View allAll Photos Tagged RESTORATIVE
An observation on a forest walk in our autumn. After this I did leave but didn't eat anything till I had my restorative brownie and flat white at our home.
Edit: sorry, panda joke removed. Too soon.
Early one morning, on the Ottawa River before freeze-up, a pair of Hooded Mergansers drift westward against the current. Perhaps because of hunting (the kind of hunting where shooting birds seems more important than eating them, because Mergansers are not prized eating ducks) they are incredibly skittish. I was lying behind a fallen tree on the shore, and although the male sensed something, he remained calm, and they drifted along, their purpose a mystery.
This species, whose scientific name means ‘crested diver’, is the only Merganser species found naturally in North America only (aside from some wandering birds showing up in the UK from time to time.
And as always la province de Québec remains to the north of us, across the River.
I just spent two weeks trapped in a hotel in Calgary trying to prevent and then trying to end a significant work stoppage in Canada, and nothing seems more restorative than the possibility of getting out into a gradually melting forest. Or lying alongside the River.
Called the cuckoo flower because its arrival often coincides with the Cuckoo Birds’, and sure enough right on schedule they've both arrived simultaneously.
Many thanks for faves & comments, they're much appreciated :-)
Following the passing of a tumultuous, late afternoon, late winter rainstorm, the breaking sun illuminates the sky over Tietan Park in Walla Walla, Washington with a companionship of color and light...a double rainbow. A restorative gift from Nature and the Verse (Universe).
A multiple-exposure photo of a mural combining three images with some restorative cloning. The lower portion of the front leg in the original mural was faded and damaged, so I used various elements of the image to restore the leg with a creative twist.
The addition of an oil paint filter helped to enhance the texture of the wall surface, as the original surface was quite bumpy and unappealing.
A tree in the foreground created the mottled shadows on the wall which merged well with the painted shadows of the mural itself. The filtered light, along with the micro-contrasting of the lens, also created an HDR feel to the photo.
Yesterday we found a beautiful series of oaks lit up by the autumn sun near old mine workings and the River Ystwyth. nr Pont-rhyd-y-groes in Ceredigion, Wales
Three "Sorbet" tulips in morning light, which lasted only 15 minutes. Happy Flower Friday!
Hope you have a lovely and restorative weekend. Stay safe and think positive!
Thanks for stopping by and for all of your kind comments, awards and faves -- I appreciate them all.
© Melissa Post 2020
In Explore 24 April 2020
We returned last night from attending a wake for my husband's best friend who he had known since 4th grade to find that additional forest closures had been mandated related to the Pack Creek Fire to some of the areas where my husband and I recreate on a regular basis, in particular, Medicine Lake.
My husband is a Vietnam Veteran. Physical activity is his therapy. The back side of the La Sals provide a restorative environment where he can run, ski, bike, and hike. He clears deadfall and debris from running and bicycle trails in the spring and has bagged every peak in the range.
We live on the saddle of South Mountain and cut down dead aspen in the fall for firewood. We were married in the La Sals. The La Sal mountains are our life. The mountains are our medicine.
A tranquil end point on my Sunday morning bike ride. The tranquil beauty found on this spot of the Black River is restorative.
South Windsor Meadows, South Windsor, Connecticut
I was looking for a flight shot opportunity of one of these birds. Unfortunately, the dense foilage makes a clean shot difficult. Also, the very tip of the beak was outside the frame. (I performed restorative surgery ; )
A summer evening with the last rays reaching the river bank. A tranquil and restorative time to be taking in this scene. I tried to soften the scene with a pseudo "Orton effect" treatment.
Finally... snow. Spent the afternoon just wandering around in a local preserve with my camera. Very restorative.
Just outside Llanerchaeron's walled garden (NT).
Many thanks for faves, and comments, they're much appreciated!
[ Part. 1 ]
Les sanatoriums ont été massivement construits au début du XXe siècle dans des régions isolées de la pollution, en montagne, sur des plateaux ensoleillés pour bénéficier du grand air et des vertus désinfectantes et reconstituantes du soleil.
Sanatoriums were massively built at the beginning of the 20th century in regions isolated from pollution, in the mountains, on sunny plateaus to benefit from the great outdoors and the disinfecting and restorative properties of the sun.
Went to the climate protest in Chicago yesterday and it was impressive, but not. I find it restorative to go out and be with people that understand the dire situation that we are in and are struggling against those that do not. It is uplifting and impressive to see the number of people around the word rising up. It is not impressive in Chicago. There were a lot of people there but only a fraction of how many should have been there. Americans and Chicagoans continue to broadcast how ignorant they are and it saddens me.
