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Arches National Park is known for its dramatic contrast in color and texture.
Skyline Arch
Arches National Park
Moab, Utah
Its dramatic location overhanging the ocean waves echoes verse from the Quran, which states that God’s throne was built upon the water. Believers pray on a centrally heated floor, and can see the Atlantic breaking over the rocks underneath the glass floor in the basement and feel the sunlight through the retractable roof
Taken @Casablanca, Morocco, North Africa
Its a long steep climb though thankfully with stairs to aid you make the journey to the castle, this photo shows the first few stairs, there are many more , many more before you reach the castle entrance .
I first visited Dunnottar Castle summer 2017, this magnificent castle sits high on a hill, last time I visited I captured my shots from the cliffs overlooking the site, though today I made the journey up the hill and entered the castle walls , wow what a magnificent experience, just perfect with loads of great photo opportunities to capture real Scottish history,after two hours wandering around and capturing as many shots that caught my eye , I made my way home, a magnificent experience indeed.
Dunnottar Castle (Scottish Gaelic: Dùn Fhoithear, "fort on the shelving slope" is a ruined medieval fortress located upon a rocky headland on the north-east coast of Scotland, about 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) south of Stonehaven.
The surviving buildings are largely of the 15th and 16th centuries, but the site is believed to have been fortified in the Early Middle Ages. Dunnottar has played a prominent role in the history of Scotland through to the 18th-century Jacobite risings because of its strategic location and defensive strength. Dunnottar is best known as the place where the Honours of Scotland, the Scottish crown jewels, were hidden from Oliver Cromwell's invading army in the 17th century. The property of the Keiths from the 14th century, and the seat of the Earl Marischal, Dunnottar declined after the last Earl forfeited his titles by taking part in the Jacobite rebellion of 1715.
The castle was restored in the 20th century and is now open to the public.
The ruins of the castle are spread over 1.4 hectares (3.5 acres), surrounded by steep cliffs that drop to the North Sea, 50 metres (160 ft) below. A narrow strip of land joins the headland to the mainland, along which a steep path leads up to the gatehouse.
The various buildings within the castle include the 14th-century tower house as well as the 16th-century palace. Dunnottar Castle is a scheduled monument, and twelve structures on the site are listed buildings.
History
Early Middle Ages
A chapel at Dunnottar is said to have been founded by St Ninian in the 5th century, although it is not clear when the site was first fortified, but in any case the legend is late and highly implausible. Possibly the earliest written reference to the site is found in the Annals of Ulster which record two sieges of "Dún Foither" in 681 and 694.
The earlier event has been interpreted as an attack by Brude, the Pictish king of Fortriu, to extend his power over the north-east coast of Scotland. The Scottish Chronicle records that King Domnall II, the first ruler to be called rí Alban (King of Alba), was killed at Dunnottar during an attack by Vikings in 900. King Aethelstan of Wessex led a force into Scotland in 934, and raided as far north as Dunnottar according to the account of Symeon of Durham. W. D. Simpson speculated that a motte might lie under the present caste, but excavations in the 1980s failed to uncover substantive evidence of early medieval fortification.
The discovery of a group of Pictish stones at Dunnicaer, a nearby sea stack, has prompted speculation that "Dún Foither" was actually located on the adjacent headland of Bowduns, 0.5 kilometres (0.31 mi) to the north.
Later Middle Ages
During the reign of King William the Lion (ruled 1165–1214) Dunnottar was a center of local administration for The Mearns. The castle is named in the Roman de Fergus, an early 13th-century Arthurian romance, in which the hero Fergus must travel to Dunnottar to retrieve a magic shield.
In May 1276 a church on the site was consecrated by William Wishart, Bishop of St Andrews. The poet Blind Harry relates that William Wallace captured Dunnottar from the English in 1297, during the Wars of Scottish Independence. He is said to have imprisoned 4,000 defeated English soldiers in the church and burned them alive.
In 1336 Edward III of England ordered William Sinclair, 8th Baron of Roslin, to sail eight ships to the partially ruined Dunnottar for the purpose of rebuilding and fortifying the site as a forward resupply base for his northern campaign. Sinclair took with him 160 soldiers, horses, and a corps of masons and carpenters.
Edward himself visited in July, but the English efforts were undone before the end of the year when the Scottish Regent Sir Andrew Murray led a force that captured and again destroyed the defences of Dunnottar.
In the 14th century Dunnottar was granted to William de Moravia, 5th Earl of Sutherland (d.1370), and in 1346 a licence to crenellate was issued by David II. Around 1359 William Keith, Marischal of Scotland, married Margaret Fraser, niece of Robert the Bruce, and was granted the barony of Dunnottar at this time. Keith then gave the lands of Dunnottar to his daughter Christian and son-in-law William Lindsay of Byres, but in 1392 an excambion (exchange) was agreed whereby Keith regained Dunnottar and Lindsay took lands in Fife.
William Keith completed construction of the tower house at Dunnottar, but was excommunicated for building on the consecrated ground associated with the parish church. Keith had provided a new parish church closer to Stonehaven, but was forced to write to the Pope, Benedict XIII, who issued a bull in 1395 lifting the excommunication.William Keith's descendents were created Earls Marischal in the mid 15th century, and they held Dunottar until the 18th century.
16th century rebuilding
Through the 16th century the Keiths improved and expanded their principal seats: at Dunnottar and also at Keith Marischal in East Lothian. James IV visited Dunnottar in 1504, and in 1531 James V exempted the Earl's men from military service on the grounds that Dunnottar was one of the "principall strenthis of our realme".
Mary, Queen of Scots, visited in 1562 after the Battle of Corrichie, and returned in 1564.
James VI stayed for 10 days in 1580, as part of a progress through Fife and Angus, during which a meeting of the Privy Council was convened at Dunnottar.
During a rebellion of Catholic nobles in 1592, Dunnottar was captured by a Captain Carr on behalf of the Earl of Huntly, but was restored to Lord Marischal just a few weeks later.
In 1581 George Keith succeeded as 5th Earl Marischal, and began a large scale reconstruction that saw the medieval fortress converted into a more comfortable home. The founder of Marischal College in Aberdeen, the 5th Earl valued Dunnottar as much for its dramatic situation as for its security.
A "palace" comprising a series of ranges around a quadrangle was built on the north-eastern cliffs, creating luxurious living quarters with sea views. The 13th-century chapel was restored and incorporated into the quadrangle.
An impressive stone gatehouse was constructed, now known as Benholm's Lodging, featuring numerous gun ports facing the approach. Although impressive, these are likely to have been fashionable embellishments rather than genuine defensive features.
Civil wars
Further information: Scotland in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms
In 1639 William Keith, 7th Earl Marischal, came out in support of the Covenanters, a Presbyterian movement who opposed the established Episcopal Church and the changes which Charles I was attempting to impose. With James Graham, 1st Marquess of Montrose, he marched against the Catholic James Gordon, 2nd Viscount Aboyne, Earl of Huntly, and defeated an attempt by the Royalists to seize Stonehaven. However, when Montrose changed sides to the Royalists and marched north, Marischal remained in Dunnottar, even when given command of the area by Parliament, and even when Montrose burned Stonehaven.
Marischal then joined with the Engager faction, who had made a deal with the king, and led a troop of horse to the Battle of Preston (1648) in support of the royalists.
Following the execution of Charles I in 1649, the Engagers gave their allegiance to his son and heir: Charles II was proclaimed king, arriving in Scotland in June 1650. He visited Dunnottar in July 1650, but his presence in Scotland prompted Oliver Cromwell to lead a force into Scotland, defeating the Scots at Dunbar in September 1650.
