Edited Hubble Space Telescope imager of the galaxy UGC 11537.

 

Original caption: This astronomical portrait from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope showcases an edge-on view of the majestic spiral galaxy UGC 11537. Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 has captured the tightly wound spiral arms swirling around the heart of UGC 11537 at infrared and visible wavelengths, showing both the bright bands of stars and the dark clouds of dust threading throughout the galaxy. UGC 11537 is 230 million light-years away in the constellation Aquila, and lies close to the plane of the Milky Way. Being so close to the starry band of the Milky Way means that foreground stars from our own galaxy have crept into the image — the two prominent stars in front of UGC 11537 are interlopers from within the Milky Way. These bright foreground stars are surrounded by diffraction spikes — imaging artifacts caused by starlight interacting with Hubble’s inner structure. This image came from a set of observations designed to help astronomers weigh supermassive black holes in distant galaxies. The combination of Hubble’s sharp-eyed observations and data from ground-based telescopes allowed astronomers to make detailed models of the mass of stars in these galaxies, which in turn helps constrain the mass of supermassive black holes.

Never been here before, but went with Zain to Lower Largo - really good spot, and got a nice bit of colour just before dawn too. Tried a few compositions but this was the most pleasing I think. Took about 40 shots at different exposures and shutter speeds but this is the one I liked the most.

 

Another good day for the reverse grad - definitly proving its worth for the winter dawns.

 

Camera // Sony DSLR-A900

Exposure // 0.3

Aperture // f/7.1

Focal Length // 17 mm

ISO Speed // 100

Exposure Bias // 0 EV

Filters // hitech 100mm reverse ND grad 0.9

 

www.imagesbyandrewjack.co.uk

 

Explored at number #57 - really pleased - have not been explored for ages and now two in a few days - many thanks!

Wonder Woman: His politeness to the contrary, Grandizer's not happy we're here.

 

Batman: They don't want us involved. We get in the way of their bloodshed.

 

Wonder Woman: You know that's not how they think. I admit, they do view the League as trying to constrain them, and much of the disagreement comes through condoning or prohibiting the use of lethal force, but they simply want to defeat Unger. Just like us.

 

Batman: They can't win without us. They hate that.

 

Wonder Woman: I like your arm around me.

 

Batman: Hrn.

 

Pembroke the County Town of Pembrokeshire, in South Wales.

 

Pembroke Castle, the substantial remains of a stone medieval fortress founded by the Normans in 1093, stands at the Western tip of the peninsular surrounded by water on three sides. The castle was the seat of the powerful Earls of Pembroke and the birthplace of King Henry VII of England.

 

Gerald de Windsor was the first recorded Constable of Pembroke. Pembroke town and castle and its surroundings are linked with the early Christian church. Following the final extension of the Castle about 1254 the town was extended, and defensive perimeter walls erected around the edge of the town. The walls survive on their medieval foundations, although much rebuilt over the centuries. A great many of the town's original medieval burgage plots survive and are divided by early stone walls that are of significant national importance.

 

Monkton Priory, sited on a hill across the river from the castle, founded in 1098 by Arnulf de Montgomery and granted by him to the Benedictine order, has very early foundations and retains much of the Norman walls of the nave. The choir and sanctuary were renovated in the 19th Century. Monkton Hall, close by the Priory church, is regarded as the oldest domestic building in Pembrokeshire and possibly Wales and is thought to have been the guesthouse for visitors to the Priory.

 

The first stone building in the town was a defensive tower, now known as the Medieval Chapel, at 69a Main Street, built on a cliff edge between 950 AD and 1000 AD. There are the remains of a great hall to the north and recently filled-in arched cellars. The building was thought to have been later used as an early church as the layout is the same as St. Govan's Chapel and was used by John Wesley in 1764 to preach Methodism. In 1866 it became the brewery for the York Tavern which was briefly Oliver Cromwell's headquarters at the end of the Siege of Pembroke during the English Civil War.

 

The town's main bridge across the River Pembroke, which also acts as a dam, crosses and constrains the millpond. The first bridge was constructed to house a tide mill, originally granted to the Knights Templar in 1199. The last mill building was destroyed by fire in 1956.

 

On both banks of the Pembroke River to the west of the castle are many remains of early activities. The North Shore Quarries are relatively complete as are the remains of medieval and Elizabethan slipways where wooden vessels were built before the industrial dockyard and admiralty town was built on the grid pattern of Pembroke Dock. There is a very early complete graving dock in what was Hancock's Yard.

 

At Pennar Flats there was an early submarine base used for experiments in submarine warfare. Three of the houses on the then foreshore, part of the shipyard before the Admiralty Dock Yard was built, are still standing but are heavily altered.

 

Information Source:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pembroke,_Pembrokeshire

 

Self-isolation for an extended time places constrains on us as photographers. Painters can continue to paint whatever their imagination can conjure, but we photographers have to find things to photograph in the confined space we now live in. For years, I was saying that my imagination is my Iceland, my African Safari, my Antelope Canyon - you get the idea. Now I am constrained in terms of where me and my camera can go and so this is the put up or shut up time. I am now building up a series (code name Covid-19) that is shot exclusively from within my apartment building (mostly my apartment). Please consider looking at all images in the series and tell me what you think.

 

With thanks to a dozen brass monkeys.

 

Water is such a fascinating and unique substance, there's nothing else that behaves quite like it and when the temperatures hover around zero Mother Nature's touch becomes even more of an influence over what one can make. And that's where it really gets interesting.

 

This art is about so much more than making things out of nature's materials. What is often hidden from the viewer is how nature constrains, moulds and changes what you are able to do while you are doing it and how the environmental conditions are in flux throughout the time you make something.

 

That is where the real fascination is. The really intense, centring sculptures are the ones where it is a true collaboration with nature herself where she has just as much input into the end result as you do and with that you see more deeply within.

 

Leaves will gradually dry and wilt as you play with them and holes made by thorns will expand so the fixings fall out all too soon. The ambient humidity, the sun and wind will all alter the speed it happens. And whats more as your senses open you can feel those things change as you progress through the making.

 

If you work on a river when it's lightly raining you may perceive a tiny rise in water level imperceptible unless tuned into over a number of hours, or on a warm, dry day you may see dark haloes around the stones only a mm or two deep as water level subtly drops in a half day or so.

It struck me this day, up in Forest Park, just how hard many of us try to assign order to Nature. Order doesn't apply to Nature though. Order and Chaos are human creations. Nature is Nature, it is its own.

 

Which then led me to think a bit more about photography, naturally. While I did not come up with any ideas that had not already crossed my mind at some point, it did remind me of certain things. As photographers, particularly landscape photographers, we are not so much in the business of recording reality. At least not reality in any universal sense of the world. We translate the world, through our biases and perceptions into images for others to experience.

 

I was thinking of this, because as I hiked this trail and saw this scenery, it occurred to me just how beautiful it was, but how much it defied typical photographic formulas in terms of composing photographs. So at first, I thought the approach I was taking in this manner was somehow a more accurate reflection of how this looked and felt than if I tried to constrain the landscape into any of a various number of photographic "rules". But then it occurred to me, that what I was doing was no more accurate, no more real, than if I had stuck strictly to a more traditional approach, I was merely finding a different perception of this forest into which to translate my experience of it.

 

Which may all sound a bit convoluted, but I think it is an important consideration to always keep in mind because I know this debate comes up fairly often in photography. Just how real is it? Is one type of photography more real than another. Is b&w more true than color? Is a 50mm lens more accurate and honest than a 14mm?

 

I think the answer is always a slippery one. I think the danger is less in the fact that we create from our own perceptions of the world, personal bias and all, but more when we start to forget that these images we create are just that, subjective translations of the world and start to believe that our take on things somehow represents something that is more "real" than another's.

 

Oh, and Forest Park totally rocks right now. This was taken along the Hardesty Trail just above the Wildwood. The driving time was so much better than heading all the way out to the Gorge too!

Deep Dream Generator(AI Vision) (AI Upscaler),Photoshop

 

For Her Use of Forbidden Magic,The Goblin Queen has Banished the Witch to The Asylum. Bound by an unbreakable spell force...The Witch Awaits her Appeal

 

Prompt:- Photo realistic,'Steampunk' Woman coming Through Mist,Bi-Laterally Symmetrical,Accurate Anatomy of Body,Preserve Face and Eyes,Tall Elegant Seductive,Wild Voluminous Dark Wind Blown Hair,'Clear Distinct Realistic Eyes',Eyes Equal Size,Ornate Decorative Steampunk Clothing, Background Arched Leaded Glass Window,Marble Pillars either side of figure,Constrain Proportions, 'mdjrny--v4 style'

My world has ended.

That which I treasure most has been ripped from me, and I am dying. I can only relive the awful circumstances that conspired to stab me in the back...

 

Quane and I are walking on the path, with the ever-growing worms accompanying us on our way.

I see something big on the horizon, and after a couple hours, it reveals itself as an island- but far bigger than the others we've seen and apparently fixed in place...

Quane runs forward, excited to explore this new land, but I hang back... Like the coward that I am! As she runs around on the island, free from the constraining path, a monstrous shape looms out of her sight. I cry out, but it grabs her with its mantis claws in the blink of my eyes and gazes hungrily on her with its eyestalks.

Her stick flies from her hands and into the mire nearby, sinking impossibly slowly as I leap over it and give the disgusting beast a blow on the head, but its head is like steel, unlike my hand as its stinging tail pierces my flesh. It must be poisoned... it was a small wound... I sink onto the stones of the path and lay there, helpless, as I watch the creature slither away, with Quane struggling in it's arms.

The last thing I see is my own staff sinking into the mud, and then everything winks out of existence...

  

WHAT will happen NEXT!?!

Will ANYTHING happen next!?!

C&C appreciated. ;)

.

For sliders sunday, best viewed full screen.

 

This began as a RAW file shot through the 720nm infrared filter on the fuji X100. See first comment box below.

This is the typical almost monochrome magenta-ish image that one gets with 720nm IR. Most of the time I'll convert one of these to straight black and white. I've dabbled in channel swapping, but most of the time it's too garish or contrived for my taste.

 

Recently I'm using Lr to create a split toned image for some of these. In the Lr Develop module, scrolling down the panels on the right brings me to it. I'll drag the sliders for saturation and color for highlights and then do the same for shadows.

 

That sliding brought this image almost to what is seen here, where the foliage on the large background trees is light and the foliage on the farther background trees is more brown.

 

As you'll see in the original image below, there was intrusion of foliage of the tree under which I was kneeling. I find that distracting from the composition I wanted, but the Lr clone/heal tool didn't do an adequate job of eradicating those distractions.

 

So this image got exported to Ps CS4 as a PSD file simply to clone out the unwanted stuff. I exported as a PSD rather than a TIFF because I was hoping to avoid banding in the dark sky.

 

Lately I'm noticing that in the process of creating the TIFF file, banding frequently occurs, especially as a black and white.

 

So back in Lr after using the PSD file to clone out the stuff, I exported as a TIFF back to Ps.

 

And as usual, the first thing I do is go to the Channels palette and create all the Lights and all the Darks luminosity channels as per information from Tony Kuyper. I highly recommend googling for him and reading his blog and his tutorials.

 

When it comes to black and white or in this instance, split tone images, I like working with brightness zones. Remember Ansel Adams and the zone system? There is a digital equivalent that can be utilized by selecting one of those luminosity channels and then subtracting another from the selection, leaving selected a more narrow region of brightness value that will be effected by an adjustment. Just like the analog zone system, in digital zone 0 is complete black and zone 10 is complete white.

 

In this image, I used the luminosity channels to select zone 4, just darker than mid way, and with that selection active clicked on the icon in Ps to create a curves adjustment layer. Changing the blend mode to Multiply darkened everything in zone 4, and by sliding the opacity, the proper amount was adjusted.

Actually later I came back and created a second zone 4 curves adjustment layer and painted out all but a little bit of what I wanted adjusted and slud the opacity down even further so I ended up with two zone 4 curves layers.

 

Then I did something similar to zone 7, which selected brightness values half way up from mid point to 10, but changing the blend modes of these curves layers to Screen to brighten the selected regions. Sliding opacity gets the amounts we want. But there were a few areas which were too much, so I placed the zone 7 curves layers into a group with a mask. Then painting on the mask with black eliminated the the adjustments from where I didn't want them. I also slud the mask's opacity a smidge.

 

But I still wanted more of that infrared look. There are probably many ways to create the Orton effect. The way I used here was to create a fresh curves adjustment layer at the top of the layer stack and set its blend mode to Screen. This brightens everything severely. Then I merged up through that to create a new layer above the Screened curves and set its blend mode to Soft Light. This darkens things severely. Gaussian Blur on that merged up layer creates a strongly contrasty effect with marked glow of everything that was bright. Grouping those two layers together lets both of them have opacity adjusted together. Selecting one of those Lights luminosity channels and clicking on the mask button constrains the total effect to only the brighter pixels in the image. Then the opacity for the group can be adjusted. In this case, way down, unlike my fence friday post from two fridays back. That had full blown in yer face dream like glow. This, I just wanted a bit more so slud the opacity of the Orton group way down.