Xena enjoys doing restorative yoga in sunbeams especially when they are starting to get more plentiful
Quite a lot of you seem to have been having a lovely time recently. My Flickr feed has been filled with purple landscapes in all their finery. The heather has been blooming from one end of the land to the other. Apart from here. I’ve been waiting quietly, but all I’ve seen over the last few weeks has been a lot of brown patches. Maybe I blinked. I had a location in mind too, a little known one that Lee and I stumbled across a couple of years ago one mid September evening. All around the small patch of heathland were signs of what we’d missed. “This would look great in August,” we agreed. Last year I didn’t quite get round to making the return, all too wrapped up in the forthcoming Iceland escapade as I was, so this summer was going to be the time to visit the location once more. Except the heather doesn’t seem to have really happened - at least nowhere that I’ve been recently it hasn’t. It seems that the rest of you in other parts of the country haven’t been in a sharing mood. Well, you’ve shown me your pictures, but you haven’t sent any of the blooming heather down to Cornwall. Somebody told me it had looked pretty good down west in the middle of August, but when I went that way I saw little evidence.
This, taken at the start of June, was as good as things got for this photographer. Wheal Coates is normally a summer banker for a colourful display of purples on the clifftops around the engine houses, and Mother Nature is always on hand to add a healthy scattering of complimentary yellows in the low lying gorse. One Thursday evening after a tiring couple of days in the company of my baby grandson, and at a time when I was seriously considering a restorative gin and tonic in front of the television, I made the mistake of peering through the window. The sky was looking good on this calm and inviting evening, so despite the juniper driven lure, I sighed and dragged my weary carcass towards the car, stuffing the camera and the wide angle lens into the bag as I went. Twenty minutes later I was sitting uncomfortably on a small patch of earth, squeezed in between what blooms there were, and trying to find a suitable foreground to match the colouring sky as the sun sank towards the edge of the world across a listless pale blue ocean.
The gin might have been postponed for the moment, but I was glad to be here enjoying the peace. So often it’s a raw and brutal environment, but today there was hardly a breath on the air, and the ocean barely murmured in response to the unmistakable cries of the pair of choughs that live in the chimney of Towanroath's old engine house. Apart from the very occasional dog walker, and another lone tog who was perched further along the cliffs, there was nobody around. Well except for the man who’d pitched his tent beside the engine house - I’d have to clone him and his belongings out later. And if I could fill the foreground with purple, I might not even need to do that.
Getting the shot in focus was going to be a bit of a nuisance, with the absence of an articulating screen and a lens that refuses to focus automatically - in fact even when it does think it’s found focus by itself, it generally hasn’t. I recently enquired about getting it fixed, but it’s such an old model that the required part is no longer readily available. With the camera as low to the ground as the dinky tripod would allow, I had to lie across a particularly prickly layer of gorse to see the screen clearly enough to focus manually. And then again, and then a third time. Focus stacking is so much fun when you can’t flip out the screen and see what the camera can see from a comfortable angle - said nobody ever at all.
After half an hour of being repeatedly stabbed by stray vegetation, the light had begun to fail, and it was time to go home and open that bottle of gin. I hadn’t really got what I was looking for, but this was early June, and it was just a test run for what would come later in the season. I returned two or three times over the coming weeks, but as so often seems to happen, the first visit turned out to be the only one with passable results. At least it’s colourful. I’ll hope for a better show next year. And maybe a solution to the challenges of taking wide angle exposures at ground level too. These knees aren’t getting any younger you know.
Royal jelly is a white, gelatinous substance produced by worker bees to feed the larvae that will become queen bees. It is considered a food rich in nutrients, including proteins, lipids, sugars, vitamins and minerals, and has energizing and restorative properties...
Cathja
The Cathja is a fully converted and fully mobile 38 metre Dutch Barge. Situated on an idyllic Thames mooring in Old Isleworth, the barge provides space for people who have experienced mental health problems to explore their creativity in a safe and supported environment.
Users determine their own frequency and duration of their involvement. There is no expectation to 'produce' so objects created are not judged, analysed or sold. The creation of objects, whether utilitarian or 'artistic', is an inherently healing and restorative process.
The Cathja service has achieved outstanding results in enabling people to grow away from the dependent, patient role.
The Cathja barge history:
The Cathja is a 38 metre Dutch Barge. She was probably built in the 1930s and her working life would have been on the canals and rivers of Europe. She is not a sea going vessel although many of the inland seas in Holland are such that she had to be able to negotiate rougher conditions than the barges that traded on English canals.