The Honours of Scotland
Charles II was crowned at Scone Palace on 1 January 1651, at which the Honours of Scotland (the regalia of crown, sword and sceptre) were used. However, with Cromwell's troops in Lothian, the honours could not be returned to Edinburgh. The Earl Marischal, as Marischal of Scotland, had formal responsibility for the honours, and in June the Privy Council duly decided to place them at Dunnottar.
They were brought to the castle by Katherine Drummond, hidden in sacks of wool. Sir George Ogilvie (or Ogilvy) of Barras was appointed lieutenant-governor of the castle, and given responsibility for its defence.
In November 1651 Cromwell's troops called on Ogilvie to surrender, but he refused. During the subsequent blockade of the castle, the removal of the Honours of Scotland was planned by Elizabeth Douglas, wife of Sir George Ogilvie, and Christian Fletcher, wife of James Granger, minister of Kinneff Parish Church. The king's papers were first removed from the castle by Anne Lindsay, a kinswoman of Elizabeth Douglas, who walked through the besieging force with the papers sewn into her clothes.
Two stories exist regarding the removal of the honours themselves. Fletcher stated in 1664 that over the course of three visits to the castle in February and March 1652, she carried away the crown, sceptre, sword and sword-case hidden amongst sacks of goods. Another account, given in the 18th century by a tutor to the Earl Marischal, records that the honours were lowered from the castle onto the beach, where they were collected by Fletcher's servant and carried off in a creel (basket) of seaweed. Having smuggled the honours from the castle, Fletcher and her husband buried them under the floor of the Old Kirk at Kinneff.
Meanwhile, by May 1652 the commander of the blockade, Colonel Thomas Morgan, had taken delivery of the artillery necessary for the reduction of Dunnottar. Ogilvie surrendered on 24 May, on condition that the garrison could go free. Finding the honours gone, the Cromwellians imprisoned Ogilvie and his wife in the castle until the following year, when a false story was put about suggesting that the honours had been taken overseas.
Much of the castle property was removed, including twenty-one brass cannons,[28] and Marischal was required to sell further lands and possessions to pay fines imposed by Cromwell's government.
At the Restoration of Charles II in 1660, the honours were removed from Kinneff Church and returned to the king. Ogilvie quarrelled with Marischal's mother over who would take credit for saving the honours, though he was eventually rewarded with a baronetcy. Fletcher was awarded 2,000 merks by Parliament but the sum was never paid.
Whigs and Jacobites
Religious and political conflicts continued to be played out at Dunnottar through the 17th and early 18th centuries. In 1685, during the rebellion of the Earl of Argyll against the new king James VII, 167 Covenanters were seized and held in a cellar at Dunnottar. The prisoners included 122 men and 45 women associated with the Whigs, an anti-Royalist group within the Covenanter movement, and had refused to take an oath of allegiance to the new king.
The Whigs were imprisoned from 24 May until late July. A group of 25 escaped, although two of these were killed in a fall from the cliffs, and another 15 were recaptured. Five prisoners died in the vault, and 37 of the Whigs were released after taking the oath of allegiance.
The remaining prisoners were transported to Perth Amboy, New Jersey, as part of a colonisation scheme devised by George Scot of Pitlochie. Many, like Scot himself, died on the voyage.
The cellar, located beneath the "King's Bedroom" in the 16th-century castle buildings, has since become known as the "Whigs' Vault".
Both the Jacobites (supporters of the exiled Stuarts) and the Hanoverians (supporters of George I and his descendents) used Dunnottar Castle. In 1689 during Viscount Dundee's campaign in support of the deposed James VII, the castle was garrisoned for William and Mary with Lord Marischal appointed captain.
Seventeen suspected Jacobites from Aberdeen were seized and held in the fortress for around three weeks, including George Liddell, professor of mathematics at Marischal College.
In the Jacobite Rising of 1715 George Keith, 10th Earl Marischal, took an active role with the rebels, leading cavalry at the Battle of Sheriffmuir. After the subsequent abandonment of the rising Lord Marischal fled to the Continent, eventually becoming French ambassador for Frederick the Great of Prussia. Meanwhile, in 1716, his titles and estates including Dunnottar were declared forfeit to the crown.
Later history
The seized estates of the Earl Marischal were purchased in 1720 for £41,172, by the York Buildings Company who dismantled much of the castle.
In 1761 the Earl briefly returned to Scotland and bought back Dunnottar only to sell it five years later to Alexander Keith, an Edinburgh lawyer who served as Knight Marischal of Scotland.
Dunnottar was inherited in 1852 by Sir Patrick Keith-Murray of Ochtertyre, who in turn sold it in July 1873 to Major Alexander Innes of Cowie and Raemoir for about £80,000.
It was purchased by Weetman Pearson, 1st Viscount Cowdray, in 1925 after which his wife embarked on a programme of repairs.
Since that time the castle has remained in the family, and has been open to the public, attracting 52,500 visitors in 2009.
Dunnottar Castle, and the headland on which is stands, was designated as a scheduled monument in 1970.In 1972 twelve of the structures at Dunnottar were listed.
Three buildings are listed at category A as being of "national importance": the keep; the entrance gateway; and Benholm's Lodging.
The remaining listings are at category B as being of "regional importance".[39] The Hon. Charles Anthony Pearson, the younger son of the 3rd Viscount Cowdray, currently owns and runs Dunnottar Castle which is part of the 210-square-kilometre (52,000-acre) Dunecht Estates.
Portions of the 1990 film Hamlet, starring Mel Gibson and Glenn Close, were shot there.
Description
Dunnottar's strategic location allowed its owners to control the coastal terrace between the North Sea cliffs and the hills of the Mounth, 3.5 kilometres (2.2 mi) inland, which enabled access to and from the north-east of Scotland.
The site is accessed via a steep, 800-metre (2,600 ft) footpath (with modern staircases) from a car park on the coastal road, or via a 3-kilometre (1.9 mi) cliff-top path from Stonehaven. Dunnottar's several buildings, put up between the 13th and 17th centuries, are arranged across a headland covering around 1.4 hectares (3.5 acres).
The dominant building, viewed from the land approach, is the 14th-century keep or tower house. The other principal buildings are the gatehouse; the chapel; and the 16th-century "palace" which incorporates the "Whigs' Vault".
Defences
The approach to the castle is overlooked by outworks on the "Fiddle Head", a promontory on the western side of the headland. The entrance is through the well-defended main gate, set in a curtain wall which entirely blocks a cleft in the rocky cliffs.
The gate has a portcullis and has been partly blocked up. Alongside the main gate is the 16th-century Benholm's Lodging, a five-storey building cut into the rock, which incorporated a prison with apartments above.
Three tiers of gun ports face outwards from the lower floors of Benholm's Lodging, while inside the main gate, a group of four gun ports face the entrance. The entrance passage then turns sharply to the left, running underground through two tunnels to emerge near the tower house.
Simpson contends that these defences are "without exception the strongest in Scotland", although later writers have doubted the effectiveness of the gun ports. Cruden notes that the alignment of the gun ports in Benholm's Lodging, facing across the approach rather than along, means that they are of limited efficiency.
The practicality of the gun ports facing the entrance has also been questioned, though an inventory of 1612 records that four brass cannons were placed here.
A second access to the castle leads up from a rocky cove, the aperture to a marine cave on the northern side of the Dunnottar cliffs into which a small boat could be brought. From here a steep path leads to the well-fortified postern gate on the cliff top, which in turn offers access to the castle via the Water Gate in the palace.
Artillery defences, taking the form of earthworks, surround the north-west corner of the castle, facing inland, and the south-east, facing seaward. A small sentry box or guard house stands by the eastern battery, overlooking the coast.
Tower house and surrounding buildings
The tower house of Dunnottar, viewed from the west
The late 14th-century tower house has a stone-vaulted basement, and originally had three further storeys and a garret above.