 

And of course I felt that the grass in the foreground was too flat. So I'd created years ago an action that places a new layer filled with 50% grey with its blend mode to Soft Light in the layer stack. Soft Light or Overlay blend modes render that 50% grey invisible, but painting on that layer with opacities of white dodges the image and opacities of black burns. Just like in the old analog dark room when we'd dodge and burn. But rather than sweating greatly as I painted onto that layer, I did it in a more controlled fashion. I went back to the Channels palette and clicked on one of the Lights channels I'd created earlier to get that marching ants selection. Ctrl H to hide the marching ants and reducing the opacity of the brush set to white, I then painted onto the 50% grey Soft Light layer, gradually building the amount of dodging I wanted. Then I slud that layer's opacity to taste.

 

Of course, now I thought that tree in front of the rest didn't stand out enough. Clicking on the create new adjustment layer button and choosing Photo Filter, I created a warming filter layer. I filled its mask with black to hide everything. Again I got my marching ants selection of one of the Lights channels, and painted 100% opacity white onto that black mask very carefully to reveal the change only in that tree's leaves. Then sliding density of the warming filter effect and sliding opacity of that layer finished things off.

 

Phew.

But I got what I wanted.

And when I'm using my pen and tablet to paint on layers of images as done here, I feel like I'm channeling my dad, who had made his living as an artist. And I feel as if I'm doing more than just letting a camera do all the heavy lifting.

Thank you all for listening to me babble away.

 

Oh, if the original image in the first comment box doesn't show, hit your browser's refresh button. That usually works.

 

Happy Sliders Sunday!

  

Scrim used as a diffuser and background. I liked her brunette hair against the white background. Nita was doing double duty, posing as well as holding the diffuser against a stiff wind.

 

I could have cropped out the rim of the reflector/diffuser, but it felt and looked right to leave them in. A bit of context, I thought.

 

I'm still convinced that the casual photo/look is really superior to the formal setting as revealing of the person.

 

Assuming a "role" constrains us . . . necessarily so if we are to fulfill the requirements of the role as an occupation, but hopefully not to be something that we are not.

 

The light was perfect that day .. . late afternoon, but well short of the Golden Hour.

Deep Dream Generator (Digital DaVinci),Photoshop,

 

A Reworking of an earlier image created in DDG old Style (Artistic)

 

Prompt (80%):- Photographic Realistic,Ancient Evil Vampire Woman Appearing Through the mist of The Catacombs,Multiple horns and Tendrils coming out of the figure,(Fluid :1),Preserve Face and Eyes,Clear distinct realistic eyes,Constrain Proportions,Detailed,Intricate,Artists H.R Giger,Peter Mohrbacher,Seb McKinnon, 'Mdjrny v5 Style'

Unveiling and Blessing of Statue of Welcoming Christ by Father Lucas Ng

 

The Welcoming Christ Statue initial idea was in the original architect's design of the Costantini Centre which was built in 2012 at St. Ignatius Church, but it was never executed due to budget constrain. Under refurbishment project undertaken by SIC Building Committee in 2013, the idea of the Welcoming Christ statue was revisited.

 

The design inspiration came from the bronze statue of Christ in Mount Teide, Tenerife, Spain. The marble statue was sculptured by Wu Shi Qing, Cui Yun Guang and Wang Ling Mei from Linyi Joy Garden Co, Ltd., Shandong Province, China.

 

The sculpture was first modelled with clay (1.1 meters tall, 1:4 ratio), and many revisions were made to the facial expression and other details before being replicated on 5 solid blocks of Beijing Masa white Marble from Beijing. It took approximately 8 months from clay model design to completion of the marble carving.

 

The entire statue measures 4.52 meters tall, 3.76 meters wide and weighs 11.8 tons. The statue is made up of 5 separate parts; pedestral, mid, top and two palms.

 

The backdrop of the statue is locally fabricated with a polystyrene foam core and finished with plaster and glass mosaic tiles.

 

To illuminate the statue, the latest LED lighting system with the flexible to change the colors according to the liturgical colors were installed.

  

it's Milky Way season again!

 

However, Malaysian (very) hazy weather plus time constrains means i haven't managed to shoot any milky way yet this year, so i just process one more shots from my NZ Tour last spring.

 

Vertorama 3 images | Nikon D600 | Samyang 14mm | f/2.8 | ISO6400 | 30s

 

check out the timelapse here.

 

for stories about my foto journey, do visit my blogspot :).

-----------------------------

 

HDR/DRI/Timelapse personal / group workshop is available upon request. PM me for details :)

 

-all rights reserved-

-contact me for information on licensing of my images and timelapse clips-

 

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This carnival of colors came from Ana and cost so dearly I fully expected it to come with 4 wheels and an airbag. I guess I should have bothered to dust it off before shooting.

There were better banded ones, higher contrast ones, all less costly. But this is the one I had to have. So much goin' on.

2 nits: the quartz center and a fracture under the surface on mid left edge, probably why the red intruded in that area.

The way those delicate light bands constrain the colors from mixing is wonderful. The more I look at it the less sick I am over the cost

Maria brought in this old sea shell that had been weathering outside in a flower pot for at least five years, and thought I might want to play with it. I cleaned it up and then applied a light coating of olive oil to give it a little bit of a shine, and then took about 30 different pictures of it trying various different lighting arrangements. A fair amount of post processing went into cleaning up some of the the most glaring damage.

 

Lighting info: For this shot I wanted to emphasize the translucent qualities of the shell and fitted a Strobie 130 in a Rogue Grid (to constrain the light and keep it out of my lens) behind the shell to give it the back lighting I wanted. Fill light came from a YN560 in a 24 inch soft box camera left and a YN560-II in an identical 24 inch soft box camera right. The strobes were triggered with a Yongnuo RF-603N.

 

Other shells that I have exploited over the years can be seen in my Shell set. www.flickr.com/photos/9422878@N08/sets/72157626043932290/

La traduzione letterale dal francese di "noblesse oblige" è "la nobiltà obbliga".

 

Il Dictionnaire de l'Académie française lo definisce in questo modo:

 

1 - Chiunque dichiara di essere nobile deve comportarsi in modo nobile.

2 - (Figurativamente) Si deve agire in modo da conformarsi alla posizione e alla reputazione che ci si è guadagnati.

 

Secondo l'Oxford English Dictionary il termine "suggerisce che un lignaggio nobile costringa ad un comportamento onorevole; un privilegio imponga responsabilità". Essere nobili significa avere delle responsabilità da osservare, da portare avanti e così via. Non si deve semplicemente trascorrere il proprio tempo in occupazioni oziose.

 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=M2uhteknyUo

  

Noblesse oblige is a French phrase literally meaning "nobility obliges".

 

The Dictionnaire de l’Académie française defines it thus:

 

1 - Whoever claims to be noble must conduct himself nobly.

2 - (Figuratively) One must act in a fashion that conforms to one's position, and with the reputation that one has earned.

 

The Oxford English Dictionary says that the term "suggests noble ancestry constrains to honorable behavior; privilege entails to responsibility." Being a noble meant that one had responsibilities to lead, manage and so on. One was not to simply spend one's time in idle pursuits.

at the Australian Centre for Photography

 

Dates:

Friday 26 November - Saturday 29 January 2011

Tue - Fri: 12.00 - 7.00pm, Sat & Sun 10.00am - 6.00pm

 

Closed over the holiday period: 23 December 2010 - 8 January 2011

 

Exhibition Notes:

Luxury can be a matter of status, prodigality or decadence. It depends where you are standing at the time. In this lavish exhibition five leading Australian photomedia artists explore the fabrics, costumes, jewellery and tableware of conspicuous consumption and absolute power.

 

Throughout history, sumptuary laws were enacted in an attempt (almost always unsuccessful) to constrain the acquisition and display of luxury goods. This was at times motivated by a sense of modesty, at times by a desire to maintain hierarchy and at times as a way to curb imports that threatened the domestic market.

Dudokpark 1, Hilversum.

Architect: Willem Marinus Dudok (1884-1974)

Rijksmonument 46773

 

Het Raadhuis van Hilversum is gebouwd naar een ontwerp van de toenmalige stadsarchitect en directeur van de dienst publieke werken van de gemeente, Willem Marinus Dudok. Het wordt beschouwd als Dudoks belangrijkste werk. Het gebouw geniet ook internationaal grote bekendheid en waardering en trekt al tientallen jaren bezoekers uit het buitenland. Volgens de vakliteratuur heeft Dudok zichzelf na deze schepping nooit meer overtroffen, al heeft hij wel enkele gebouwen ontworpen die – vrijwel altijd gebouwd op een kleinere schaal – bewonderd worden. Het raadhuis is gebouwd op de grond van het voormalige landgoed "Witten Hull" dat voor de bouw door de gemeente werd gekocht.

Ook het interieur van het Raadhuis is door Dudok ontworpen. Meubels, tapijten, klokken, lampen, alles moest precies bij elkaar passen. Zelfs de lettertypen die in het pand werden gebruikt werden door de bouwmeester uitgekozen. Het Raadhuis werd officieel geopend op 14 juli 1931.

 

In de Tweede Wereldoorlog was dit het hoofdkwartier van de Wehrmacht in Nederland. Het stadhuis was toen (tijdelijk) verplaatst naar een ander bekend gebouw, namelijk Hotel Gooiland. De toren was in die tijd gehuld in camouflagemateriaal.

Het Raadhuis van Hilversum heeft in de periode 1989-1995 een ingrijpende restauratie ondergaan en is weer in volle glorie hersteld. Bij de restauratie werden zowel externe als interne facetten hersteld. Zo is veel van het meubilair in publieke ruimten uitgevoerd in authentieke stijl (buismeubelen e.d.) en werden alle oorspronkelijke kleuren weer aangebracht.

 

Voor meer informatie en foto's, zie dudok.org/1931/08/13/raadhuis-hilversum-1927-1931/

 

Bron: Wikipedia & www.dudok.org

_________________________________________________________

 

The Hilversum Town Hall was designed by architect Willem Marinus Dudok to serve as seat of the municipal council of Hilversum in the Netherlands. Construction was completed in 1931. It is a much-admired building that is considered the finest example of Dudok’s work and internationally recognized as one of the most influential buildings of its time.

Not only did he design the building, but also the interior including the carpets, furniture and even the mayor's meeting hammer.

 

Dudok became Director of Public Works of Hilversum in 1915. Initially, he designed a traditional building intended to fit into the town’s downtown area. However, due to World War I and lack of funds this was not constructed. Dudok presented the first sketches for a new design in 1924, for which he was able to use an elevated location to the northwest of the town centre. This location, which did not constrain the building with composition or height restrictions, gave Dudok the freedom to express his considerable capabilities. It is surrounded by a park and the light-coloured building rises from water, highlighting the garden city character that Hilversum wanted to achieve.

 

Somewhat reminiscent of the early designs of Frank Lloyd Wright, this remarkable and in many ways unique structure was completed in 1931, by which time Dudok was Hilversum’s Municipal Architect, and was enthusiastically embraced by the people of Hilversum for its balance between form and function, fine workmanship and high quality finishes and materials used. Some critics, however, accused Dudok of diluting modernist designs and being halfway modernist, lacking a specific style. However, the end result is considered by many to be a testament to the consistent harmonic form, function, art and human need. Hilversum Town Hall is one of the most successful buildings in the history of the modernist movement.

 

During World War II the building was used as headquarters of the German Wehrmacht, for which it was necessary to camouflage the prominent tower. The building was restored between 1989 and 1995.

 

For more info (in Dutch) and pictures, please check dudok.org/1931/08/13/raadhuis-hilversum-1927-1931/

 

Source: Wikipedia

Day Three-Hundred and Fifty Seven, "Meet Shadow" theme, twenty seventh shot.

 

Dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig!

Looking at Ombra digging as much shore as she can, I realise how much gratifying this activity must be for a dog. And I realise how much difficult NOT digging the soil out of our vases must be for her every single day. Luckily the shore is at less than thirty minutes driving from home, so from time to time I'll be bringing her here to unleash her from most of her constrains. Some sane crazy digging activity should make it easier to control her impulses while at home.

And yes, the RX1 got covered in sand while taking this shot.

  

365 Days of RX1 - one camera, one lens, 12 projects

www.lucarossini.it/category/365-days-of-rx1/

 

www.lucarossini.it

www.facebook.com/LucaRossiniPhotographer

The principal author of this document was the eminent scholar, Thomas Jeffferson, these are his words of wisdom:

(This is much less than half of his eloquent discourse, even though he was the author of this document his signature is hard to find. He signed it as Th Jefferson in the row well below John Hancock)

One interesting fact is that Thomas Jefferson and John Adams both signers of this Declaration died on July 4th, 1826

 

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

 

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

The protostellar object OH 339.88-1.26, which lies 8 900 light-years from Earth in the constellation Ara, lurks in this dust-filled image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. Winding lanes of dark dust thread through this image, which is also studded with bright stars crowned with criss-crossing diffraction spikes.

 

The dark vertical streak at the centre of this image hides OH 339.88-1.26, which is an astrophysical maser. A maser — which is an acronym for “microwave amplification by stimulated emission of radiation” — is essentially a laser that produces coherent light at microwave wavelengths. Such objects can occur naturally in astrophysical situations, in environments ranging from the north pole of Jupiter to star-forming regions such as the one pictured here.

 

This image comes from a set of Hubble observations that peer into the hearts of regions where massive stars are born to constrain the nature of massive protostars and test theories of their formation. Astronomers turned to Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 to explore five intermediate-mass protostars at infrared wavelengths. The Hubble observations were supported by other state-of-the-art observatories including ALMA, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array. ALMA is composed of 66 moveable high-precision antennas which can be arranged over distances of up to 16 kilometres on a plateau perched high in the Chilean Andes. Further data were contributed by the Stratospheric Observatory For Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA), which is a telescope that — until recently — operated out of a converted 747 aircraft.

