reproduced texts, all of which in this era were in manuscript form. This room, the manuscript repository / library dates to the 11th century. Notice the ornately carved and geometric lightwell above, very characteristic of Armenian monastic architecture. Also notice the gravestones, which can generally be found in every room throughout these complexes, whatever their function. The floor also tells the story of the changing circumstances of the thirteenth century. With the Mongol incursions the monks removed the monastery's precious manuscripts to be hidden in caves (some were preserved, while others were lost--those that were preserved can be found in the Ancient Manuscripts Library in Yerevan). From around the mid-thirteenth century onward the room was used as a storeroom, and the holes and ceramics in the floor were a kind of climate control for food storage. Mrs. Orca in the Matenadaran, Hagphat Monastery, Armenia.
One might be surprised that Bulgaria was at the forefront of European conservation. In the second half of the 19th century industrialization helped to produce a growing middle class that sought some temporary escape from the conditions that created it, and found it in a retreat to the country's abundant mountain ranges. This happened elsewhere in Europe, too, but in Bulgaria it coincided with an upsurge of patriotism that accompanied the 1878 liberation from the Ottomans.
In 1895 Aleko Konstantinov, proclaiming "Get to know your motherland and you will fall in love with it,” organized the first recreational climb of Vitosha, the large mountain overlooking Sofia (He was also the first to propose the National Trail that eventually became the Kom-Emine). This led to the creation of a hiking society, the Bulgarian Tourist Union, and eventually to the country's excellent hut system and a number of protected areas, including Vitosha Nature Park (1934), the first nature park on the Balkan Peninsula.
When the communists took over in 1944 they saw hiking as a healthful and patriotic leisure activity that dovetailed nicely with socialist ideals (i.e. it was a group leisure activity, but a classless one that required discipline and perseverance from all). They nationalized the hut system and the Tourist Union and greatly increased the number of huts and protected areas. With the collapse of the communist regime in 1989 conservation gave way to unregulated logging, an increase in poaching, and some noticeable decay in the hut system, which was privatized. We also saw new development projects, such as ski hotels and ski lifts, enabled through the current regime of crony capitalism, which have significantly damaged some of the natural areas. Nevertheless, the core protected areas remain and Bulgaria is still home to some magnificent wild areas and a remarkable amount of wildlife, including wolves and bears.
European brown bear print on the Five Mountains Trail, Verila Mountains, Bulgaria.
Yerevan's name derives from the Erubuni Fortress, founded in 782 BC by the Urartian King Argishti I. While we were there what appeared to be a joint French and Armenian team of archaeologists were wrapping up a recent excavation. The on-site museum and the History Museum of Armenia already contain remarkable inscriptions, artifacts and frescoes that paint a vivid picture of that distant world of more than 2800 years ago.
When not under local control, Armenia has since been ruled over by a succession of empires: Medes, Achaemenids, Macedonians, Seleucids, Romans, Parthians, Sasanids, Byzantines, Abbasids, Seljuks, Mongols, Safavids, Ottomons, Russians and Soviets. During all that time Yerevan has been inhabited continuously. Today it has over a million people and is noticeably overcrowded, and promises to become more so: huge apartment blocks (back of image) are going up everywhere on the outskirts of the city. Walls of the Erubuni Fortress, Yerevan, Armenia.
Hier macht die reißende Isar ihrem Namen alle Ehre (aus dem Keltischen "Isaria" - die Reißende)
Stromschnellen bei Lenggries
The trees in this park (Quercus agrifolia) are somewhat stunted by a low nutrient environment (they grow out of ancient sand dunes). They are often many hundreds of years old, but are more gnarly than enormous. Coast live oak and lace lichen, Los Osos Oaks State Natural Reserve, California.
The Hungarian Museum of Fine Arts (c. 1900) was built shortly after the Budapest Milliennium Exposition (1896), around which time many of Budapest's most notable buildings were either constructed or restored. The most striking part of the museum is the Romanesque Hall (above), which was inspired by the Christian basilica and decorated in motifs related to the first 1000 years of Hungarian history. Mrs. Orca in Romanesque Hall at the Hungarian Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest, Hungary.