Measuring 12 by 11 metres (39 by 36 ft), the tower house stood 15 metres (49 ft) high to its gable. The principal rooms included a great hall and a private chamber for the lord, with bedrooms upstairs.
Beside the tower house is a storehouse, and a blacksmith's forge with a large chimney. A stable block is ranged along the southern edge of the headland. Nearby is Waterton's Lodging, also known as the Priest's House, built around 1574, possibly for the use of William Keith (died 1580), son of the 4th Earl Marischal.
This small self-contained house includes a hall and kitchen at ground level, with private chambers above, and has a projecting spiral stair on the north side. It is named for Thomas Forbes of Waterton, an attendant of the 7th Earl.
The palace
The palace, to the north-east of the headland, was built in the late 16th century and early to mid-17th century. It comprises three main wings set out around a quadrangle, and for the most part is probably the work of the 5th Earl Marischal who succeeded in 1581.
It provided extensive and comfortable accommodation to replace the rooms in the tower house. In its long, low design it has been compared to contemporary English buildings, in contrast to the Scottish tradition of taller towers still prevalent in the 16th century.
Seven identical lodgings are arranged along the west range, each opening onto the quadrangle and including windows and fireplace. Above the lodgings the west range comprised a 35-metre (115 ft) gallery. Now roofless, the gallery originally had an elaborate oak ceiling, and on display was a Roman tablet taken from the Antonine Wall.
At the north end of the gallery was a drawing room linked to the north range. The gallery could also be accessed from the Silver House to the south, which incorporated a broad stairway with a treasury above.
The basement of the north range incorporates kitchens and stores, with a dining room and great chamber above. At ground floor level is the Water Gate, between the north and west ranges, which gives access to the postern on the northern cliffs.
The east and north ranges are linked via a rectangular stair. The east range has a larder, brewhouse and bakery at ground level, with a suite of apartments for the Countess above. A north-east wing contains the Earl's apartments, and includes the "King's Bedroom" in which Charles II stayed. In this room is a carved stone inscribed with the arms of the 7th Earl and his wife, and the date 1654. Below these rooms is the Whigs' Vault, a cellar measuring 16 by 4.5 metres (52 by 15 ft). This cellar, in which the Covenanters were held in 1685, has a large eastern window, as well as a lower vault accessed via a trap-door in the floor.
Of the chambers in the palace, only the dining room and the Silver House remain roofed, having been restored in the 1920s. The central area contains a circular cistern or fish pond, 16 metres (52 ft) across and 7.6 metres (25 ft) deep, and a bowling green is located to the west.
At the south-east corner of the quadrangle is the chapel, consecrated in 1276 and largely rebuilt in the 16th century. Medieval walling and two 13th-century windows remain, and there is a graveyard to the south.
Excerpt from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Itsukushima_Shrine:
Itsukushima Shrine (厳島神社, Itsukushima-jinja) is a Shinto shrine on the island of Itsukushima (popularly known as Miyajima), best known for its "floating" torii. It is in the city of Hatsukaichi, in Hiroshima Prefecture in Japan, accessible from the mainland by ferry at Miyajimaguchi Station. The shrine complex is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and the Japanese government has designated several buildings and possessions as National Treasures.
The Itsukushima shrine is one of Japan's most popular tourist attractions. It is most famous for its dramatic gate, or torii on the outskirts of the shrine, the sacred peaks of Mount Misen, extensive forests, and its ocean view. The shrine complex itself consists of two main buildings: the Honsha shrine and the Sessha Marodo-jinja, as well as 17 other different buildings and structures that help to distinguish it.
Arnarstapi or Stapi is a small fishing village at the foot of Mt. Stapafell between Hellnar village and Breiðavík farms on the southern side of Snæfellsnes, Iceland
The Snæfellsnes Peninsula is a region in western Iceland known for its dramatic landscapes. At its western tip, Snæfellsjökull National Park is dominated by Snæfellsjökull Volcano, which is topped by a glacier. Nearby, a trail leads through lava fields to black-pebble Djúpalónssandur Beach. In Stykkishólmur fishing village, the 19th-century wood-frame Norwegian House is a regional museum with a craft shop.
EOS R - Canon RF 16mm f/2.8 STM
Sony NEX-6, Touit 2.8/12, f/7,1, 1/160 sec, ISO 200, Dome-Port, 2 dedicated flash systems
© Kevin Palmer
REFORD GARDENS | LES JARDINS DE METIS
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
Photo of a photo taken at Reford Gardens on July 22, 2015.
Unforgettable Lady!
Mrs Reford taking a nap...
Mme Reford qui fait la sieste.
From Wikipedia:
Elsie Stephen Meighen - born January 22, 1872, Perth, Ontario - and Robert Wilson Reford - born in 1867, Montreal - got married on June 12, 1894.
Elsie Reford was a pioneer of Canadian horticulture, creating one of the largest private gardens in Canada on her estate, Estevan Lodge in eastern Québec. Located in Grand-Métis on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, her gardens have been open to the public since 1962 and operate under the name Les Jardins de Métis and Reford Gardens.
Born January 22, 1872 at Perth, Ontario, Elsie Reford was the eldest of three children born to Robert Meighen and Elsie Stephen. Coming from modest backgrounds themselves, Elsie’s parents ensured that their children received a good education. After being educated in Montreal, she was sent to finishing school in Dresden and Paris, returning to Montreal fluent in both German and French, and ready to take her place in society.
She married Robert Wilson Reford on June 12, 1894. She gave birth to two sons, Bruce in 1895 and Eric in 1900. Robert and Elsie Reford were, by many accounts, an ideal couple. In 1902, they built a house on Drummond Street in Montreal. They both loved the outdoors and they spend several weeks a year in a log cabin they built at Lac Caribou, south of Rimouski. In the autumn they hunted for caribou, deer, and ducks. They returned in winter to ski and snowshoe. Elsie Reford also liked to ride. She had learned as a girl and spent many hours riding on the slopes of Mount Royal. And of course, there was salmon-fishing – a sport at which she excelled.
In her day, she was known for her civic, social, and political activism. She was engaged in philanthropic activities, particularly for the Montreal Maternity Hospital and she was also the moving force behind the creation of the Women’s Canadian Club of Montreal, the first women club in Canada. She believed it important that the women become involved in debates over the great issues of the day, « something beyond the local gossip of the hour ». Her acquaintance with Lord Grey, the Governor-General of Canada from 1904 to 1911, led to her involvement in organizing, in 1908, Québec City’s tercentennial celebrations. The event was one of many to which she devoted herself in building bridges with French-Canadian community.
During the First World War, she joined her two sons in England and did volunteer work at the War Office, translating documents from German into English. After the war, she was active in the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Montreal Council of Social Agencies, and the National Association of Conservative Women.
In 1925 at the age of 53 years, Elsie Reford was operated for appendicitis and during her convalescence, her doctor counselled against fishing, fearing that she did not have the strength to return to the river.”Why not take up gardening?” he said, thinking this a more suitable pastime for a convalescent woman of a certain age. That is why she began laying out the gardens and supervising their construction. The gardens would take ten years to build, and would extend over more than twenty acres.
Elsie Reford had to overcome many difficulties in bringing her garden to life. First among them were the allergies that sometimes left her bedridden for days on end. The second obstacle was the property itself. Estevan was first and foremost a fishing lodge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to a salmon river and its dramatic views – not for the quality of the soil.
To counter-act nature’s deficiencies, she created soil for each of the plants she had selected, bringing peat and sand from nearby farms. This exchange was fortuitous to the local farmers, suffering through the Great Depression. Then, as now, the gardens provided much-needed work to an area with high unemployment. Elsie Reford’s genius as a gardener was born of the knowledge she developed of the needs of plants. Over the course of her long life, she became an expert plantsman. By the end of her life, Elsie Reford was able to counsel other gardeners, writing in the journals of the Royal Horticultural Society and the North American Lily Society. Elsie Reford was not a landscape architect and had no training of any kind as a garden designer. While she collected and appreciated art, she claimed no talents as an artist.