 

[Image Description: The field is field with hundreds of bright stars. They are primarily blue in colour, with scattered smaller stars visible in yellow/orange. The background is dominated by cloudy grey dust, with permeating regions of dark black and orange.]

 

Credits: ESA/Hubble & NASA, J. Tan; CC BY 4.0

Gentleness and self-control.

 

Gentleness is rooted in an attitude of humility before God. In experiencing God's gentleness to us, we desire to demonstrate the same to others.

 

"24 And the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, 25 correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth," 2 Timothy 2:24-25

 

This leads to self-control because gentleness is meekness, not weakness.

 

Meekness is power under control. Every person is powerful. We can speak words that influence others; we can act in ways that help or hurt; and we can choose what influences will inform our words and actions. So, gentleness leads to self-control, which constrains and channels that power in our desire to be like the Lord Jesus Christ.

 

Our objectives and goals become increasing less about ourselves and more about the glory of our God. His will and His thoughts control and inform what we do.

 

"He must increase, but I must decrease." John 3:30

 

This Thanksgiving we can thank God for all of these wonderful fruits of the Spirit, freely given to everyone who will repent and believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ!

 

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law." Galatians 5:22-23

__________________________

A year of the shows and performers of the Bijou Planks Theater.

  

This year, astronomers around the world have been celebrating the 50th anniversary of X-ray astronomy. Few objects better illustrate the progress of the field in the past half-century than the supernova remnant known as SN 1006.

 

When the object we now call SN 1006 first appeared on May 1, 1006 A.D., it was far brighter than Venus and visible during the daytime for weeks. Astronomers in China, Japan, Europe, and the Arab world all documented this spectacular sight. With the advent of the Space Age in the 1960s, scientists were able to launch instruments and detectors above Earth's atmosphere to observe the Universe in wavelengths that are blocked from the ground, including X-rays. SN 1006 was one of the faintest X-ray sources detected by the first generation of X-ray satellites.

 

A new image of SN 1006 from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory reveals this supernova remnant in exquisite detail. By overlapping ten different pointings of Chandra's field-of-view, astronomers have stitched together a cosmic tapestry of the debris field that was created when a white dwarf star exploded, sending its material hurtling into space. In this new Chandra image, low, medium, and higher-energy X-rays are colored red, green, and blue respectively.

 

The new Chandra image provides new insight into the nature of SN1006, which is the remnant of a so-called Type Ia supernova. This class of supernova is caused when a white dwarf pulls too much mass from a companion star and explodes, or when two white dwarfs merge and explode. Understanding Type Ia supernovas is especially important because astronomers use observations of these explosions in distant galaxies as mileposts to mark the expansion of the Universe.

 

The new SN 1006 image represents the most spatially detailed map yet of the material ejected during a Type Ia supernova. By examining the different elements in the debris field -- such as silicon, oxygen, and magnesium -- the researchers may be able to piece together how the star looked before it exploded and the order that the layers of the star were ejected, and constrain theoretical models for the explosion.

 

Scientists are also able to study just how fast specific knots of material are moving away from the original explosion. The fastest knots are moving outward at almost eleven million miles per hour, while those in other areas are moving at a more leisurely seven million miles per hour. SN 1006 is located about 7,000 light years from Earth. The new Chandra image of SN 1006 contains over 8 days worth of observing time by the telescope. These results were presented at a meeting of High Energy Astrophysics Division of the American Astronomical Society in Monterey, CA.

 

NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages the Chandra program for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory controls Chandra's science and flight operations from Cambridge, Mass.

 

Read entire caption/view more images: chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2013/sn1006_hdr/

 

Image credit: NASA/CXC/Middlebury College/F.Winklerch

 

Caption credit: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics

 

Read more about Chandra:

www.nasa.gov/chandra

 

p.s. You can see all of our Chandra photos in the Chandra Group in Flickr at: www.flickr.com/groups/chandranasa/ We'd love to have you as a member!

  

_____________________________________________

These official NASA photographs are being made available for publication by news organizations and/or for personal use printing by the subject(s) of the photographs. The photographs may not be used in materials, advertisements, products, or promotions that in any way suggest approval or endorsement by NASA. All Images used must be credited. For information on usage rights please visit: www.nasa.gov/audience/formedia/features/MP_Photo_Guidelin...

 

Now that's what I call proper Autumn weather. The blue skies and drifting fluffy clouds of yesterday have given way to mist, drizzle and grey skies. It's been an interesting and prolific year making land art and today gave me the first reminder of last Autumn and the sculptures I was making then.

 

I went back to muddy Middlewood today and back down to that now familiar spot on the river and was amazed to find my stack still standing, see 'spider earthquake', along with JRTPickle's Leaf Candles,. The top stone had moved and now had bird poo on it, I wonder if it had landed on it and moved the stone, given itself a shock and left a marker of it's fleeting presence! How it hadn't toppled I do not know and as I set about trying to think of a new idea two Dippers flew past, loudly twittering as they banked around the corner at high speed and closely in procession.

 

The original thing that I saw that sparked this idea was an Ash frond laying in the water, with pairs of leaves either side of the stalk. I wanted to recreate that in the flow of the water but I would need to protect it from the moving water by building a wall around it and the wall would act as a frame boxing in the shape of the leaves. It is often something like that that will trigger an idea. I will see something like light shining through a leaf or a leaf that has fallen onto a rock and I will want to make something with the image I have in my mind's eye.

 

The river here passes between two cliffs and in places runs on top of the bedrock and it has carved several shelves so I immediately thought I wanted to build something there. I haven't made anything from stone for quite a while, save for balances, and as Winter approaches it will become a more often used material but as it is still Autumn and I decided to combine something delicate like a leaf with the hardness of stone.

 

And so that is how it was, frame a leaf by building a wall but I would need to do it on somewhere flat so the river shelf was perfect.

 

I went searching for flat square rocks that were suitable for building a structure and it took quite a while to find enough that were straight and flat and yet more time to find enough that were a similar depth so that the wall was the same height all round. The level of the water within the box was lower than outside and it flowed in through one corner and out through another. That gave me ideas for future projects, to see whether it is possible to control the strength and direction of flow and to incorporate that into a sculpture.

 

As I completed the box the water still flowed strongly through it so I would not be able to lay the leaf on the water so I would have to suspend it above the surface. I went looking for something suitable and came back with some grasses and arranged them in a grid. I laid the mountain ash leaves on top of them but it didn't look quite right.

 

I wanted it to have a form where the framed structure looked graphical like a well framed photo so I needed something that would fill the space in the right way so I decided on a beech branch many of which were growing nearby. I looked for one with the right shape and with a mixture of green and coloured leaves. It took a while experimenting with different shapes and styles before I was happy that it was framed properly. I removed some of the grass supports as they were upsetting the organic form of the branch and then I was done!

 

Hopefully that gives you an insight into how I go about making something. Somehow an idea is sparked by something I see, but it isn't the whole idea straight away. And as I start to work on that idea nature constrains what I can do and so I change tack and refine the idea, all the time learning more about the place and the materials I am using, until finally I end up with the finished article. The intutive process is very absorbing, very interesting and fun too.

 

Land Art Site

 

Land Art Blog

Self-isolation for an extended time places constrains on us as photographers. Painters can continue to paint whatever their imagination can conjure, but we photographers have to find things to photograph in the confined space we now live in. For years, I was saying that my imagination is my Iceland, my African Safari, my Antelope Canyon - you get the idea. Now I am constrained in terms of where me and my camera can go and so this is the put up or shut up time. I am now building up a series (code name Covid-19) that is shot exclusively from within my apartment building (mostly my apartment). Please consider looking at all images in the series and tell me what you think.

“The Open Society and Its Enemies” ―Karl R. Popper, 1945

 

“The so-called paradox of freedom is the argument that freedom in the sense of absence of any constraining control must lead to very great restraint, since it makes the bully free to enslave the meek. The idea is, in a slightly different form, and with very different tendency, clearly expressed in Plato.

 

Less well known is the paradox of tolerance: Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them. — In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies; as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion, suppression would certainly be unwise. But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant. We should claim that any movement preaching intolerance places itself outside the law, and we should consider incitement to intolerance and persecution as criminal, in the same way as we should consider incitement to murder, or to kidnapping, or to the revival of the slave trade, as criminal.”

Pembroke Castle (Welsh: Castell Penfro) is a medieval castle in the centre of Pembroke, Pembrokeshire in Wales. The castle was the original family seat of the Earldom of Pembroke. A Grade I listed building since 1951, it underwent major restoration during the early 20th century.

 

In 1093, Arnulf of Montgomery built the first castle at the site when he fortified the promontory beside the Pembroke River during the Norman invasion of Wales. A century later, the castle was given by Richard I to William Marshal, who became one of the most powerful men in 12th-century Britain. He rebuilt Pembroke Castle in stone, creating most of the structure that remains today. The castle is open to the public and is the largest privately owned castle in Wales.

 

The castle is sited on a strategic rocky promontory by the Milford Haven Waterway. The first fortification on the site was a Norman motte-and-bailey. It had earthen ramparts and a timber palisade.

 

In 1189, Pembroke Castle was acquired by William Marshal. He soon became Lord Marshal of England, and set about turning the earth and wood fort into an impressive Norman stone castle. The inner ward, which was constructed first, contains the huge round keep with its domed roof. Its original first-floor entrance was through an external stairwell. Inside, a spiral staircase connected its four stories. The keep's domed roof also has several putlog holes that supported a wooden fighting-platform. If the castle was attacked, the hoarding allowed defenders to go out beyond the keep's massive walls above the heads of the attackers.

 

The inner ward's curtain wall had a large horseshoe-shaped gateway. But only a thin wall was required along the promontory. This section of the wall has a small observation turret and a square stone platform. Domestic buildings including William Marshal's Great Hall and private apartments were within the inner ward. The 13th century keep is 23 metres (75 ft) tall with walls up to 6 metres (20 ft) thick at its base.

 

In the late 13th century, additional buildings were added to the inner ward, including a new Great Hall. A 55-step spiral staircase was also created that led down to a large limestone cave, known as Wogan Cavern, beneath the castle. The cave, which was created by natural water erosion, was fortified with a wall, a barred gateway and arrowslits. It may have served as a boathouse or a sallyport to the river where cargo or people could have been transferred.

 

The outer ward was defended by a large twin-towered gatehouse, a barbican and several round towers. The outer wall is 5 metres (16 ft) thick in places and constructed from Siltstone ashlar.

 

Although Pembroke Castle is a Norman-style enclosure castle with great keep, it can be more accurately described as a linear fortification because, like the later 13th-century castles at Caernarfon and Conwy, it was built on a rocky promontory surrounded by water. This meant that attacking forces could only assault on a narrow front. Architecturally, Pembroke's thickest walls and towers are all concentrated on its landward side facing the town, with Pembroke River providing a natural defense around the rest of its perimeter.

 

Pembroke Castle stands on a site that has been occupied at least since the Roman period. Roger de Montgomerie, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury founded the first castle here in the 11th century. Although only made from earth and wood, Pembroke Castle resisted several Welsh attacks and sieges over the next 30 years. The castle was established at the heart of the Norman-controlled lands of southwest Wales. Arnulf de Montgomery appointed Gerald de Windsor as his castellan at Pembroke.

 

When William Rufus died, Arnulf de Montgomery joined his elder brother, Robert of Bellême, in rebellion against Henry I, William's brother and successor as king; when the rebellion failed, he was forced to forfeit all his British lands and titles. Henry appointed his castellan, but when the chosen ally turned out to be incompetent, the King reappointed Gerald in 1102. By 1138 King Stephen had given Pembroke Castle to Gilbert de Clare who used it as an important base in the Norman invasion of Ireland.

 

In August 1189 Richard I arranged the marriage of Isabel, de Clare's granddaughter, to William Marshal who received both the castle and the title, Earl of Pembroke. He had the castle rebuilt in stone and established the great keep at the same time. Marshal was succeeded in turn by each of his five sons. His third son, Gilbert Marshal, was responsible for enlarging and further strengthening the castle between 1234 and 1241. All of Marshal's sons died childless. In 1247, the castle was inherited by William de Valence (a half-brother of Henry III), who had become Earl of Pembroke through his marriage to Joan de Munchensi, William Marshal's granddaughter.

 

The de Valence family held Pembroke for 70 years. During this time, the town was fortified with defensive walls, three main gates and a postern. Pembroke Castle became de Valence's military base for fighting the Welsh princes during the conquest of North Wales by Edward I between 1277 and 1295. On the death of Aymer de Valence, 2nd Earl of Pembroke, William de Valence's son, the castle passed through marriage to the Hastings family. In 1389, 17-year-old John Hastings died in a jousting accident, ending a line of inheritance stretching back 250 years.

 

Pembroke Castle then reverted to Richard II. Short tenancies were then granted by The Crown for its ownership. By 1400 Owain Glyndŵr had begun a rebellion in Wales. However, Pembroke escaped attack because the castle's Constable, Francis а Court, paid off Glyndŵr in gold. Then in 1452, the castle and the earldom were presented to Jasper Tudor by his half-brother Henry VI. Tudor brought his widowed sister-in-law, Margaret Beaufort, to Pembroke where, in 1457, she gave birth to her only child, who was to become King Henry VII of England.