Cathja would have been operated as a family business with a husband and wife team, possibly with their children, leading a somewhat itinerant life. It is likely that the name Cathja is derived from a combination of the names of the skipper and his wife. Living accommodation was minimal and restricted to the back cabin so that the maximum area was given over to the hold for carrying cargo. The sorts of cargo carried would have included grain, fertiliser, coffee beans etc.
The back cabin remains with many original features and currently provides the office space for the charity. The wheel house is a more recent addition and is the 'tea room' for the activity. As the barge is fully mobile, the tea room also accommodates the ship's wheel and all the instrumentation. The wheelhouse is collapsible in order to negotiate the low bridges that are often found on the smaller waterways.
After being 'decommissioned' the Cathja had several short term owners, including a British gentleman who intended to convert her for use as a floating restaurant. This last project foundered as Cathja was damaged by rough seas in the Channel and was rescued and brought to a mooring on the Thames where she lay largely uncared for. She was purchased in an almost derelict state by the charity in 1996.
A mooring was found for her in Isleworth, being the historic wharf where coastal trade took place. The original crane used for unloading still stands as a monument to this phase of the area's history
* All Saints' Church is the oldest parish church in Isleworth in the London Borough of Hounslow in south-west London.
Its 14th-century Kentish ragstone tower and foundations are the only pre–20th-century parts to survive.[1] It faces the Thames before Church Street skirts away from the river to pass Syon Park. The parish itself is pre-Norman. A vicar replacing its rector is recorded in 1290 in records associated with Syon Abbey who gave his family £2 and a new robe each year and daily meat and drink at the upper table in the abbey hall, while his servant was to be fed at the grooms' table. The patron of the church became the trustees of St George's Chapel, Windsor, due to the dissolution of the monasteries.[2] By the end of the 17th century, Sir Christopher Wren was approached to draw plans for a new body of a much-dilapidated building. His project was deemed too expensive until 1705, when Sir Orlando Gee (MP), of Syon Hill in the parish, left £500 towards the work in his will; he is commemorated in a marble monument by Francis Bird.[3] This sum, combined with funds raised through subscriptions, ensured that the work took place (with modifications) in 1705–1706.
"He restores my soul..."
Chose to use a bit of impressionism / texture magic from Topaz Studio to give this waterfall a little extra treatment. Falls Creek along the Mayo River
I can see I am going to have to up my mailbox game! This was found in Virginia last Sunday. We were riding the little one around some back roads while she enjoyed a restorative nap when we spotted this. Currently my mailbox is about the color of this roosters tail with big and little bubbles painted on it. Before that it was bright red, like the wing on this guy with Thumper the bunny rabbit painted on it.... a different pose for each side. What next?? LOL I'll post a photo if I ever get around to putting a plan into action! Have a great and wonderful day everyone!
[Press L for BIGGER n' BETTER view]
Just a quick shot & edit for a sunny Monday. I'm not gonna lie, I am fighting a case of the Mondays! This weekend was soo fun and soo restorative & last week was crazy busy, so today I am just exhausted, thankful, and overwhelmed. The last part because there's always more that needs to be done... Keep on living and loving my little cabbages. XO
Inspiration Monday Link Love List is here.
It; truly was a restorative summer for me.
Being able to just relax and soak up the sun on the beach was the icing on the cake in my recovery process.
I now feel like I'm back 100%, and I feel like I'm ready to jump into fall with both feet.
I'm a little melancholy about packing up and leaving the island today, but I expect this feeling will be fleeting. As soon as I see all those furry little faces greeting me, I'll be more than happy to be back home.
So we're wrapping up another summer season. It's been a hot one, but fun. Time to go edit all those pictures for the new book and start getting back in touch with my favorite wildlife haunts.
Catch up with you all soon.
Found at Diamond Botanical Gardens on the lovely Caribbean island of St. Lucia, this waterfall is fed from an area of volcanic activity and is rich in restorative minerals especially sulphur. You can see the effects of the minerals where it has brightly colored the wall behind the falls. There are mineral baths downstream on the estate. This is in the area of the famous Twin Pitons; further upstream are hot baths near the active sunken caldera.
This meadow was a pasture about 25-30 years ago. Since the agriculture in this area had been escaped the restorative succession had started. Now the meadow is covered with spots and single individuals of oak, birch, pear, apple, maple and willow. In the Kaluzhskiye Zaseki reserve
This is one of my favorite Buildings in Buffalo, NY. There is a lot of History to this Richardson Building. I heard there was freaky storys in this Building. It is a Gothic Building in my eyes.