Elsie Stephen Reford died at her Drummond Street home on November 8, 1967 in her ninety-sixth year.
In 1995, the Reford Gardens ("Jardins de Métis") in Grand-Métis were designated a National Historic Site of Canada, as being an excellent Canadian example of the English-inspired garden.(Wikipedia)
Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Reford
LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS
Créés par Elsie Reford de 1926 à 1958, ces jardins témoignent de façon remarquable de l’art paysager à l’anglaise. Disposés dans un cadre naturel, un ensemble de jardins exhibent fleurs vivaces, arbres et arbustes. Le jardin des pommetiers, les rocailles et l’Allée royale évoquent l’œuvre de cette dame passionnée d’horticulture. Agrémenté d’un ruisseau et de sentiers sinueux, ce site jouit d’un microclimat favorable à la croissance d’espèces uniques au Canada. Les pavots bleus et les lis, privilégiés par Mme Reford, y fleurissent toujours et contribuent , avec d’autres plantes exotiques et indigènes, à l’harmonie de ces lieux.
Created by Elsie Reford between 1926 and 1958, these gardens are an inspired example of the English art of the garden. Woven into a natural setting, a series of gardens display perennials, trees and shrubs. A crab-apple orchard, a rock garden, and the Long Walk are also the legacy of this dedicated horticulturist. A microclimate favours the growth of species found nowhere else in Canada, while the stream and winding paths add to the charm. Elsie Reford’s beloved blue poppies and lilies still bloom and contribute, with other exotic and indigenous plants, to the harmony of the site.
Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada
Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
Gouvernement du Canada – Government of Canada
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Arnarstapi or Stapi is a small fishing village at the foot of Mt. Stapafell between Hellnar village and Breiðavík farms on the southern side of Snæfellsnes, Iceland
The Snæfellsnes Peninsula is a region in western Iceland known for its dramatic landscapes. At its western tip, Snæfellsjökull National Park is dominated by Snæfellsjökull Volcano, which is topped by a glacier. Nearby, a trail leads through lava fields to black-pebble Djúpalónssandur Beach. In Stykkishólmur fishing village, the 19th-century wood-frame Norwegian House is a regional museum with a craft shop.
EOS R - Canon RF 16mm f/2.8 STM
Arnarstapi or Stapi is a small fishing village at the foot of Mt. Stapafell between Hellnar village and Breiðavík farms on the southern side of Snæfellsnes, Iceland
The Snæfellsnes Peninsula is a region in western Iceland known for its dramatic landscapes. At its western tip, Snæfellsjökull National Park is dominated by Snæfellsjökull Volcano, which is topped by a glacier. Nearby, a trail leads through lava fields to black-pebble Djúpalónssandur Beach. In Stykkishólmur fishing village, the 19th-century wood-frame Norwegian House is a regional museum with a craft shop.
EOS R - Canon RF 16mm f/2.8 STM
1718
REFORD GARDENS | LES JARDINS DE METIS
Coucher de soleil, Sainte-Flavie.
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
Photo taken close to REFORD GARDENS.(Sainte-Flavie)
Mrs Elsie Reford loved those beautiful sunsets.
Reference: Elsie's Paradise, The Reford Gardens, Alexander Reford, 2004, ISBN 2-7619-1921-1, That book is a must for Reford Gardens lovers!
''I shall always, all my life, want to come back to those sunsets.'' Elsie Reford, July 20, 1913. (page 25)
" It is just after 8 o'clock and I am sitting in front of my big window with the gorgeous panorama of a glorious afterglow from a perfect sunset. There is every hue of blue on the water of 'the Blue Lagoon' while Pointe-aux-Cenelles is bathed in pink and crimson and the dark hills of the north shore seem no further than two or three miles distant. I don't think in the whole world at this moment there could be anything more beautiful." Elsie Reford, June 2, 1931. (page 81)
Beautiful flowers at Reford Gardens.
''One thing I can do that no one else can is to pass the love that I feel for this place and this woman'' Alexander Reford
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
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From Wikipedia:
Elsie Stephen Meighen - born January 22, 1872, Perth, Ontario - and Robert Wilson Reford - born in 1867, Montreal - got married on June 12, 1894.
Elsie Reford was a pioneer of Canadian horticulture, creating one of the largest private gardens in Canada on her estate, Estevan Lodge in eastern Québec. Located in Grand-Métis on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, her gardens have been open to the public since 1962 and operate under the name Les Jardins de Métis and Reford Gardens.
Born January 22, 1872 at Perth, Ontario, Elsie Reford was the eldest of three children born to Robert Meighen and Elsie Stephen. Coming from modest backgrounds themselves, Elsie’s parents ensured that their children received a good education. After being educated in Montreal, she was sent to finishing school in Dresden and Paris, returning to Montreal fluent in both German and French, and ready to take her place in society.
She married Robert Wilson Reford on June 12, 1894. She gave birth to two sons, Bruce in 1895 and Eric in 1900. Robert and Elsie Reford were, by many accounts, an ideal couple. In 1902, they built a house on Drummond Street in Montreal. They both loved the outdoors and they spend several weeks a year in a log cabin they built at Lac Caribou, south of Rimouski. In the autumn they hunted for caribou, deer, and ducks. They returned in winter to ski and snowshoe. Elsie Reford also liked to ride. She had learned as a girl and spent many hours riding on the slopes of Mount Royal. And of course, there was salmon-fishing – a sport at which she excelled.
In her day, she was known for her civic, social, and political activism. She was engaged in philanthropic activities, particularly for the Montreal Maternity Hospital and she was also the moving force behind the creation of the Women’s Canadian Club of Montreal, the first women club in Canada. She believed it important that the women become involved in debates over the great issues of the day, « something beyond the local gossip of the hour ». Her acquaintance with Lord Grey, the Governor-General of Canada from 1904 to 1911, led to her involvement in organizing, in 1908, Québec City’s tercentennial celebrations. The event was one of many to which she devoted herself in building bridges with French-Canadian community.
During the First World War, she joined her two sons in England and did volunteer work at the War Office, translating documents from German into English. After the war, she was active in the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Montreal Council of Social Agencies, and the National Association of Conservative Women.
In 1925 at the age of 53 years, Elsie Reford was operated for appendicitis and during her convalescence, her doctor counselled against fishing, fearing that she did not have the strength to return to the river.”Why not take up gardening?” he said, thinking this a more suitable pastime for a convalescent woman of a certain age. That is why she began laying out the gardens and supervising their construction. The gardens would take ten years to build, and would extend over more than twenty acres.
Elsie Reford had to overcome many difficulties in bringing her garden to life. First among them were the allergies that sometimes left her bedridden for days on end. The second obstacle was the property itself. Estevan was first and foremost a fishing lodge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to a salmon river and its dramatic views – not for the quality of the soil.
To counter-act nature’s deficiencies, she created soil for each of the plants she had selected, bringing peat and sand from nearby farms. This exchange was fortuitous to the local farmers, suffering through the Great Depression. Then, as now, the gardens provided much-needed work to an area with high unemployment. Elsie Reford’s genius as a gardener was born of the knowledge she developed of the needs of plants. Over the course of her long life, she became an expert plantsman. By the end of her life, Elsie Reford was able to counsel other gardeners, writing in the journals of the Royal Horticultural Society and the North American Lily Society. Elsie Reford was not a landscape architect and had no training of any kind as a garden designer. While she collected and appreciated art, she claimed no talents as an artist.
Elsie Stephen Reford died at her Drummond Street home on November 8, 1967 in her ninety-sixth year.