 

In the 15th and 16th centuries, the castle was a place of peace until the outbreak of the English Civil War. Although most of South Wales sided with the King, Pembroke declared for Parliament. It was besieged by Royalist troops but was saved after Parliamentary reinforcements arrived by sea from nearby Milford Haven. Parliamentary forces then went on to capture the Royalist castles of Tenby, Haverfordwest and Carew.

 

In 1648, at the beginning of the Second Civil War, Pembroke's commander Colonel John Poyer led a Royalist uprising alongside Colonel Powell, Tenby Castle, and Sir Nicholas Kemoys, Chepstow Castle. Oliver Cromwell came to Pembroke on 24 May 1648 and took the castle after a seven-week siege. Its three leaders were found guilty of treason and Cromwell ordered the castle to be destroyed. Townspeople were even encouraged to disassemble the fortress and re-use its stone for their purposes.

 

The castle was then abandoned and allowed to decay. It remained in ruins until 1880, when a three-year restoration project was undertaken. Nothing further was done until 1928, when Major-General Sir Ivor Philipps acquired the castle and began an extensive restoration of the castle's walls, gatehouses, and towers. After his death, a trust was set up for the castle, jointly managed by the Philipps family and Pembroke town council.

 

In July 2022, archaeological survey funded by the Natural History Museum and the British Cave Research Society uncovered evidence of prehistoric megafauna such as reindeer and woolly mammoth bones, in addition to seashells, pigs and deer at Wogan Cavern. According to the researchers, the cave was occupied by residents as far back as the Paleolithic and Mesolithic Periods.

 

Pembroke has appeared in numerous feature films. These include the 1968 film The Lion in Winter, the 1976 film Jabberwocky, the BBC adaptation of C.S. Lewis's Prince Caspian, the film of Shakespeare's Richard II, and the 2016 Anglo-American romantic film Me Before You. It features as the fictional Penleven Castle in Cornwall in the 2015 comedy film The Bad Education Movie.

 

The Castle Pond has only been a ‘pond’ since the barrage was built in the late 1970s. To the west of the barrage wading birds can be seen feeding in the mud sediments, and redshank, curlew, common sandpiper, little egret and kingfisher are frequently seen from the barrage. It is a delight during the summer when the weather is warm to stand and watch dozens of swallows swooping to feed low over the water, martins flashing past you on the wing, and swifts screaming as they slice through the sky above hunting food.

 

Pembroke River is a short waterway near Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, West Wales.

 

Rising at Hogeston Hill, near Manorbier Newton, the river meanders through Lamphey and flows past Pembroke Castle to its confluence with Milford Haven Waterway at Pennar Mouth.

 

When the river reaches the town of Pembroke, there are three pools, the first of which is Mill Pond, then downstream is Middle Mill Pond, followed by Castle Pond below the castle. The river is navigable to small craft from Pennar to Mill Pond, but is normally closed at Castle Pond. A rally is held once a year to allow small craft into Castle Pond, and since 1994 an annual canoe race has been held in the river.

 

Pennarmouth is the opening of that branch of the Haven upon which Pembroke town lies, where the Custom house of Milford is kept. The entrance or breadth between rock and rock, is but 200 yards at-high water, and 112 yards at low water, and from nine to twelve feet deep. The navigation up this river to Pembroke town is much impeded by the rubbish of the lime-stone quarries being thrown into the river, which ought to be prevented, or the place, in process of time, will be stopped up. Within Pennarmouth a dock might be made which would contain all the vessels in England, and which would be, perhaps, the greatest thing in the world of that kind.

 

A dockyard was built soon afterwards, not on the Pembroke River, but on the River Cleddau just to the north, which became Pembroke Dockyard, developing into the town of Pembroke Dock. Writing in 1810, Richard Fenton notes that there is a Pembroke Ferry, although he does not name the river, which may have been across the Cleddau. The River Pembroke, though, was clearly still an important waterway, as Lewis's Topographical Dictionary of 1833 describes:

The town is beautifully situated on an elevated ridge projecting into the head of the Pennar Mouth Pill, forming the largest southern creek of Milford Haven, and which it divides into two branches, by which, at high water, it is nearly insulated and over each of which is a neat bridge of stone...the inhabitants consisting of persons of small independent fortune, shop keepers, publicans, and a few whose business is at the dock.

 

Lewis also refers to the river as "a branch of Milford Harbour (which) terminates at the town". Further, it says:

The entrance from Milford Haven to the creek at the head of which the town of Pembroke is situated, at low water, is little more than a hundred yards wide, and from nine to twelve feet deep; but proceeding upwards it immediately expands into a wide oozy reach, called Crow Pool, containing an abundance of excellent oysters.

 

In February 1889 the river was the scene of a tragedy when the Bentlass ferry boat capsized and sank, drowning all 16 passengers and crew.

 

Pembroke is a town and community in Pembrokeshire, Wales, with a population of 7,552. The names of both the town and the county (of which the county town is Haverfordwest) have a common origin; both are derived from the Cantref of Penfro: Pen, "head" or "end", and bro, "region", "country", "land", which has been interpreted to mean either "Land's End" or "headland".

 

Pembroke features a number of historic buildings, town walls, complexes and Pembroke Castle which was the birthplace of Henry Tudor, who became Henry VII of England.

 

Pembroke Castle, the substantial remains of a stone medieval fortress founded by the Normans in 1093, stands at the western tip of a peninsula surrounded by water on three sides. The castle was the seat of the powerful Earls of Pembroke and the birthplace of King Henry VII of England. Gerald de Windsor was the first recorded Constable of Pembroke. Pembroke town and castle and its surroundings are linked with the early Christian church. Following the final extension of the castle about 1254 the town was extended and defensive perimeter walls erected around the edge of the town. The walls survive on their medieval foundations, although much rebuilt over the centuries. A great many of the town's original medieval burgage plots survive and are divided by early stone walls that are of significant national importance.

 

Monkton Priory, sited on a hill across the river from the castle, founded in 1098 by Arnulf de Montgomery and granted by him to the Benedictine order, has very early foundations and retains much of the Norman walls of the nave. The choir and sanctuary were renovated in the nineteenth century. Monkton Hall, close by the Priory church, is regarded as the oldest domestic building in Pembrokeshire and possibly Wales and is thought to have been the guesthouse for visitors to the Priory.

 

The first stone building in the town was a defensive tower, now known as the Medieval Chapel, at 69a Main Street and built on a cliff edge. There are the remains of a great hall to the north and recently filled-in arched cellars. The building was thought to have been later used as an early church as the layout is the same as St. Govan's Chapel and was used by John Wesley in 1764 to preach Methodism. In 1866 it became the brewery for the York Tavern which was briefly Oliver Cromwell's headquarters at the end of the Siege of Pembroke during the English Civil War.

 

The town's main bridge across the River Pembroke, which also acts as a dam, crosses and constrains the millpond. The first bridge was constructed to house a tide mill, originally granted to the Knight's Templar in 1199. The last mill building was destroyed by fire in 1956.

 

On both banks of the Pembroke River to the west of the castle are many remains of early activities. The North Shore Quarries are relatively complete as are the remains of medieval and Elizabethan slipways where wooden vessels were built before the industrial dockyard and admiralty town was built on the grid pattern of Pembroke Dock. There is a very early complete graving dock in what was Hancock's Yard.

 

During the English Civil War, the strategic maritime shire was primarily in the control of the parliamentary forces which aspired to prevent communication to Ireland.

 

At Pennar Flats there was an early submarine base used for experiments in submarine warfare. Three of the houses on the then foreshore, part of the shipyard before the Admiralty Dock Yard was built, are still standing but are heavily altered.[citation needed]

 

The ferry port of Pembroke Dock is 3 miles (4.8 km) to the northwest of Pembroke. It was established in 1814.

 

Pembroke town stands on the South Pembrokeshire limestone peninsula by the estuary of the River Cleddau, flanked on all sides by woodland and arable farmland. The town is 8 miles (13 km) south of the county town of Haverfordwest.

 

The town is centred on Main Street, which is the only street that is inside the original Pembroke town walls. Outside the walls, residential estates have been built to the north towards Pembroke Dock, to the east towards Lamphey, and to the south. To the west of the town lies the village of Monkton, which is included as part of the community of Pembroke. At the 2001 census, the community had a population of 7,214.

 

The conurbation of Pembroke Dock and Pembroke has a combined population of 15,890 and as such is one of the major population centres of West Wales.

 

There are two tiers of local government covering Pembroke, at community (town) and county level: Pembroke Town Council and Pembrokeshire County Council. Pembroke Town Council is based at Pembroke Town Hall. The community of Pembroke covers an area of 4.58 square miles (1,190 ha) and includes the Pembroke St Mary North, St Mary South, St Michael and Monkton wards.

 

For representation on the county council, the four wards comprising Pembroke community each elect one councillor.

 

Pembroke is part of the Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire Senedd constituency and UK Parliamentary constituency.

 

The local Member of Parliament (MP) is Simon Hart, a Conservative.

 

Pembroke was an ancient borough, with evidence of borough charters dating back to at least 1168. The borough covered the two parishes of Pembroke St Mary and Pembroke St Michael plus part of the parish of Monkton (also known as Pembroke St Nicholas). The borough was reformed to become a municipal borough in 1836. The borough included a sizeable rural area within its boundaries as well as the built up area of Pembroke itself. The town of Pembroke Dock, which developed from the early nineteenth century as a separate urban area was nevertheless within the borough boundaries of Pembroke, falling within the parish of Pembroke St Mary. The part of the parish of Monkton outside the borough boundaries became a separate parish called Hundleton in 1894.

 

As Pembroke Dock grew through the nineteenth century it began to rival the old town of Pembroke for position as the main settlement within the borough. By 1895 Pembroke Borough Council had adopted the practice of holding its meetings alternately at Pembroke Town Hall and at Pembroke Dock, where the council had established its main administrative offices at 37 Bush Street (renumbered 71 Bush Street in 1906). The council remained based at 71 Bush Street (and later also expanded into neighbouring 73 Bush Street) until the early 1970s when it acquired Llanion Park, part of the Llanion Barracks at Pembroke Dock, to serve as its headquarters.

 

Pembroke Borough Council was abolished under the Local Government Act 1972, with the area becoming part of the new district of South Pembrokeshire within the county of Dyfed on 1 April 1974. A community was established to cover the area of the former borough, with its council taking the name Pembroke Town Council. South Pembrokeshire District Council took over Llanion Park at Pembroke Dock to serve as its headquarters.

 

On 1 April 1986 the community of Pembroke was split into a Pembroke Dock community and a reduced Pembroke community, with Pembroke Town Council thereafter just covering the old town of Pembroke itself.

 

South Pembrokeshire was abolished in 1996, with the area becoming part of a re-established Pembrokeshire.

 

Primary and pre-school (ages 3–11) education in Pembroke is served by two state schools. In Pembroke town, Golden Grove CP School is a dual stream school established in 2002 following the amalgamation of Golden Manor Infants School and Grove Junior School. In Monkton, pupils can attend Monkton Priory CP School.

 

Secondary education is provided by Pembroke School (in Welsh: Ysgol Benfro), a mixed 11–18 comprehensive school of 1,600 pupils with a sixth form of about 200. The school was formed in 1972 as a result of the amalgamation of the former grammar school and secondary modern school. The school takes pupils from the Pembroke family of schools, which as well as Golden Grove and Monkton Priory includes community primary schools in Lamphey, Orielton, Pennar and Pembroke Dock, voluntary controlled primary schools in Angle, Cosheston and Stackpole, and St. Mary's Catholic Primary School in Pembroke Dock.

 

Pembroke 21C community association was founded in 2004, and is based out of the Foundry House building on the Commons, which they operate as a community centre. Activities carried out by 21C include organising the annual Pembroke Festival, running the town's fortnightly farmers' market and producing a quarterly newsletter which is distributed to all households in the town. Pembroke Rugby Club organises the town's annual carnival, which is usually held in June. Pembroke Library shares a building with the Tourist Information Centre on Commons Road and offers a full lending service and internet access.

 

Pembroke has been twinned with the towns of Bergen, Lower Saxony, Germany, since 1977 and Pembroke, Malta, since 2002.

 

Notable people

King Henry VII (1457–1509), King of England, born in Pembroke Castle.

William Lort Mansel (1753–1820), an English churchman and Cambridge fellow.

Frank Goodden (1889–1917), a pioneering British aviator and test pilot

Mervyn Johns (1899–1992), a Welsh stage, film and TV character actor.

W. F. Grimes CBE (1905–1988), a Welsh archaeologist, studied the prehistory of Wales.

Daniel Jones, OBE (1912–1993), a Welsh composer of classical music.

John Cooke CB, OBE (1922–2011), a British doctor and senior Royal Air force officer.

Peter Bishop (1953–2022), an English painter of mountain landscape of north Wales and an art historian.

 

Sport

William Bowen (1862–1925), a Welsh international rugby union player, capped 13 times for Wales.

Henry Davies (1865–1934), a Welsh horse racing jockey and first-class cricketer.

W. J. A. Davies OBE (1890–1967), a Welsh rugby union footballer, capped 22 times for England

Reg Thomas (1907–1946), a Welsh middle-distance runner, he competed at the 1928 and 1932 Summer Olympics

David Gwynne-James (1937−2011), a Welsh first-class cricketer, British Army officer and military historian.

Scott Gammer (born 1976), a Welsh former professional boxer, British heavyweight title-holder from 2006 to 2007

Jonathan Thomas (born 1982), a Welsh rugby union coach and former player, capped 67 times for Wales.