Please read below and go to the link for more info
The Henry Hobson Richardson Complex, or the Buffalo State Asylum for the Insane, as it was originally called, started construction in 1870 and was completed almost 20 years later. It was a state-of-the-art facility when it was built, incorporating the most modern ideas in psychiatric treatment. The design of the buildings as well as the restorative grounds, designed by famed landscape designer Frederick Law Olmsted, were intended to complement the innovations in psychiatric care practiced at this facility.
shot by KHWD
want to see more images or read the blog?
www.motorhome-travels.net/post/blog-98-harbury-fields-far...
reflection: spot the flower reflection on the inside of the circular arch, tick!
see more in my doubles album, the same images in both COLOUR & B&W / Monochrome /maybe AI
www.flickr.com/photos/keefhwebdesigns/albums/721777203247...
🌿 The Sensory Garden at Jephson Gardens, Leamington Spa is a beautifully curated space designed to engage all five senses—sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell—making it a standout feature in this formal Victorian park.
🌸 What Makes It Special
- Taste Garden: Visitors can pick and enjoy seasonal fruits like raspberries and blackberries, adding a deliciously interactive element.
- Fragrant & Textured Planting: A variety of aromatic herbs and tactile foliage invite you to explore through scent and touch.
- Mirrored Archway: This playful structure reflects the surrounding greenery, creating a surreal and immersive visual experience.
- Xylophone Installation: A musical feature that encourages auditory exploration—yes, you can play it!
- Benches & Quiet Corners: Thoughtfully placed seating allows for peaceful reflection or simply soaking in the atmosphere.
- Insect Homes: These structures support pollinators and add an ecological layer to the garden’s design.
🏆 Awards & Recognition
- Special Award for Innovation (2015 & 2016): Honoured for its redesign and educational outreach, including projects with local schools like Project Sunflower.
- Bees' Needs Award (2016): Recognized nationally for its pollinator-friendly planting.
📍 Location & Accessibility
- Situated within Jephson Gardens, on Newbold Terrace, Leamington Spa CV32 4AA.
- Fully accessible for wheelchairs and pushchairs, with disabled toilets and baby changing facilities nearby.
🌼 Why It’s Worth Visiting
Whether you're drawn to its ecological ethos, its artistic flair, or simply want a tranquil spot to unwind, the Sensory Garden offers a multi-layered experience that’s both playful and restorative. It’s especially lovely for families, nature lovers, and anyone seeking a moment of calm in the heart of town.
I was just framing up the shot here ,when suddenly this guy walked straight into my viewfinder and started taking pictures !
Some photographers have no consideration for....well.. other photographers :)
Anyway, I thought it might be fun to take the shot including my new friend (I hope he doesn't mind in case he sees this).
The thing is, just as I was ready to press the cable release, I had this strange sensation that , on the hill behind me, half a mile away...another photographer was looking through his viewfinder at me taking a photograph of another guy taking a photograph...and we were all releasing the shutter at exactly the same moment.
Which was all a bit too Twilight Zone for my liking and I repaired to the Sheep Rustlers' Inn for a restorative beer or three.
What I really wanted to do was spend the day at home, catching up with normal life, pottering around the garden and planning what to plant where for the summer, and returning to the huge backlog of images from the trips to Madeira and the New Forest. After coming home from the latter a few days earlier I’d packed the van again the very next day to meet up with Mark and Wendy, our old hiking buddies who were touring Cornwall in their motorhome. By the time I returned home on Sunday afternoon I slumped onto the sofa and slept until tea time, woken by a text from my son in Wadebridge, who wanted to add another escapade to our friends’ visit the following day. My first reaction was to decline. I had plans for almost every day of the forthcoming week, and I really wanted a breather from life for twenty-four hours. But then it occurred to me that Tom’s time is far more precious than mine; he’d be back at work the following morning, and even though it was a bank holiday which means I usually hide in the garden, I said I’d be at his around noon, from where we’d push on to a couple of places that until now had always just been interesting looking dots on the map.
To start with, we headed for Port Isaac, home of TV’s Mr Grumpy, Doc Martin, a number of pasty hungry herring gulls and more than a smattering of bank holiday visitors. Only Wendy’s pasty came under attack, and fortunately for Tom and myself, it was of the vegetarian variety, so we didn’t feel obliged to share our steak filled options in recompense for failing to warn our friends about the likelihood of needing to repel airborne assaults. Following this, we spent the entire car parking allowance hunting for sea glass on the beach. Of course we did. What else would you do in a picture perfect postcard village riddled with pubs and ice cream parlours? “We’re looking for Sea Badger Droppings!” affects my son in a strangely Bristolian sounding accent whenever asked by strangers what they’re missing. The odd thing is he was born in Truro, so quite why he suddenly decides to sound like he’s the new tambourine player in The Wurzels for these moments is a question that remains unresolved. The fact that he believes for a moment even the most gullible tourist might fall for the ruse also requires further explanation. Surely everyone knows the Sea Badgers only ever leave the Isles of Scilly and come to the mainland for the mating season in the autumn?