In 1995, the Reford Gardens ("Jardins de Métis") in Grand-Métis were designated a National Historic Site of Canada, as being an excellent Canadian example of the English-inspired garden.(Wikipedia)
Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Reford
LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS
Créés par Elsie Reford de 1926 à 1958, ces jardins témoignent de façon remarquable de l’art paysager à l’anglaise. Disposés dans un cadre naturel, un ensemble de jardins exhibent fleurs vivaces, arbres et arbustes. Le jardin des pommetiers, les rocailles et l’Allée royale évoquent l’œuvre de cette dame passionnée d’horticulture. Agrémenté d’un ruisseau et de sentiers sinueux, ce site jouit d’un microclimat favorable à la croissance d’espèces uniques au Canada. Les pavots bleus et les lis, privilégiés par Mme Reford, y fleurissent toujours et contribuent , avec d’autres plantes exotiques et indigènes, à l’harmonie de ces lieux.
Created by Elsie Reford between 1926 and 1958, these gardens are an inspired example of the English art of the garden. Woven into a natural setting, a series of gardens display perennials, trees and shrubs. A crab-apple orchard, a rock garden, and the Long Walk are also the legacy of this dedicated horticulturist. A microclimate favours the growth of species found nowhere else in Canada, while the stream and winding paths add to the charm. Elsie Reford’s beloved blue poppies and lilies still bloom and contribute, with other exotic and indigenous plants, to the harmony of the site.
Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada
Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
Gouvernement du Canada – Government of Canada
© Copyright
This photo and all those in my Photostream are protected by copyright. No one may reproduce, copy, transmit or manipulate them without my written permission.
Arches National Park is known for its dramatic contrast in color and texture.
Skyline Arch
Arches National Park
Moab, Utah
The Miami Tower is a 47-story, landmark office skyscraper in Miami, Florida, United States. It is located in central Downtown. It is currently the 8th tallest building in Miami and Florida. On April 18, 2012, the AIA's Florida Chapter placed it on its list of Florida Architecture: 100 Years. 100 Places as the Bank of America Tower.
Built for CenTrust Bank in 1987, the 47-story building ranks in the top ten tallest skyscrapers in Miami and in Florida at a height of 625 feet (191 m) and is known for its elaborate night-time illuminations and its dramatic three glass tiers. Designed by the Pei Cobb Freed & Partners architectural firm, the tower consists of two separate structures: A 10-story parking garage owned by the city and the 47-story office tower built upon the air rights of the garage. Preliminary planning for the tower began in February 1980; construction on the garage began by November. The garage was completed in February 1983 and the tower began construction a year later. On August 1984, while the tower was under construction, a 5-alarm fire began on the ninth floor; construction was subsequently delayed for several weeks. On December 15, 1985, the tower was lit for the first time in Miami Dolphins aqua and snowflakes.
By mid-1986, the tower's exterior was complete and the grand opening for the complex was set for early fall that same year. Due to the uneven settling of the tower's foundation to one side by several inches, and the resulting misalignment of the tower's elevator rails, the grand opening for the complex was delayed until February 1987. The complete complex featured the world's only elevated metro station in a skyscraper (Knight Center station). It also gained notoriety for its luxurious interiors, including a skylobby on the 11th floor covered in marble and gold and a 10,000 sq ft (930 m2) outdoor terrace. Also its indoor gym features mahogany cabinets. The tower is connected to the James L. Knight Center by a pedestrian walkway and on the first floor is a retail spine covered with green marble. The tower contains 1,160,000 sq ft (108,000 m2) with 503,000 sq ft (46,700 m2) of office space and a 535,000 sq ft (49,700 m2), 1,500 space parking garage.
The building appears during the end credits of the 1986 movie Flight Of The Navigator in an aerial shot of Miami. The very top floors can clearly be seen still under construction.
The roof of the building was the set of Gloria Estefan's 1994 video for "Turn The Beat Around". The building is also one of many featured on the backdrop of the stage on The Tonight Show.
On January 1, 2010, the building was renamed the Miami Tower.
Credit for the data above is given to the following website:
REFORD GARDENS | LES JARDINS DE METIS
MECONOPSIS BETONICIFOLIA
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
From Wikipedia:
Elsie Stephen Meighen - born January 22, 1872, Perth, Ontario - and Robert Wilson Reford - born in 1867, Montreal - got married on June 12, 1894.
Elsie Reford was a pioneer of Canadian horticulture, creating one of the largest private gardens in Canada on her estate, Estevan Lodge in eastern Québec. Located in Grand-Métis on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, her gardens have been open to the public since 1962 and operate under the name Les Jardins de Métis and Reford Gardens.
Born January 22, 1872 at Perth, Ontario, Elsie Reford was the eldest of three children born to Robert Meighen and Elsie Stephen. Coming from modest backgrounds themselves, Elsie’s parents ensured that their children received a good education. After being educated in Montreal, she was sent to finishing school in Dresden and Paris, returning to Montreal fluent in both German and French, and ready to take her place in society.
She married Robert Wilson Reford on June 12, 1894. She gave birth to two sons, Bruce in 1895 and Eric in 1900. Robert and Elsie Reford were, by many accounts, an ideal couple. In 1902, they built a house on Drummond Street in Montreal. They both loved the outdoors and they spend several weeks a year in a log cabin they built at Lac Caribou, south of Rimouski. In the autumn they hunted for caribou, deer, and ducks. They returned in winter to ski and snowshoe. Elsie Reford also liked to ride. She had learned as a girl and spent many hours riding on the slopes of Mount Royal. And of course, there was salmon-fishing – a sport at which she excelled.
In her day, she was known for her civic, social, and political activism. She was engaged in philanthropic activities, particularly for the Montreal Maternity Hospital and she was also the moving force behind the creation of the Women’s Canadian Club of Montreal, the first women club in Canada. She believed it important that the women become involved in debates over the great issues of the day, « something beyond the local gossip of the hour ». Her acquaintance with Lord Grey, the Governor-General of Canada from 1904 to 1911, led to her involvement in organizing, in 1908, Québec City’s tercentennial celebrations. The event was one of many to which she devoted herself in building bridges with French-Canadian community.
During the First World War, she joined her two sons in England and did volunteer work at the War Office, translating documents from German into English. After the war, she was active in the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Montreal Council of Social Agencies, and the National Association of Conservative Women.
In 1925 at the age of 53 years, Elsie Reford was operated for appendicitis and during her convalescence, her doctor counselled against fishing, fearing that she did not have the strength to return to the river.”Why not take up gardening?” he said, thinking this a more suitable pastime for a convalescent woman of a certain age. That is why she began laying out the gardens and supervising their construction. The gardens would take ten years to build, and would extend over more than twenty acres.
Elsie Reford had to overcome many difficulties in bringing her garden to life. First among them were the allergies that sometimes left her bedridden for days on end. The second obstacle was the property itself. Estevan was first and foremost a fishing lodge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to a salmon river and its dramatic views – not for the quality of the soil.
To counter-act nature’s deficiencies, she created soil for each of the plants she had selected, bringing peat and sand from nearby farms. This exchange was fortuitous to the local farmers, suffering through the Great Depression. Then, as now, the gardens provided much-needed work to an area with high unemployment. Elsie Reford’s genius as a gardener was born of the knowledge she developed of the needs of plants. Over the course of her long life, she became an expert plantsman. By the end of her life, Elsie Reford was able to counsel other gardeners, writing in the journals of the Royal Horticultural Society and the North American Lily Society. Elsie Reford was not a landscape architect and had no training of any kind as a garden designer. While she collected and appreciated art, she claimed no talents as an artist.
Elsie Stephen Reford died at her Drummond Street home on November 8, 1967 in her ninety-sixth year.