 

Pembroke Rugby Club is on Upper Lamphey Road. The ground is called Crickmarren. The club plays in WRU Division Five West. Pembroke's main game of the season is often the local derby with rivals the Pembroke Dock Harlequins. Pembroke produced Ospreys and Welsh international Jonathan Thomas, Welsh international Dominic Day and Scotland international Luke Hamilton.

 

Other sporting clubs in the area include the football team Monkton Swifts.

 

The town is home to Pembroke Cricket Club. The cricket club plays its home games at its Treleet ground on Upper Lamphey Road, opposite the rugby club. The club currently has a 1st and a 2nd team playing in divisions 2 and 4 of the Pembrokeshire league. The club colours are green and gold.

 

In February 2012, it was revealed that Pembroke was the UK's second-slowest broadband town. The average internet download speed in Pembroke was just over 1.6 Mbit/s (1600 kbit/s) compared to the UK average of 12.0 Mbit/s (12000 kbit/s) at the time.

 

BT's telephone exchange, which serves Pembroke and Pembroke Dock, was upgraded in 2014 under the Superfast Cymru programme and new cabinets were built to provide FTTC technology. Additional exchanges across Pembrokeshire are also being upgraded under the programme, with a goal of bringing superfast broadband to 96% of Wales by spring 2016.

 

Pembrokeshire is a county in the south-west of Wales. It is bordered by Carmarthenshire to the east, Ceredigion to the northeast, and is otherwise surrounded by the sea. Haverfordwest is the largest town and administrative headquarters of Pembrokeshire County Council.

 

The county is generally sparsely populated and rural, with an area of 200 square miles (520 km2) and a population of 123,400. After Haverfordwest, the largest settlements are Milford Haven (13,907), Pembroke Dock (9,753), and Pembroke (7,552). St Davids (1,841) is a city, the smallest by population in the UK. Welsh is spoken by 17.2 percent of the population, and for historic reasons is more widely spoken in the north of the county than in the south.

 

Pembrokeshire's coast is its most dramatic geographic feature, created by the complex geology of the area. It is a varied landscape which includes high sea cliffs, wide sandy beaches, the large natural harbour of Milford Haven, and several offshore islands which are home to seabird colonies. Most of it is protected by Pembrokeshire Coast National Park, and can be hiked on the 190-mile (310 km) Pembrokeshire Coast Path. The interior of Pembrokeshire is relatively flat and gently undulating, with the exception of the Preseli Mountains in the north.

 

There are many prehistoric sites in Pembrokeshire, particularly in the Preseli Mountains. During the Middle Ages several castles were built by the Normans, such as Pembroke and Cilgerran, and St David's Cathedral became an important pilgrimage site. During the Industrial Revolution the county remained relatively rural, with the exception of Milford Haven, which was developed as a port and Royal Navy dockyard. It is now the UK's third-largest port, primarily because of its two liquefied natural gas terminals. The economy of the county is now focused on agriculture, oil and gas, and tourism.

 

Human habitation of the region that is now Pembrokeshire extends back to between 125,000 and 70,000 years  and there are numerous prehistoric sites such as Pentre Ifan, and neolithic remains (12,000 to 6,500 years ago), more of which were revealed in an aerial survey during the 2018 heatwave; in the same year, a 1st-century Celtic chariot burial was discovered, the first such find in Wales. There may have been dairy farming in Neolithic times.

 

There is little evidence of Roman occupation in what is now Pembrokeshire. Ptolemy's Geography, written c. 150, mentioned some coastal places, two of which have been identified as the River Teifi and what is now St Davids Head, but most Roman writers did not mention the area; there may have been a Roman settlement near St Davids and a road from Bath, but this comes from a 14th-century writer. Any evidence for villas or Roman building materials reported by mediaeval or later writers has not been verified, though some remains near Dale were tentatively identified as Roman in character by topographer Richard Fenton in his Historical Tour of 1810. Fenton stated that he had "...reason to be of opinion that they had not colonized Pembrokeshire till near the decline of their empire in Britain".

 

Part of a possible Roman road is noted by CADW near Llanddewi Velfrey, and another near Wiston. Wiston is also the location of the first Roman fort discovered in Pembrokeshire, investigated in 2013.

 

Some artefacts, including coins and weapons, have been found, but it is not clear whether these belonged to Romans or to a Romanised population. Welsh tradition has it that Magnus Maximus founded Haverfordwest, and took a large force of local men on campaign in Gaul in 383 which, together with the reduction of Roman forces in south Wales, left a defensive vacuum which was filled by incomers from Ireland.

 

Between 350 and 400, an Irish tribe known as the Déisi settled in the region known to the Romans as Demetae.  The Déisi merged with the local Welsh, with the regional name underlying Demetae evolving into Dyfed, which existed as an independent petty kingdom from the 5th century.  In 904, Hywel Dda married Elen (died 943), daughter of the king of Dyfed Llywarch ap Hyfaidd, and merged Dyfed with his own maternal inheritance of Seisyllwg, forming the new realm of Deheubarth ("southern district"). Between the Roman and Norman periods, the region was subjected to raids from Vikings, who established settlements and trading posts at Haverfordwest, Fishguard, Caldey Island and elsewhere.

 

Dyfed remained an integral province of Deheubarth, but this was contested by invading Normans and Flemings who arrived between 1067 and 1111.  The region became known as Pembroke (sometimes archaic "Penbroke":), after the Norman castle built in the cantref of Penfro. In 1136, Prince Owain Gwynedd at Crug Mawr near Cardigan met and destroyed a 3,000-strong Norman/Flemish army and incorporated Deheubarth into Gwynedd.  Norman/Flemish influence never fully recovered in West Wales.  In 1138, the county of Pembrokeshire was named as a county palatine. Rhys ap Gruffydd, the son of Owain Gwynedd's daughter Gwenllian, re-established Welsh control over much of the region and threatened to retake all of Pembrokeshire, but died in 1197. After Deheubarth was split by a dynastic feud, Llywelyn the Great almost succeeded in retaking the region of Pembroke between 1216 and his death in 1240.  In 1284 the Statute of Rhuddlan was enacted to introduce the English common law system to Wales, heralding 100 years of peace, but had little effect on those areas already established under the Marcher Lords, such as Cemais in the north of the county.

 

Henry Tudor, born at Pembroke Castle in 1457, landed an army in Pembrokeshire in 1485 and marched to Cardigan.  Rallying support, he continued to Leicestershire and defeated the larger army of Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth Field. As Henry VII, he became the first monarch of the House of Tudor, which ruled England until 1603.

 

The Laws in Wales Act 1535 effectively abolished the powers of the Marcher Lords and divided the county into seven hundreds, roughly corresponding to the seven pre-Norman cantrefi of Dyfed. The hundreds were (clockwise from the northeast): Cilgerran, Cemais, Dewisland, Roose, Castlemartin, Narberth and Dungleddy and each was divided into civil parishes; a 1578 map in the British Library is the earliest known to show parishes and chapelries in Pembrokeshire. The Elizabethan era brought renewed prosperity to the county through an opening up of rural industries, including agriculture, mining and fishing, with exports to England and Ireland, though the formerly staple woollen industry had all but disappeared. 

 

During the First English Civil War (1642–1646) the county gave strong support to the Roundheads (Parliamentarians), in contrast to the rest of Wales, which was staunchly Royalist. In spite of this, an incident in Pembrokeshire triggered the opening shots of the Second English Civil War when local units of the New Model Army mutinied. Oliver Cromwell defeated the uprising at the Siege of Pembroke in July 1648.  On 13 August 1649, the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland began when New Model Army forces sailed from Milford Haven.

 

In 1720, Emmanuel Bowen described Pembrokeshire as having five market towns, 45 parishes and about 4,329 houses, with an area of 420,000 acres (1,700 km2). In 1791 a petition was presented to the House of Commons concerning the poor state of many of the county's roads, pointing out that repairs could not be made compulsory by the law as it stood. The petition was referred to committee.  People applying for poor relief were often put to work mending roads. Workhouses were poorly documented. Under the Poor Laws, costs and provisions were kept to a minimum, but the emphasis was often on helping people to be self-employed. While the Poor Laws provided a significant means of support, there were many charitable and benefit societies. After the Battle of Fishguard, the failed French invasion of 1797, 500 French prisoners were held at Golden Hill Farm, Pembroke. From 1820 to 1878 one of the county's prisons, with a capacity of 86, was in the grounds of Haverfordwest Castle. In 1831, the area of the county was calculated to be 345,600 acres (1,399 km2) with a population of 81,424.

 

It was not until nearly the end of the 19th century that mains water was provided to rural south Pembrokeshire by means of a reservoir at Rosebush and cast iron water pipes throughout the district.

 

Throughout much of the 20th century (1911 to 1961) the population density in the county remained stable while it rose in England and Wales as a whole. There was considerable military activity in Pembrokeshire and offshore in the 20th century: a naval base at Milford Haven because German U-boats were active off the coast in World War I and, in World War II, military exercises in the Preseli Mountains and a number of military airfields. The wartime increase in air activity saw a number of aircraft accidents and fatalities, often due to unfamiliarity with the terrain. From 1943 to 1944, 5,000 soldiers from the United States Army's 110th Infantry Regiment were based in the county, preparing for D-Day. Military and industrial targets in the county were subjected to bombing during World War II. After the end of the war, German prisoners of war were accommodated in Pembrokeshire, the largest prison being at Haverfordwest, housing 600. The County of Pembroke War Memorial in Haverfordwest carries the names of 1,200 of those that perished in World War I.

 

In 1972, a second reservoir for south Pembrokeshire, at Llys y Fran, was completed.

 

Pembrokeshire's tourism portal is Visit Pembrokeshire, run by Pembrokeshire County Council. In 2015 4.3 million tourists visited the county, staying for an average of 5.24 days, spending £585 million; the tourism industry supported 11,834 jobs. Many of Pembrokeshire's beaches have won awards, including Poppit Sands and Newport Sands. In 2018, Pembrokeshire received the most coast awards in Wales, with 56 Blue Flag, Green Coast or Seaside Awards. In the 2019 Wales Coast Awards, 39 Pembrokeshire beaches were recognised, including 11 awarded Blue Flag status.

 

The Pembrokeshire coastline is a major draw to tourists; in 2011 National Geographic Traveller magazine voted the Pembrokeshire Coast the second best in the world and in 2015 the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park was listed among the top five parks in the world by a travel writer for the Huffington Post. Countryfile Magazine readers voted the Pembrokeshire Coast the top UK holiday destination in 2018, and in 2019 Consumers' Association members placed Tenby and St Davids in the top three best value beach destinations in Britain. With few large urban areas, Pembrokeshire is a "dark sky" destination. The many wrecks off the Pembrokeshire coast attract divers. The decade from 2012 saw significant, increasing numbers of Atlantic bluefin tuna, not seen since the 1960s, and now seen by some as an opportunity to encourage tourist sport fishing.

 

The county has a number of theme and animal parks (examples are Folly Farm Adventure Park and Zoo, Manor House Wildlife Park, Blue Lagoon Water Park and Oakwood Theme Park), museums and other visitor attractions including Castell Henllys reconstructed Iron Age fort, Tenby Lifeboat Station and Milford Haven's Torch Theatre. There are 21 marked cycle trails around the county.

 

Pembrokeshire Destination Management Plan for 2020 to 2025 sets out the scope and priorities to grow tourism in Pembrokeshire by increasing its value by 10 per cent in the five years, and to make Pembrokeshire a top five UK destination.

 

As the national sport of Wales, rugby union is widely played throughout the county at both town and village level. Haverfordwest RFC, founded in 1875, is a feeder club for Llanelli Scarlets. Village team Crymych RFC in 2014 plays in WRU Division One West. There are numerous football clubs in the county, playing in five leagues with Haverfordwest County A.F.C. competing in the Cymru Premier.

 

Triathlon event Ironman Wales has been held in Pembrokeshire since 2011, contributing £3.7 million to the local economy, and the county committed in 2017 to host the event for a further five years. Ras Beca, a mixed road, fell and cross country race attracting UK-wide competitors, has been held in the Preselis annually since 1977. The record of 32 minutes 5 seconds has stood since 1995. Pembrokeshire Harriers athletics club was formed in 2001 by the amalgamation of Cleddau Athletic Club (established 1970) and Preseli Harriers (1989) and is based in Haverfordwest.

 

The annual Tour of Pembrokeshire road-cycling event takes place over routes of optional length. The 4th Tour, in April 2015, attracted 1,600 riders including Olympic gold medallist Chris Boardman and there were 1,500 entrants to the 2016 event. Part of Route 47 of the Celtic Trail cycle route is in Pembrokeshire. The Llys y Fran Hillclimb is an annual event run by Swansea Motor Club, and there are several other county motoring events held each year.

 

Abereiddy's Blue Lagoon was the venue for a round of the Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series in 2012, 2013, and 2016; the Welsh Surfing Federation has held the Welsh National Surfing Championships at Freshwater West for several years, and Llys y Fran Country Park hosted the Welsh Dragonboat Championships from 2014 to 2017.

 

While not at major league level, cricket is played throughout the county and many villages such as Lamphey, Creselly, Llangwm, Llechryd and Crymych field teams in minor leagues under the umbrella of the Cricket Board of Wales.