And then we moved on to the bit I’d been looking forward to. Tom’s partner Rhi grew up in Tintagel, and had arranged to meet us later at Trebarwith Strand, her local childhood haunt after finishing her shift as a paramedic. We ate at the pub which sits above the water overlooking the sea, where I was so wrapped up in the prospect of the sunset shoot that I raced through my Waldorf Salad almost without reference to Fawlty Towers at all. I also failed to notice the presence of the famous face sitting at the opposite table; one who appeared in the locally filmed TV series mentioned above if you were wondering. Of course, I’d already done my homework, which mostly consisted of examining the weather and tide apps that tell me whether I should get excited, and then viewing a certain Mr Pedlar’s (you know him!) photos in these pages to see what to expect. And in a rare moment of perfect fusion, it seemed the gods were on my side. The high tide I'd anxiously coveted for this location would be just an hour before sunset and in the previously featureless sky, groups of fluffy clouds were gathering like old friends to hang in stillness over Gull Rock. My plate now clear of all the remaining Waldorfs, I raced down to the water’s edge like a child excused from the dinner table, only to find the plum spot taken by an interloper. I knew I should have brought a sandwich and refused to budge for two hours – naturally if I’d been here on a photography only mission rather than a social engagement that’s exactly what I would have done. Soon he was followed by three or four more tripod bearing togs, each competing for ground in a very limited space, and to add insult to injury not one of them appeared to be Mr Pedlar himself. It goes without saying that if Lee had been present they’d have seen him sharpening his famous elbows and all headed for the pub in varying states of fear for their personal safety to soak up restorative brandies in an instant, leaving me with only himself to contend with.
But high tide Trebarwith offers a secret weapon to the intrepid tripod wielder, in the form of a narrow ledge of rock to the left of the funnel where we were all standing. With a degree of care and the removal of the varifocals that suddenly become about as useful as a house made of cheese when looking at the space around my feet, I hopped across the stream that cuts through the rock shelf on its way to the sea. Finally I had the space I wanted, from where I could watch the rest of them fight for position on the other side of the divide. One of them decided to offer some counsel. “Take care down there. I once watched someone slip over on that bit, and when they carried him back to safety his kneecap wasn’t in the same place it had been when he first went down there.” I nodded and smiled. I’d already negotiated a section that the falling tide had uncovered and was all too aware of exactly how slippery the green and black areas that I’d so studiously avoided were. Two hours earlier, on the other side of high tide it had been bone dry here and the difference on the surface beneath my feet was all too palpable. I moved very slowly, just a few yards forward; every inch was undertaken with the utmost caution in my most grippy of hiking shoes, using the tripod as a makeshift walking stick until I reached a small crack in the rock above the receding sea that offered a bit of traction. Now I could concentrate on setting up the shot, waiting for those moments when an incoming wave washed back towards the sea, the brightness of the white water softening to an icy blue after the break. Above us, the dreamy shroud began to light from underneath as the sun, cloaked in a glorious bold and bright orange made its final bow. As long as I stayed on my feet, I might just get a shot. At least if I got it right, I wouldn’t have to take my chances here again on another visit. Probably.
I’ve often thought that pride is an unattractive trait, and blowing one’s own trumpet should be put to one side in favour of reluctant acceptance of a positive reaction from one’s peers where merited. But in this case, I have to admit I was rather excited about sharing the image, and the entire brass section, accompanied by an oboe, a couple of flutes and three very noisy recorders has been turned to full volume on presenting the final result. I like this shot rather a lot. In fact I'd go as far as to say it's one of my favourites. So much in fact that I’m going to get it printed and put it on the wall at home. Of course it’s pure luck really. It's not often that you turn up at a brand new location to conditions you never dared to hope for. Not often you get to take a shot that makes you this happy when you’re in the company of people who didn’t come here armed with tripods and bags full of camera gear.
The farewell was not long after I took this shot. Mark and Wendy were heading back to the campsite near Tintagel as their adventures in the beautiful county that we call home came towards a close. Tom and Rhi headed back to their home in Wadebridge and work the next day. For a while I sat at the wheel of my car and grinned into the fading light. Somewhere out on the water, a skulking pair of Sea Badgers grinned back as they slipped beneath the surface and began the long journey back to the Scillies.