In 1995, the Reford Gardens ("Jardins de Métis") in Grand-Métis were designated a National Historic Site of Canada, as being an excellent Canadian example of the English-inspired garden.(Wikipedia)
Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Reford
Visit : www.refordgardens.com
LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS
Créés par Elsie Reford de 1926 à 1958, ces jardins témoignent de façon remarquable de l’art paysager à l’anglaise. Disposés dans un cadre naturel, un ensemble de jardins exhibent fleurs vivaces, arbres et arbustes. Le jardin des pommetiers, les rocailles et l’Allée royale évoquent l’œuvre de cette dame passionnée d’horticulture. Agrémenté d’un ruisseau et de sentiers sinueux, ce site jouit d’un microclimat favorable à la croissance d’espèces uniques au Canada. Les pavots bleus et les lis, privilégiés par Mme Reford, y fleurissent toujours et contribuent , avec d’autres plantes exotiques et indigènes, à l’harmonie de ces lieux.
Created by Elsie Reford between 1926 and 1958, these gardens are an inspired example of the English art of the garden. Woven into a natural setting, a series of gardens display perennials, trees and shrubs. A crab-apple orchard, a rock garden, and the Long Walk are also the legacy of this dedicated horticulturist. A microclimate favours the growth of species found nowhere else in Canada, while the stream and winding paths add to the charm. Elsie Reford’s beloved blue poppies and lilies still bloom and contribute, with other exotic and indigenous plants, to the harmony of the site.
Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada
Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
Gouvernement du Canada – Government of Canada
© Copyright
This photo and all those in my Photostream are protected by copyright. No one may reproduce, copy, transmit or manipulate them without my written permission.
I read in one of Aberdeen's local newspaper that a new plaque celebrating Bram Stokers first writings of Dracula on his visit to Cruden Bay while he stayed at the Kilmarnock Arms Hotel in the village is now on display, I decided to visit today myself to capture the plaque and archive here on my Flickr account, posting a few of the shots I captured today Sunday 10th Feb 2019.
News Paper item 8th February 2019.
A plaque has been installed at the north-east hotel where Bram Stoker began writing his most famous work.
The Dracula author arrived in Cruden Bay on a walking holiday in 1893 and a year later he checked into the Kilmarnock Arms Hotel.
Mr Stoker wrote a message in the guestbook. It read: “Second visit to Port Erroll. Delighted with everything & everybody & hope to come again to the Kilmarnock Arms.”
In 1896 he went back to the inn and began writing the early chapters of his novel on the mysterious Transylvanian aristocrat.
Nearby Slains Castle provided the inspiration for many of the scenes that ended up in the book.
Mike Shepherd from the Port Errol Heritage Group nominated the Bridge Street hotel for a plaque to help highlight the role it played in the early days of one of the greatest horror tales of all time.
The commemorative plate was placed on the hotel yesterday and Mr Shepherd was there to see it.
He said: “What’s great about is it is that first commemoration for Bram Stoker’s visit to Cruden Bay.
“There were quite a lot of people who didn’t realise there was a connection between Bram Stoker and the Kilmarnock Arms Hotel.”
Martin Taylor, owner and manager at the Kilmarnock Arms Hotel, said having the plaque on the side of the building makes their links with Mr Stoker “official”.
The plaque is part of a Historic Environment Scotland scheme celebrating the lives of significant people by erecting plaques on the buildings where they lived or worked.
Stoker’s plaque is the 57th announced under the initiative since it began in 2012.
Caroline Clark, head of grants at Historic Environment Scotland, said: “This commemorative plaque highlights Bram Stocker’s connection to Scotland’s heritage.
“We hope that this will encourage fans of Bram Stoker to visit Cruden Bay and the Kilmarnock Arms Hotel – the hotel he stayed in while creating his most famous novel, Dracula.”
Historic Scotland Info
Aberdeenshire inn Bram Stoker stayed at while writing famous novel will house new plaque commemorating the author’s visits
The Scottish hotel that accommodated renowned Irish author Bram Stoker while he created Dracula will be recognised under Historic Environment Scotland’s 2018 Commemorative Plaque Scheme.
The annual scheme celebrates the lives of significant people by erecting plaques on the buildings where they lived or worked. Stoker’s plaque is the 57th announced under the scheme since it began in 2012. The plaque will be unveiled in the near future at the Kilmarnock Arms Hotel.
Born near Dublin in 1847, Bram Stoker was a part-time writer for most of his life. Later in his career, for 11 months out of every year, he worked as the business manager at the Lyceum Theatre in London and as the personal manager for the famous English stage actor, Henry Irving. After 1894, he spent the other month on holiday in Cruden Bay - then known as Port Erroll - where he wrote his books.
He first discovered Cruden Bay on a walking holiday to Aberdeenshire in 1893, writing: "When first I saw the place I fell in love with it." He returned in 1894, booking into the Kilmarnock Arms Hotel and writing in the guest book: "Second visit to Port Erroll. Delighted with everything & everybody & hope to come again to the Kilmarnock Arms."
He checked-in again in 1895 with the aim of writing the early chapters of his definitive work, Dracula. The Transylvanian vampire, Count Dracula, rose from the page in the hotel known locally as 'the Killie'. Stoker returned to Aberdeenshire in 1896 to complete the later chapters.
New Slains Castle, with its dramatic cliff-top setting nearby, is believed to have acted as the visual palette to prompt the dramatic scenes set in the fictional 'Castle Dracula'. The castle contains a room that has a look-alike in the novel - the octagonal hall used as a reception room for visitors - with the following observation from the novel's protagonist, Jonathan Harker, containing a clue: "The Count halted, putting down my bags, closed the door, and crossing the room, opened another door which led into a small octagonal room lit by a single lamp, and seemingly without a window of any sort."
Mike Shepherd, a member of the Port Erroll Heritage Group who nominated Stoker for a plaque to bring attention to the Kilmarnock Arms Hotel's role in the early days of the novel's creation, said:
"When the journalist Gordon Casely visited Cruden Bay in the 1960s to interview those who knew Bram Stoker, they told him they were immensely proud that the famous author had picked their village to write his books.
"Bram's special place is our special place. The new plaque is the first-ever celebration of the link between Bram Stoker and Cruden Bay. As such, it will provide a focus for that pride."
The remaining 13 successful plaque nominations under the 2018 Commemorative Plaque Scheme will be announced over the coming months.
Wikipedia -
Abraham "Bram" Stoker (8 November 1847 – 20 April 1912) was an Irish author, best known today for his 1897 Gothic novel Dracula. During his lifetime, he was better known as the personal assistant of actor Sir Henry Irving and business manager of the Lyceum Theatre in London, which Irving owned.
Early life
Stoker was born on 8 November 1847 at 15 Marino Crescent, Clontarf, on the northside of Dublin, Ireland.
His parents were Abraham Stoker (1799–1876) from Dublin and Charlotte Mathilda Blake Thornley (1818–1901), who was raised in County Sligo.
Stoker was the third of seven children, the eldest of whom was Sir Thornley Stoker, 1st Bt..
Abraham and Charlotte were members of the Church of Ireland Parish of Clontarf and attended the parish church with their children, who were baptised there, and Abraham was a senior civil servant.
Stoker was bedridden with an unknown illness until he started school at the age of seven, when he made a complete recovery. Of this time, Stoker wrote, "I was naturally thoughtful, and the leisure of long illness gave opportunity for many thoughts which were fruitful according to their kind in later years." He was educated in a private school run by the Rev. William Woods.
After his recovery, he grew up without further serious illnesses, even excelling as an athlete (he was named University Athlete, participating in multiple sports) at Trinity College, Dublin, which he attended from 1864 to 1870. He graduated with a BA in 1870, and purchased his MA in 1875. Though he later in life recalled graduating "with honours in mathematics," this appears to have been a mistake.