 

Notable people

From mediaeval times, Rhys ap Gruffydd (c. 1132-1197), ruler of the kingdom of Deheubarth, was buried in St Davids Cathedral. and Gerald of Wales was born c. 1146 at Manorbier Castle. Henry Tudor (later Henry VII) was born in 1457 at Pembroke Castle.

 

The pirate Bartholomew Roberts (Black Bart) (Welsh: Barti Ddu) was born in Casnewydd Bach, between Fishguard and Haverfordwest in 1682.

 

In later military history, Jemima Nicholas, heroine of the so-called "last invasion of Britain" in 1797, was from Fishguard, Lieutenant General Sir Thomas Picton GCB, born in Haverfordwest, was killed at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 and Private Thomas Collins is believed to be the only Pembrokeshire man that fought in the Battle of Rorke's Drift in 1879.

 

In the arts, siblings Gwen and Augustus John were both born in Pembrokeshire, as was the novelist Sarah Waters; singer Connie Fisher grew up in Pembrokeshire. The actor Christian Bale was born in Haverfordwest.

 

Stephen Crabb, a former Secretary of State for Work and Pensions and Secretary of State for Wales, was brought up in Pembrokeshire and is one of the county's two Members of Parliament, the other being Simon Hart,[90] who served as Secretary of State for Wales from 2019 to 2022.

For some, confinement has been constraining, for others, we are finding inspiration in places we never looked before. See out photos shot from the window. - www.aperturetours.com/blog/2020/shooting-from-the-window

When under time constrains and/or wanting to keep travel costs under control, one can always find ways to connect with nature within a short distance from urban centers. Here, with past year’s images I am sort of giving a heads up as to what one might discover along the Rideau Canal.

Rideau Canal, Kingston, Ontario, Canada

History and tradition are great, but should be used for learning and memories, but not constrain us in moving forward. The lines of this 1931 Ford are delightful and the car is many times more photogenic than today's beasts, but I'm not sure I would enjoy a cross country trip in one of these.

 

Taken at Coronation Park in Oakville, Ontario Canada

This fence runs along side a footpath which leads along the bank of the river Pembroke which flows around the North & Western sides of Pembrooke Castle:

 

Pembroke (/ˈpɛmbrʊk/; Welsh: Penfro pronounced [pɛnˈvroː]) is an historic settlement and former county town of Pembrokeshire in west Wales. The town and county derive their names from the cantref of Penfro: Pen = "head" or "end", and bro = "region", "country", "land", which means, "Land's End".

 

On both banks of Pembroke River to the west of the castle are many remains of early activities. The buildings of Catshole Quarry and the rare vegetation with the irreplaceable foreshore have recently been buried by dumped materials. The North Shore Quarries are relatively complete as are the remains of medieval and Elizabethan slipways where wooden vessels were built before the industrial Dockyard and Admiralty town was built on the grid pattern of Pembroke Dock.

 

There is a very early graving dock complete in what was Hancocks Yard, about to be buried by a massive infill of the mud flats to the North. The reclaimed land will be used to build high rise flats! The bridge which crosses and constrains the millpond was constructed to house a tide mill, originally granted to the Knight's Templars in 1199 which survived until it was burnt down in 1956.

 

At Pennar flats the early submarine base used for experiments in submarine warfare has been recently bulldozed to allow speculative development by executive housing. Three of the houses on the then foreshore, part of the shipyard before the Admiralty Dock Yard was built, are still standing but are heavily altered.

 

Pembroke Castle (Welsh: Castell Penfro) is a medieval castle in Pembroke, West Wales. Standing beside the River Cleddau, it underwent major restoration work in the early 20th century. The castle was the original seat of the Earldom of Pembroke.

 

In 1093 Roger of Montgomery built the first castle at the site when he fortified the promontory during the Norman invasion of Wales. A century later this castle was given to William Marshal by Richard I. Marshall, who would become one of the most powerful men in 12th-Century Britain, rebuilt Pembroke in stone creating most of the structure that remains today

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pembroke,_Pembrokeshire

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pembroke_Castle

THIS SHORE LIGHTHOUSE GUARDS THE EAST SIDE OF THE ENTRANCE TO LOCH RYAN FROM A POINT JUST SOUTH EAST OF IT. IT STANDS ON CAIRN POINT WHICH PROJECTS INTO LOCH RYAN FROM A NARROW SHELF IN FRONT OF THE MAIN (A77) ROAD; A SOLID PORTION ON THE EAST SIDE OF THE LANTERN CONSTRAINS THE LIGHT TO SEAWARD. THE LIGHTHOUSE WAS BUILT BY ALAN STEVENSON AND FIRST LIT IN 1847. IT WAS CONVERTED TO OIL BURNING IN 1847, AND AUTOMATED (ELECTRIFIED AND MADE 'UNATTENDED') IN 1964.

ODC: ENDS WITH "AIN"

 

---

attain from the clouds

just unable to maintain

remains on the ground

---

 

During a walk in the park, Jaiden picks up this feather causing Jenna to protest wildly as she spoke of germs and diseases hidden on the discarded feather. Jaiden, being contrary, is now determined to hold and maintain his newly attained possession. Me... I decide to make some lemonade by making the best of a yelling-screaming-children situation.

You will see these around outport Newfoundland setting in peoples front yards like flower pots.

After it was well known that CN was intending to removed the aging GE's from their fleet in numbers, they put a few on 570; the Aldershot based road freight. My assumption is they did this to keep the (potentially) unreliable motive power close to the McMillan Diesel shop, with the added bonus of constraining these old timers to service that doesn't require PTC, which they didn't have. I tried to take full advantage and on this occasion a "big" snowstorm provided the backdrop.

 

The way 570 works is, by day they run Aldershot yard to McMillan and return. By night, part of the train turns into 555 and continues onto Hamilton (Aldershot to Parkdale Yard [in Hamilton] and return). It's essentially how most of the local traffic to Hamilton, Aldershot and Oakville areas arrives to their respective yards. This can accumulate to quite a lot of traffic, with 570 being well over 100 cars.

 

This makes for quite the show here at Mainway as 570 really begins digging into the grade up the Niagara escarpment. Here, they were probably only doing 10-15 mph, getting every bit of the notch 8 horsepower from these middle-to-old-age workhorses as they could muster.

 

CN 570

Mile 46.3 Halton Sub

Burlington, ON

Due to timing constrain and lack of pre-planning I had a little struggle to find a vantage as there were crowd everywhere.

 

After much of a squeeze and bump, I finally managed to find a place to setup tripod and start shooting the NDP 2015 Fireworks. Hope you guys can enjoy my work.

L a r g e r

 

Short series of drifting work inspired by David Burdeny; of course its far similiarity from his work...

 

This is just a wannabe shots with shorter exposure....:)

 

Straits of Malacca - Indian Ocean

 

Besides that, would love to thank my good friend for fixing up the CS4 problem and re-install it. Had it working perfectly fine now and am very grateful!

 

You can choose to view other * drift * works under * in motion * set.

 

!!! Please, do not leave award or faving without a comment, a small comment will make my day. Thank you !!!

Rivoli, Museo di arte Contemporanea (Rivoli - Piemonte): molte sono le cose che costringono il mondo attuale.

Rivoli, Contemporary art Museum (Rivoli - Piedmont): There are many things that constrain the current world

www.khyber.org/places/2005/ZhobDistrict.shtml

  

Elevation: 7,500-10,000 feet

Area: 20,297 Sq Km

 

Zhob means oozing water, a reference perhaps to the spring which constitutes the source of Zhob River. Karez water can be seen everywhere when there is no drought situation. The Zhob district is located in the Balochistan Province in the north east of Pakistan. It lies close to the Afghanistan border. Zhob town is just east of Zhob river on an open plain. To the north is a ridge, about 150 ft high, on which is a castle from the time when the British colonized the area. In the winter, the weather is cold and the snow is normal. In the summer, although the temperature can get up to 100 degrees Fahrenheit, there is little moisture, so it is not uncomfortable.

Zhob is a picturesque valley known for its beautiful mountains, treks and archeological sites. It starts from the Muslim Bagh (7500 feet) and ends at the Afghan border at Fort Sandeman (10000 feet). It expands to beautiful, breathtaking views throughout the valley. With an abundance of fruit orchards there is one dangerous little thing found amongst them, and that is the scorpion. In the month of April the flowers bloom and you'll be able to see an extraordinary site with flowers and snow together.

  

History:

The tribes inhabiting the area are indigenous to the land. Zhob is the cradle of the Afghan race. Qais Abdul Rashid, who is believed to be one of the progenitors of the Pashtoons or Afghans, lived in the Suleiman mountains near Zhob. He was born in 575 AD and died in 661 AD. Natives call the place where he is buried "Da Kase Ghar" (the mountain of Qais). He is buried near the Takht-e-Suleiman. The Chinese pilgrim Hiven Tsiang who visited India in 629 AD, described the Afghans as living in Zhob.

The inhabitants of Zhob valley gave tough resistance to Mehmood Ghazni, when he initiated his raids on India. Later, however they joined ranks with him. Subsequently the area came under the rule of Nadir Shah from 1736 to 1747 and later Ahmed Shah Abdali from 1747 to 1773. Zhob remained under the rule of Durranis and Barakzais till British captured it. Preceding this event was a period of fifty years of anarchy when Zhob was dubbed as 'Yaghistan" or the land of the rebels. A number of areas now in Zhob, Killa Saifullah, and Pishin districts were ceded to British India after signing of Durand Treaty in 1893. They soon became a district

Sir Robert Sandeman, the first Agent to the governor General in Balochistan occupied Zhob in 1889 extending his forward policy to the region with the subjugation of the tribes inhabiting the Suleman range and occupation and control of numerous passes through it to the south. He also secured the great Gomal pass and the carvanic routes to Ghazani and Kandhar. Captain Mac Ivor had been appointed the first political agent in Zhob with formation as the Political Agency in 1890. Zhob district is the second oldest existing district of Balochistan, after Quetta.

Zhob was formed as a Political Ageny under the British rule in 1890. The district and its town acquired the name of Zhob in 1975. Previously, it was known as Fort Sandeman after Sir Robert Sandeman; who was then Political Agent to the Governor General in Balochistan. It was Sir Robert Sandeman who extended British Rule into this region. The name was changed on July 30 1976 by the then Prime Minister of Pakistan; Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. The hand written remarks inserted by him into the visitors book; preserved at the Zhob Militia Mess, says "Today we have taken a decision to eliminate the last vestige of colonialism in this historical place by changing the name to Zhob instead of Sandeman; the British conqueror and oppressor of Pathan and Baloch people and of the country." Traditionally, Fort Sandeman was called Appozai, named after a village situated two kilometres away.

  

Geography:

The district lies between 30 30 to 32 05 north latitudes and 67 26 to 70 00 east longitudes. It is bounded on the north by Afghanistan and South Waziristan agency of FATA, on the east by the tribal area adjoining Dera Ismail Khan district of NWFP and Musakhel district, on the south and south-west by Loralai and Killa Saifullah districts. Total area of district is 20297 square kilometers.

The district has an important geo-strategic location. It links Afghanistan, South Waziristan Agency, D.I.Khan district, Killa Saifullah, Loralai, and MusaKhel.

Topographically, the district is covered with mountains and hills intersected by the broad valley of Zhob and its tributaries. The Toba Kakar range covers the western half of the district extending from the boundary of Afghanistan up to the Zhob River. The Suleman range locally called as the Kasi Ghar lies on the eastern boundary of the district. The famous Takht-e-Sulaiman or Solomon's Throne is the highest peak of this range. It is about 3441 meters above sea level and located just outside the boundary. The Sindh Ghar, Tor Ghar and Sur Ghar ranges are also situated in the eastern side of the district. The two mountainous regions are of different character. The great part of the district, beyond the left bank of the Zhob, consists almost entirely beyond the district boundary. The general elevation of the district is 1500 to 3000 meters (7,500-10,000 feet)

On the south of Zhob valley, a succession of parallel ridges running from north-east to south-west divide the drainage of the Zhob from that of the Bori valley in the Loralai district.

  

RIVERS AND STREAMS

The two principal drainage channels of the district are the Zhob and the Kundar Rivers, both flow into the Gomal River. The Zhob river has a total length of about 410 kilometres. Zhob River is the only river in the country that follows a north eastern course. It springs from the Kan Metarzai range (Tsari Mehtarazai Pass), passes about 4 kilometre from Zhob city and finally flows into the Gomal river near Khajuri Kach. The broad plain of the Zhob River is occupied by the alluvial formation. The Kundar River rises from the central and highest point of the Toba Kakar range, a few kilometers northeast of the Sakir. It constitutes boundary between Pakistan and Afghanistan territory for a considerable length.

The other subsidiary rivers or streams are the Baskan, Chukhan, Sri Toi, Sawar, Surab, etc.

  

CLIMATE

The climate of the district is hot and dry in summer and cold in winter. June is the hottest month with mean maximum and minimum temperature of about 37C and 23C respectively. January is the coldest month with mean maximum and minimum temperature of about 13C and -1C degree respectively. The dust storms occur in summer from July to September accompanied by thunderstorms. In winters the wind blows from the west and is very cold. The winds from the Southwest and east are also common, the later invariably brings rain. The wind from the north occasionally blows during September to April bring drought and damage standing crops. Rainfall is scanty and varies with the altitude. Most of the rainfall is received during winter seasons.

  

Flora & Fauna:

Principal trees and plants found in Zhob district are wild olive (shinay), pistachio, chilgoza or edible pine and wild almond in ghigh lands. Other trees include willow, tamarisk (along the beds of streams) pastawana (grewia oppositifolio) and spalnai (calotropis gigantea).

Wild animals are wolves, jackals, hyenas, foxes, deer, and porcupines. Leopards and black bear are occasionally found in the high hills in Suleman range. Wild pigs are seen along Zhob river while straight horned markhors, wild goats, are present in moderate numbers in Shinghar mountains. Among the game bird chakor, partridge and pigeon are numerous i n higher altitudes, Sand grouse, quails, and bustard are found in plains. Other birds are doves, hoopoe, starlings and vegetals, Jay black birds, wood pigeons, cuckoos and thrush live in high ranges while wild duck and pelican are seen along the Zhob river in winter. Snake and scorpion are common every where in Zhob. Fish (Mahsir) are found in every running stream and in Zhob river some of which weigh up to 8 pounds.

 

Agriculture

Most part the area is hilly and barren with every limited water resources for agriculture purposes. However, during recent years tube wells have become quite abundant with the result that agricultural activity has registered a rise and a total of 36170 acre of land is under cultivation in the district. Sowing and harvesting are still largely carried out in traditional manner but the use of agricultural machinery is increasing day by day. However, there is very little scope for a radical increase in the area under cultivation as the area is mostly "Barani". There are two cropping seasons, Kharif and Rabi. Rabi crops are sown between October and mid February and harvested in June. Kharif crops are sown from April to July and harvested by the end of October.

 

Forestry

The district has big potential for social and natural forestry and vegetation cover in the district is quite extensive. There are two forest reserves in the district. The total area under forest cover (including social forest) is around 10,010 hectares. Commercial forestry in the district is for the production of pine nut and timber. The pine- nut forests are very profitable. Commercial forestry or cutting of timber for commercial purposes exists in Sherani sub-division.

 

Horticulture

Grapes are grown in abundance on the foothills of the mountains. Other is almond, apricot and apple.

 

Livestock

Livestock raising is an important source of livelihood for the rural population and this has a great potential. There are four veterinary hospitals in the district, with 57 veterinary dispensaries. There is also one Artificial Insemination Center (A.I) and one Disease Investigation Laboratory (D.I.L).

 

Irrigation

Only 16,206 acres of land is irrigated throughout the district. Majority of the area in the district is irrigated by springs. The following forms of irrigation are found in the district:

•Perennial Irrigation Schemes - 35

•Flood Irrigation Schemes - 10

•Delay Action Dam/Storage Dam - 5

•Flood Protection Schemes - 6

Political Parties in Zhob

Two political parties play an active role in the district. They are Jamiat-e-Ullemah Islam (JUI) and Pakhtoon Milli Awami Party (PKMAP). However, the JUI is a stronger political group than the PKMAP. It is more disciplined and organised on ideological grounds. Since its establishment in 1947, the Pakistan Muslim League received only little support in Zhob district. However, since 1988, support for the Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) has increased, after its candidate Jaffar Khan Mandokhel started winning election. Still he is supported for tribal (Mandokhel) than for party-political reasons.

There are two Senators from the Zhob district, Zariff Khan Mandokhel and Subedar Khan Mandokhel; both are members of the PML-Nawaz. Previously there was another Senator, Rahim Khan Mandokhel from PKMAP, but he resigned after his election to the Provincial Assembly.

 

Trade & Industries

Trade and trading activity in the district is largely in the informal sector because of proximity with Afghanistan. Regular formal trade is relatively limited and mostly confined to consumable items.

Apart from two flourmills located in Zhob town, no industry worth the name exist in the district.

 

Communication:

Zhob is linked by air with major cities of the country. A fokker flight operate from Quetta linking Zhob with Multan, Dera Ismail Khan, Peshawar and Islamabad. Zhob is 320kilometers from Quetta, 225 kilometer from Dera Ismail Khan. However, the road linking with Dera Ismail Khan is for most part a dirt track passing through water streams and only 48 kilometers is metalloid.

The poor condition of the road acts as a deterrent for an increase in inter-provincial transportation and commercial exploitation of the route. The narrow railway linking Quetta with Zhob became moribund in 1984 and the service is no longer available. While it functioned, the railway was a romantic reminder of yesteryears highest railway-station of the country, enroute namely Kan Mehtarzai (altitude 2800 meters). The total length of the track of the track was 295 kilometers with 11 railway stations on the way.

A radio station is functioning at Zhob, broadcast from which are widely listened to in the district to in the district. In the urban television sets are common. The signal is transmitted from the booster located at Loralai. The use of dish antennas is also growing.

Zhob is linked through the Nation Wide Dialing system to the country and other telecommunication facilities such fax and telegraph are also available.

Postal service in Zhob is based on departmental arrangements. There are three departmental post offices at Zhob City, Zhob GPO and Qamardin Karez respectively. There are nine extra-departmental branches one each at Killi Appozai, Killi Ibrahim Khel, Kili Gohar Appozai, Killi Lowara, Mani Kwa, Mir Ali Khel, Sambaza, Shinghar and Sharan Jogezai.

 

Ethnicity and Tribes

The district is inhabited by Mandokhels, Kakars, Sheranis, Haripals, Babars, Lawoons, Khosty and Syeds. Sulemankhels, Nasars, Kharots, and other tribes of Afghan origin are also present.

 

RELIGION

The population of the district is almost Muslim. They constitute 99.43 percent of the total population, with a breakup of 99.67 percent in rural and 98.15 percent in urban areas.The absolute majority of the muslims living in Zhob district belongs to the Sunni sect of Islam. A very small number of Shia people lives in the district. There are Syeds living in the district but they belong to Sunni sect as well. There is no "Imam Bara" found in the district. The two major festivals are Eid-ul-Fitr and Eid-ul-Azha. They are occasions of great jubilation and joy. Other festivals are "Eid-Miladuld Nabi, and Sab-e-Barat". During these festivals alms are given to the poor and relatives give each other presents.

The population of Zhob district are religiously very conservative and strict. There is large attendance in mosques, routine prayers, and religious observance. The performing of "Hajj" (pilgrimage to Mecca) is common. Also poor people have performed Hajj. During the Ramzan, the observance of fasting is generally very strict.

The role of the "Mullah" (religious leader) is very important in the performance of rituals. The role of Mullahs is still strong in rural areas where literacy is low. A Mullah is respected for being the leader in prayers, profound knowledge of the Quran and performing rituals. Sick persons visit him to be healed.

There are very few Christians, Hindu, Qadiani/Ahmadi, Scheduled Caste and other communities which are only 0.58 percent of the total population. The district used to have a huge Hindu population, but since partition of the sub-continent most of them have migrated. The Hindu population left behind is not seen celebrating "Diwali" and "Holi".

 

MOTHER TONGUE

The predominant mother tongue of the population of the district is Pushto which is spoken by 96.82 percent of the total population followed by Saraki at 1.27 percent. The proportion of the population speaking Pushto is higher in rural areas at 99.65 percent as compared to 81.93 percent in urban areas. In contrast the proportion of Saraiki is higher in urban areas at 7.71 percent in comparison to that in rural areas at 0.05 percent. The proportion of the population speaking Urdu, Punjabi, Sindhi, Balochi and others is 1.91 percent.

 

Culture & Traditions:

The dominating life style is still nomadic. Scattered mud huts exist for seasonal habitation; summer is spent in highlands and winter in lower plains for feeding cattle in tribal reserved pastures. The people are deeply religious and their lives are marked by strict adherence to tribal norms and values.There are two major channels for conflict resolution in the district: namely the traditional/tribal and the government/ institutional. The traditional/tribal channel however has proved more effective than the latter. In the past jirga system operated in the region which was the traditional system where by tribal elders sat together to settle disputes and mete out justice to offenders. The system stands annulled by a decision of the Supreme Court of Pakistan in 1991. The government however, still forms informal jirgas (comprising of notables from the tribes) for conflict resolution, as they have proven to be very effective.

A high order of social cooperation exists among the people both on occasions of happiness and sorrow. In case of death of a relative neighbor or friend, food is supplied to the deceased's household for two to three days.

Majority of the people living in Zhob district belongs to the Sunni sect of Islam with a marginal number of people belonging to the Shia sect of Islam.

There are two major channels for conflict resolution in the district namely the traditional/tribal and the government/institutional. The traditional /tribal channel however, has proved more effective than the latter. In the past the jirga system operate in the region which was proved more effective than the latter. In the Past the Jirga system operated in the region which was the traditional system where by tribal elders sat together to settle disputes and mete out justice to offenders. The system stands annulled by a decision of the Supreme Court of Pakistan in 1991. The Government however, still forms informal jirgas (comprising notable's etc) for conflict resolution, as they have proven to be very effective.

 

Food

Majority of the people have two meals daily, one in the morning and other at sunset. Only well-to-do families have a third meal. An average meal consists of nan, locally called "marai" with pulses, vegetables/meat broth and butter milk (lassi). Consumption of landhi, or dried meat is common during winters. Sheep are specially fattened so that they may be more suitible for preparing "landhi"

 

Dress And Ornaments

The majority of the male population wears shalwar kameez and a turban to cover their heads both in summer and in winter with a chadder (piece of cloth) slung across the shoulders. The women wear a wrapper and a long shirt reaching to the knees. Women belonging to the middle and upper classes dress in the manner of other urban women in the province and also wear gold ornaments.

 

Marriages in Zhob

The marriage system is more or less the same for all tribes living in the district. Marriage is regarded as an important institution. The age for a man to marry is from 20 to 25 years. Women are 13 to 18 years old when they marry. The majority of marriages is pre-arranged and the bride and groom often come from the same family. Marriages within the family with first or second (paternal/maternal) cousins are common. The marriage is settled by the families of the bride and bride-groom. Compared to women, men have a bigger say in the selection of their brides than women have in the selection of their future husbands. Yet the mutual families play the biggest role. Polygamy is practised. A large number of men has two wives. Hardly any man has three or four wives. When the husband dies, the wife has little chance of remarrying. When the wife dies, the husband easily marries again, no matter how many children he has. Through a girl is valuable asset in an Afghanistan family by virtue of the bride price that she fetches yet no joy attends her birth while the birth of a baby boy is celebrated in a joyous manner with the offering of shots in the air.

The system of vulvar (bride-price) is widely practised in the district. Money is paid by the groom for a proposal to the guardians/parents of the girl. The amount varies from case to case. In case of close family marriages, the amount may be smaller or waived completely. The payment of vulvar is imputed at the time a proposal of marriage is made. There are no fixed rules about the amount of vulvar. The amount of vulvar may be paid by the bridegroom, his parents/guardians or relatives. The demanded price is usually raised when a proposal is repeated to the bride's side or when the one proposed to is very beautiful; or when the man proposing is very rich and already married.

The centuries old system of exchanging girls for marriage is commonly practised. It is called "tsarai". The system is strongly practised in semi-nomadic and the lower classes of society. In tsarai, a girl is married to a man in exchange for a bride for her brother. The system brings down marriage expenses as no vulvar has to be paid. Under the system girls are left with no choice. They are not asked for their consent. After their daughters are married, parents become almost indifferent towards their future welfare. The newly wedded wives remain at the mercy of their husband and in-laws. It is observed that under an exchange system of marriages, retaliation may be shown by the husband's side against his wife in case his sister is not happy with his wife's brother. A second marriage on the side may result in marriage break-up or ill treatment of the wife.

The major expenses involved in marriages, other than vulvar, are the arrangement of the wedding and the purchase of jewellery and dresses. Gifts are given by relatives and friends to bride and bride-groom. The bride is wearing a typical red bridal dress designed for the occasion, with her hands and feet dyed red with henna. In Zhob district, where society is close, a man marrying outside the family under an arranged marriage is not allowed to see his bride before the wedding night. Marriage proposals, vulvar arrangements are verbal agreements. Though nothing is on paper, they are respected by and large.

A marriage is regarded as a way to strengthen tribal or family relations. Marriages can be used to settle tribal or family disputes. Refusal of a marriage if proposed may result in the weakening of a family relationship. However, the spread of education and literacy are mitigating this kind of considerations. The educated class of Zhob society is less rigid in the following of traditional rules, though they are not totally free from them.

 

Role of Women Zhob

The entire society of Zhob district is male and tribally dominated. Men decide on politics and the fate of the family and tribe. Therefore, they assume a predominant role in both the community and family decision making. The rate of literacy amongst women is very low. Because of illiteracy and unawareness, women enjoy fewer civil amenities and fundamental rights. Human rights of women are frequently violated without any report.

Politically women are without any say. The women's seats of the Union Councils are filled, but they do not participate in meetings. Female participation in elections has increased since 1985. Previously, women were discouraged to vote.

Women play a minor role in decision-making, but they play an important role in the household and agricultural affairs of the district. Though a woman shares the economic burden of the family as she contributes to the household and productive work outside the house in fields, nonetheless, her household work is not considered an economic contribution, and seldom credit is given to her by husband or elders for her significant contribution to the family and society.

In rural areas, women are commonly observed to be involved in looking after horses, camels and sheep, assisting in cultivation and doing traditional embroidery work. Society constrains them to remain illiterate and to endure problems related to polygamy, vulvar and a generally low social status. In case of polygamy, the first wife's opinion is not considered when a man wants to marry a second wife. A change in the women's status is observed in areas with more female literacy. Educated women have more influence in decision making and have more authority. Interest in female education is rising, but there are not enough schools.