He was auditor of the College Historical Society (the Hist) and president of the University Philosophical Society, where his first paper was on Sensationalism in Fiction and Society.
Early career
Stoker became interested in the theatre while a student through his friend Dr. Maunsell. While working for the Irish Civil Service, he became the theatre critic for the Dublin Evening Mail, which was co-owned by Sheridan Le Fanu, an author of Gothic tales.
Theatre critics were held in low esteem, but he attracted notice by the quality of his reviews. In December 1876, he gave a favourable review of Henry Irving's Hamlet at the Theatre Royal in Dublin. Irving invited Stoker for dinner at the Shelbourne Hotel where he was staying, and they became friends.
Stoker also wrote stories, and "The Crystal Cup" was published by the London Society in 1872, followed by "The Chain of Destiny" in four parts in The Shamrock. In 1876 while a civil servant in Dublin, Stoker wrote the non-fiction book The Duties of Clerks of Petty Sessions in Ireland (published 1879) which remained a standard work.
Furthermore, he possessed an interest in art, and was a founder of the Dublin Sketching Club in 1879.
Lyceum Theatre
Bram Stoker's former home, Kildare Street, Dublin
In 1878 Stoker married Florence Balcombe, daughter of Lieutenant-Colonel James Balcombe of 1 Marino Crescent. She was a celebrated beauty whose former suitor was Oscar Wilde.
Stoker had known Wilde from his student days, having proposed him for membership of the university's Philosophical Society while he was president. Wilde was upset at Florence's decision, but Stoker later resumed the acquaintanceship, and after Wilde's fall visited him on the Continent.
The Stokers moved to London, where Stoker became acting manager and then business manager of Irving's Lyceum Theatre, London, a post he held for 27 years. On 31 December 1879, Bram and Florence's only child was born, a son whom they christened Irving Noel Thornley Stoker.
The collaboration with Henry Irving was important for Stoker and through him he became involved in London's high society, where he met James Abbott McNeill Whistler and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (to whom he was distantly related). Working for Irving, the most famous actor of his time, and managing one of the most successful theatres in London made Stoker a notable if busy man.
He was dedicated to Irving and his memoirs show he idolised him. In London Stoker also met Hall Caine, who became one of his closest friends – he dedicated Dracula to him.
In the course of Irving's tours, Stoker travelled the world, although he never visited Eastern Europe, a setting for his most famous novel. Stoker enjoyed the United States, where Irving was popular.
With Irving he was invited twice to the White House, and knew William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt.
Stoker set two of his novels there, using Americans as characters, the most notable being Quincey Morris. He also met one of his literary idols, Walt Whitman.
Stoker visited the English coastal town of Whitby in 1890, and that visit was said to be part of the inspiration for Dracula.
He began writing novels while working as manager for Henry Irving and secretary and director of London's Lyceum Theatre, beginning with The Snake's Pass in 1890 and Dracula in 1897.
During this period, Stoker was part of the literary staff of The Daily Telegraph in London, and he wrote other fiction, including the horror novels The Lady of the Shroud (1909) and The Lair of the White Worm (1911).
He published his Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving in 1906, after Irving's death, which proved successful] and managed productions at the Prince of Wales Theatre.
Before writing Dracula, Stoker met Ármin Vámbéry, a Hungarian writer and traveller. Dracula likely emerged from Vámbéry's dark stories of the Carpathian mountains.
Stoker then spent several years researching European folklore and mythological stories of vampires.
The 1972 book In Search of Dracula by Radu Florescu and Raymond McNally claimed that the Count in Stoker's novel was based on Vlad III Dracula.[12] At most however, Stoker borrowed only the name and "scraps of miscellaneous information" about Romanian history, according to one expert, Elizabeth Miller; further, there are no comments about Vlad III in the author's working notes.
Dracula is an epistolary novel, written as a collection of realistic but completely fictional diary entries, telegrams, letters, ship's logs, and newspaper clippings, all of which added a level of detailed realism to the story, a skill which Stoker had developed as a newspaper writer
At the time of its publication, Dracula was considered a "straightforward horror novel" based on imaginary creations of supernatural life. "It gave form to a universal fantasy . . . and became a part of popular culture."
Stoker was a deeply private man, but his almost sexless marriage, intense adoration of Walt Whitman, Henry Irving and Hall Caine, and shared interests with Oscar Wilde, as well as the homoerotic aspects of Dracula have led to scholarly speculation that he was a repressed homosexual who used his fiction as an outlet for his sexual frustrations.[16] In 1912, he demanded imprisonment of all homosexual authors in Britain: it has been suggested that this was due to self-loathing and to disguise his own vulnerability.
Possibly fearful, and inspired by the monstrous image and threat of otherness that the press coverage of his friend Oscar's trials generated, Stoker began writing Dracula only weeks after Wilde's conviction.
According to the Encyclopedia of World Biography, Stoker's stories are today included in the categories of "horror fiction", "romanticized Gothic" stories, and "melodrama."
They are classified alongside other "works of popular fiction" such as Mary Shelley's Frankenstein,394 which also used the "myth-making" and story-telling method of having multiple narrators telling the same tale from different perspectives, according to historian Jules Zanger. "'They can't all be lying,' thinks the reader."
The original 541-page typescript of Dracula was believed to have been lost until it was found in a barn in northwestern Pennsylvania in the early 1980s It consisted of typed sheets with many emendations and handwritten on the title page was "THE UN-DEAD."
The author's name was shown at the bottom as Bram Stoker. Author Robert Latham remarked: "the most famous horror novel ever published, its title changed at the last minute.[
The typescript was purchased by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen.
Stoker's inspirations for the story, in addition to Whitby, may have included a visit to Slains Castle in Aberdeenshire, a visit to the crypts of St. Michan's Church in Dublin, and the novella Carmilla by Sheridan Le Fanu.
Stoker's original research notes for the novel are kept by the Rosenbach Museum and Library in Philadelphia
A facsimile edition of the notes was created by Elizabeth Miller and Robert Eighteen-Bisang in 1998.
Death
After suffering a number of strokes, Stoker died at No. 26 St George's Square, London on 20 April 1912.
Some biographers attribute the cause of death to tertiary syphilis, others to overwork.
He was cremated, and his ashes were placed in a display urn at Golders Green Crematorium in north London. The ashes of Irving Noel Stoker, the author's son, were added to his father's urn following his death in 1961. The original plan had been to keep his parents' ashes together, but after Florence Stoker's death, her ashes were scattered at the Gardens of Rest.
Beliefs and philosophy
Stoker was raised a Protestant in the Church of Ireland. He was a strong supporter of the Liberal Party and took a keen interest in Irish affairs.
As a "philosophical home ruler," he supported Home Rule for Ireland brought about by peaceful means.
He remained an ardent monarchist who believed that Ireland should remain within the British Empire, an entity that he saw as a force for good. He was an admirer of Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone, whom he knew personally, and supported his plans for Ireland.
Stoker believed in progress and took a keen interest in science and science-based medicine. Some Stoker novels represent early examples of science fiction, such as The Lady of the Shroud (1909). He had a writer's interest in the occult, notably mesmerism, but despised fraud and believed in the superiority of the scientific method over superstition. Stoker counted among his friends J. W. Brodie-Innis, a member of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, and hired member Pamela Colman Smith as an artist for the Lyceum Theatre, but no evidence suggests that Stoker ever joined the Order himself.
Snæfellsjökull is a 700,000-year-old glacier-capped stratovolcano in western Iceland. It is situated on the most western part of the Snæfellsnes peninsula in Iceland
The Snæfellsnes Peninsula is a region in western Iceland known for its dramatic landscapes. At its western tip, Snæfellsjökull National Park is dominated by Snæfellsjökull Volcano, which is topped by a glacier. Nearby, a trail leads through lava fields to black-pebble beach
REFORD GARDENS | LES JARDINS DE METIS
Coucher de soleil, Sainte-Flavie.