Cases of Siakari, or adultery, are very rarely reported. Because of the tribalism and Pashtoon code of honour, such an incident if happens is not reported. A number of females found suspected of having illegal relationship are believed to have been put to death (by shooting or beheading) without being reported officially. The man she was involved with may be killed as well. The discussion of the act is regarded as taboo.

  

Arms in Zhob

The population possess a large number of weapons. According to the Political Agent office report, both traditional and advanced weapons have been used in different situations. They include traditional rifles and 12-bore shot-guns, and advanced weapons. The use of rocket launchers and mortar gun has been reported as well.

In the tribal "B" area, the role of the police is limited. It is easy to obtain a licence for small arms, but there are many unlicensed arms in the district, particularly amongst tribes living close to the borders where many arms are smuggled in from Afghanistan. The frontier towns are believed to have stored arms and ammunition for supply into Pakistan during the Afghan revolution (1979 to 1994). The frontier town Kamardin Karez, at a distance of 224 kilometres from Zhob, had a famous arms market where one could buy a variety of arms including rocket launchers.

 

Housing in Zhob

Houses in the district are mostly solid buildings of stone-blocks and mud. In both urban and rural areas, the use of the stone is very frequent in the construction of houses. They are coated with thick mud. Well-off people coat their houses with cement or concrete. The use of clay bricks and baked bricks is common in the construction of houses in Zhob city and some other areas. The use of clay bricks is common for roofs, boundary walls and barns. The majority of the houses has roofs made of tin or iron, which are curved because of the snow fall in winter. The construction of double storey buildings is uncommon. There are a few in Zhob city. In rural areas a courtyard may enclose a number of the houses, both for reasons of safety and social affinity.

The housing characteristics are more or less similar all over the district. The houses are knit together in villages which may comprise few or many houses. Seventy-five percent of the houses in rural areas are without latrine and bath-room. Eighty-five percent of all houses in the district is without proper drainage, human waste disposal arrangements and sewerage system. However, because of the mountains and hills, the absence of drainage does not cause sewerage problems.

Eighty percent of the houses in the district are owned. The ratio of rented houses other than in Zhob city is 5 to 8 percent. The rest of the houses is let to tenants. The ratio of rented houses in the district is higher in Zhob city. In Zhob city, the ratio of rented houses is 35 to 40 percent, because of the large number of army, FC, and government officers.

In Zhob city and the surrounding area there are buildings constructed during the British period. In Zhob city the British built a huge airforce/military garrison, the Zhob Militia Mess and residences for Political Agent and Assistant Political Agents. Most of them were built during the period 1893 to 1910. Buildings which are important from an historical point of view are the Political Agent's Official residence known as "The Castle" and the Zhob Militia Mess the centennial of which was celebrated in 1989. All VIPs to Zhob can, if desired, stay overnight in one of these two buildings. There are a number of officers' bungalows, now under the occupation of army officers, situated on the VIP lane which are 80 to 100 years old. The APA house is also very old and nowadays accommodates the Assistant Commissioner.

At Shinghar, at a distance of 82 km from Zhob, at the height of 2850 metres above sea level, are a number of huts which were used by British officers. The place was the summer camp for the British Political Agent, the Assistant Political Agent, the Commandant Zhob militia, and other few officers. Arrangements were made for the pumping of water and transportation. The site is now abandoned because the present Pakistani district administrators do not seem to show the least of interest in the place. It appears a ghost town where occasionally people go for an adventurous over-night stay or a picnic.

A number of forts exist in the surrounding of the district which were built by the British for the deployment of militia troops. Some of them are abandoned and have collapsed. Others are in use by the Frontier Corps and Levy. The important ones are at Mir Ali Khel, Dana Sher and Mughalkot. There is one in Qamardin Kariz under the use of FC.

 

Construction Material Used in Housing:

As mentioned earlier, the houses in the district are made of stone, clay and baked bricks with thick clay or mud topping and iron or steel roofing. Doors, windows and ventilators are made of wood. Iron grills are rare. Most houses have a room with a ventilator. The use of cement is not common. It is mostly found in case of government buildings and upper class people housing. There are a number of houses which are over 100 years old. The height of the houses is usually not more than 3 metres.

 

Sources of Energy

Twenty-five percent of the area of the district is electrified. Gas is not available in the district except in cylinders by those who can afford buying them. For industrial and mechanical/agricultural purpose, the use of electricity is the only source. For the purpose of cooking and heating electricity, dung-cake and wood are used. The use of coal for heating is less common after the railway service was abandoned. In winter time, the rural population has difficulty finding sources of energy for heating. Therefore, they start storing wood in summer.

 

Drinking Water and Sanitation

The major source of drinking water in the district is spring water. The drinking water in urban area of Zhob is supplied through gravity source by storage tanks. There are six reservoirs with each 120,000 gallon capacity. There is no regular sanitation system except in Zhob city which is however not properly maintained. As mentioned, because of the hilly slop and lack of mud, the rain water is soon absorbed.

 

Places to See:

 

Zhob Town

Zhob situated at a distance of 320 kilometers from Quetta was previously called Fort Sandeman. It still contains relics that harkens back to its grand past, one is the Zhob Militia mess and the other is the officials residence of Political Agent, Zhob known as the "castle". The British cemetery at Zhob, which was another reminder of the "Raj", has been vandalized and lies in ruins.

 

Muslim Bagh

Muslim Bagh is the center of Chromate Mines and is located 96 kilometers north east of Quetta. Coming to Muslim Bagh and not visiting the chromate mines is a waste of a tour. The Muslim Bagh is known as an Oasis of Orchards. Yet another place to see in Muslim Bagh is Asia's highest Railway Station Kanmehtarzai Pass, which is on the road that connects Fort Sandeman with Bostan.

 

Qilla Saifullah

Qila Saifullah is the seat of the famous Jogezai family located on the ancient Carvan routes. It is famous for its Apples, Pistachio Nuts, and some beautiful scenery spots. Its community is known to be the earliest agricultural community in the Indo-Pak Subcontinent, which flourished at the beginning of 3000 BC. The climate here is heavy, but enthrallingly seductive for adventure travellers!

 

Fort Sandeman

Fort Sandeman is at the Afghan-Pakistan border and is sorrounded with beautiful scenery. Sheen Ghar (Green Mountain) at this height is covered with Pine forests and is the best area in the valley to shoot Chakor.

 

Shrines

There are two well-known shrines in the district. They are of Hazrat Nazar Nika at six km from Zhob and Hazrat Khostoo Baba 100 km from Zhob in the direction of Waziristan. Two other shrines are Zakoo Nika near Zhob and Palwand Baba in the Mughalkot area. Visits to shrines is not common in Zhob. There are no shrines in the district where regular "urs" (annual celebrations) are observed.

The tomb of Qais Rashid on the top of Suleiman mountain is also a place to visit. However, as the mountain is steep and high, visits are difficult to make. People who reach the top take goats for sacrifice for the fulfilment of their desires and for the sake of the saint.

 

Historical And Archeological Sites

A number of mounds, ruins, and caves dot the expanse of the district, which have historical and archeological importance. The general consensus among most experts is that they belong to the Mughal period.

The region is rife with many legends. One legend relates that on their way back to Palestine, Prophet Suleman was requested by his newly wed Indian bride who was a princess that she be allowed to take a last look at her ancestral land India and Soloman Landed his "takht" or flying throne on the mountains.

 

Paryano Ghundi

Paryan-o-Ghundi, which means a hill of fairies, is at two miles distance to the west of Zhob town. It was excavated by Sir Aural Syien in 1924. It was visited in 1950 by Fair resemblance with that found in Harapa. Unfortunately, the mound has been completely destroyed by the local people.

 

Rana Ghundi

Rana Ghundi is an archeological site having mounds from which remains of a culture have been found with affinities spread to the Hisar culture of North East Iran dating back to 3500 BC. Red Pottery has also been found, which is estimated to belong to a period earlier than the Indus valley civilization.

 

Occupations

Animal husbandry, small-scale farming and Government service are the major occupations. The Mandokkhels are an enterprising lot who dominate the realm of Government contractor-ship in Balochistan and as far away as Karachi and Islamabad, while numerous members of the Shirani tribe are serving in the Gulf countries, mostly as laborers.

 

Population Size and Growth

The population of Zhob district is 275.14 thousands in 1998 as compared to 213.29 thousands in 1981 recording an increase of 29.00 percent over the last 17 years i.e. 1981-98. The increase of 113.50 and 99.36 percent was observed during intercensal period 1972-81 (8.46 years) and 1961-72 (11.67 years) respectively. Overall the population of the district has increased rapidly showing substantial increase of 449.07 percent during the last 37 years i.e. 1961-98 which is five and a half times.

The total are of the district is 20297 square kilometers having population density 13.6 persons per square per square kilometer in March 1998.

 

Rural/Urban Distribution

The rural population of the district is 231.30 thousands constituting 84.07 percent of the total population. The average annual growth rate of rural population during 1981-98 is 1.44 percent which was 9.74 and 5.96 percents during 1972-81 and 1961-72 respectively. The urban population of the district is 43.84 thousands constituting 15.93 percent of the total population. The average annual growth rate of the urban population during 1981-98 is 1.88 percent which was 7.52 and 6.76 percent during 1972-81 and 1961-72 respectively

 

Literacy

A person was treated as literate in the 1998 census if he could read a newspaper and write a simple letter in any language. The literacy ration of the district among the population aged 10 years and above is 16.78 percent, 47.84 percent for urban areas, and 10.40 percent for rural areas.The literacy ratio of the district among the population aged 10 years and above is 16.78 percent, 47.84 percent is urban areas and 10.40 percent in rural areas. The male literacy ratio is 24.53 percent compared to 6.90 percent for female.

 

Education Attainment

During the 1990s, the enrollment of children in schools nearly doubled in the Zhob district. For boys, it went from 15136 in 1993 to 21841 in 1997. For girls, it more than doubled, from 3046 in 1993 to 6789 in 1997. A large variation exists in the ratio of educated persons by sex and area. The percentage of educated males is 23.72 percent and of females, 6.33 percent. It is 47.65 percent for urban areas as against 9.58 for rural areas.

 

Immunization

53.34 percent of the children under 10 years of age have been reported as vaccinated, while 21.01 percent have been reported as not vaccinated, leaving the rest 25.65 as not known.

 

Zhob in Comparison to Rest of Balochistan

The main objective of the series of District Profiles is to provide information on a wide range of sectors and subjects for each of the 26 districts in Balochistan. The result however creates the possibility to compare the districts among themselves and to compare the situation in each of them with the situation in Balochistan as a whole. To introduce this perspective, 32 indicators have been selected on which this comparison can take place. These indicators, and others, can be found on the following two pages. Each district can be ranked on each of the indicators. The relative position of Zhob district is reflected in the diagram on the third page. The diagram gives a bottom-up ranking: position nr.1 means the lowest score on that particular indicator, while position nr.26 implies the highest score.

An overall ranking of districts is not given, because that would mean attaching as certain weight to each of the indicators.

 

As far as Zhob district is concerned, the following observations can be made.

•With its 16,520 square kilometer, Zhob is about 3,000 square kilometer bigger than the average size of districts in Balochistan; the size of the area gives the district position nr.20, while the population (projected to be 344,122) puts it one position lower. The density of population is the same as the density for the whole of the province.

•The quantity of fruit production is comparatively high (fifth highest in the province), while the overall agricultural production puts the district in the middle category. The agricultural production value per hectare is the third highest, which might indicate a reasonably favourable productivity.

•Zhob district scores relatively high as far as the number of livestock units is concerned; it takes however a fairly low position in the ranking on pasture area and available pasture area per livestock unit. This would suggest that expansion of the livestock sector is only feasible through more intensive methods of production. The current value of livestock off-take per capita puts the district in the upper half of the ranking.

•The enrolment figures in primary education for both boys and girls belong to the middle category (position nr.13 and 10 respectively); while the pupils/teacher ratio is on the high side compared to the other districts (position nr.21 for boys and nr.17 for girls).

•All of the four health indicators fall in the middle category of rankings with the lowest score for the population per doctor ratio (position nr.9), although the number of population per bed is nearly twice the average in the province as a whole.

•Although exact figures on the coverage of water supply are not available, the impression is that also on this indicator the district takes a position in the middle.

•The density of metalled roads (length of road per square kilometer) is about 50% higher than the average in the province and gives Zhob district position nr.16. The situation with regard to shingle roads is less favourable: position nr.9 and a density which is 20% lower than the provincial average.

 

I am planning on entering this picture in the Maryland DNR photo contest, but have a question for you folks.

 

To enter, the photos should be 8 x 10, or 5 x 7. When cropped, this picture was something like 9 x 6.5. Do you think it's bad to add the black border to make it an 8x10?

 

If I make it 8x10 by not constraining proportions, the photo is stretched. How do most of you resize your photos to have them fit typical format sizes, or do you not worry about?

 

thanks in advance!

On Aug 6 a turtledove rested by the edge outside my window. It's rainy and windy. From the eye I guessed he got terrified. I took this quick shot without too much thought.That day typhoon Morakot has been announced. People were a bit excited and happy, since it will be a quick relief from the dryness . (The government has already announced the plan to constrain the useage of water.) As you probably knew already, 2 days later Taiwan has been hit badly by Morakot's heavy rains. Dozens of villages were tore apart by landslides. Among them, 2 were completely buried by mugs and rocks instantly. There are around 150s dead and over 500 villagers still remain undiscovered.

 

A lovely tribute on Youtube :

FREE HUGs in Taiwan