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
Photo taken close to REFORD GARDENS. (Sainte-Flavie)
Mrs Elsie Reford loved those beautiful sunsets.
Reference: Elsie's Paradise, The Reford Gardens, Alexander Reford, 2004, ISBN 2-7619-1921-1, That book is a must for Reford Gardens lovers!
''I shall always, all my life, want to come back to those sunsets.'' Elsie Reford, July 20, 1913. (page 25)
" It is just after 8 o'clock and I am sitting in front of my big window with the gorgeous panorama of a glorious afterglow from a perfect sunset. There is every hue of blue on the water of 'the Blue Lagoon' while Pointe-aux-Cenelles is bathed in pink and crimson and the dark hills of the north shore seem no further than two or three miles distant. I don't think in the whole world at this moment there could be anything more beautiful." Elsie Reford, June 2, 1931. (page 81)
Beautiful flowers at Reford Gardens.
''One thing I can do that no one else can is to pass the love that I feel for this place and this woman'' Alexander Reford
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
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From Wikipedia:
Elsie Stephen Meighen - born January 22, 1872, Perth, Ontario - and Robert Wilson Reford - born in 1867, Montreal - got married on June 12, 1894.
Elsie Reford was a pioneer of Canadian horticulture, creating one of the largest private gardens in Canada on her estate, Estevan Lodge in eastern Québec. Located in Grand-Métis on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, her gardens have been open to the public since 1962 and operate under the name Les Jardins de Métis and Reford Gardens.
Born January 22, 1872 at Perth, Ontario, Elsie Reford was the eldest of three children born to Robert Meighen and Elsie Stephen. Coming from modest backgrounds themselves, Elsie’s parents ensured that their children received a good education. After being educated in Montreal, she was sent to finishing school in Dresden and Paris, returning to Montreal fluent in both German and French, and ready to take her place in society.
She married Robert Wilson Reford on June 12, 1894. She gave birth to two sons, Bruce in 1895 and Eric in 1900. Robert and Elsie Reford were, by many accounts, an ideal couple. In 1902, they built a house on Drummond Street in Montreal. They both loved the outdoors and they spend several weeks a year in a log cabin they built at Lac Caribou, south of Rimouski. In the autumn they hunted for caribou, deer, and ducks. They returned in winter to ski and snowshoe. Elsie Reford also liked to ride. She had learned as a girl and spent many hours riding on the slopes of Mount Royal. And of course, there was salmon-fishing – a sport at which she excelled.
In her day, she was known for her civic, social, and political activism. She was engaged in philanthropic activities, particularly for the Montreal Maternity Hospital and she was also the moving force behind the creation of the Women’s Canadian Club of Montreal, the first women club in Canada. She believed it important that the women become involved in debates over the great issues of the day, « something beyond the local gossip of the hour ». Her acquaintance with Lord Grey, the Governor-General of Canada from 1904 to 1911, led to her involvement in organizing, in 1908, Québec City’s tercentennial celebrations. The event was one of many to which she devoted herself in building bridges with French-Canadian community.
During the First World War, she joined her two sons in England and did volunteer work at the War Office, translating documents from German into English. After the war, she was active in the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Montreal Council of Social Agencies, and the National Association of Conservative Women.
In 1925 at the age of 53 years, Elsie Reford was operated for appendicitis and during her convalescence, her doctor counselled against fishing, fearing that she did not have the strength to return to the river.”Why not take up gardening?” he said, thinking this a more suitable pastime for a convalescent woman of a certain age. That is why she began laying out the gardens and supervising their construction. The gardens would take ten years to build, and would extend over more than twenty acres.
Elsie Reford had to overcome many difficulties in bringing her garden to life. First among them were the allergies that sometimes left her bedridden for days on end. The second obstacle was the property itself. Estevan was first and foremost a fishing lodge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to a salmon river and its dramatic views – not for the quality of the soil.
To counter-act nature’s deficiencies, she created soil for each of the plants she had selected, bringing peat and sand from nearby farms. This exchange was fortuitous to the local farmers, suffering through the Great Depression. Then, as now, the gardens provided much-needed work to an area with high unemployment. Elsie Reford’s genius as a gardener was born of the knowledge she developed of the needs of plants. Over the course of her long life, she became an expert plantsman. By the end of her life, Elsie Reford was able to counsel other gardeners, writing in the journals of the Royal Horticultural Society and the North American Lily Society. Elsie Reford was not a landscape architect and had no training of any kind as a garden designer. While she collected and appreciated art, she claimed no talents as an artist.
Elsie Stephen Reford died at her Drummond Street home on November 8, 1967 in her ninety-sixth year.
In 1995, the Reford Gardens ("Jardins de Métis") in Grand-Métis were designated a National Historic Site of Canada, as being an excellent Canadian example of the English-inspired garden.(Wikipedia)
Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Reford
LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS
Créés par Elsie Reford de 1926 à 1958, ces jardins témoignent de façon remarquable de l’art paysager à l’anglaise. Disposés dans un cadre naturel, un ensemble de jardins exhibent fleurs vivaces, arbres et arbustes. Le jardin des pommetiers, les rocailles et l’Allée royale évoquent l’œuvre de cette dame passionnée d’horticulture. Agrémenté d’un ruisseau et de sentiers sinueux, ce site jouit d’un microclimat favorable à la croissance d’espèces uniques au Canada. Les pavots bleus et les lis, privilégiés par Mme Reford, y fleurissent toujours et contribuent , avec d’autres plantes exotiques et indigènes, à l’harmonie de ces lieux.
Created by Elsie Reford between 1926 and 1958, these gardens are an inspired example of the English art of the garden. Woven into a natural setting, a series of gardens display perennials, trees and shrubs. A crab-apple orchard, a rock garden, and the Long Walk are also the legacy of this dedicated horticulturist. A microclimate favours the growth of species found nowhere else in Canada, while the stream and winding paths add to the charm. Elsie Reford’s beloved blue poppies and lilies still bloom and contribute, with other exotic and indigenous plants, to the harmony of the site.
Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada
Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
Gouvernement du Canada – Government of Canada
© Copyright
This photo and all those in my Photostream are protected by copyright. No one may reproduce, copy, transmit or manipulate them without my written permission.
CAPTIVATING ALL WHO VISIT ITS DRAMATIC, CRESCENT-SHAPED SHORES, SANTORINI'S LEGENDARY BEAUTY WAS BORNE OF A VOLCANIC ERUPTION. NESTLED WITHIN ITS PEAKS, VILLAGES, BLUE DOMED MONASTERIES WELCOME YOU TO ITS CLIFF-LINED SHORES.
Close to REFORD GARDENS | JARDINS DE METIS
Lots of beautiful flowers at Reford Gardens.
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
From Wikipedia:
Elsie Stephen Meighen - born January 22, 1872, Perth, Ontario - and Robert Wilson Reford - born in 1867, Montreal - got married on June 12, 1894.
Elsie Reford was a pioneer of Canadian horticulture, creating one of the largest private gardens in Canada on her estate, Estevan Lodge in eastern Québec. Located in Grand-Métis on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, her gardens have been open to the public since 1962 and operate under the name Les Jardins de Métis and Reford Gardens.
Born January 22, 1872 at Perth, Ontario, Elsie Reford was the eldest of three children born to Robert Meighen and Elsie Stephen. Coming from modest backgrounds themselves, Elsie’s parents ensured that their children received a good education. After being educated in Montreal, she was sent to finishing school in Dresden and Paris, returning to Montreal fluent in both German and French, and ready to take her place in society.
She married Robert Wilson Reford on June 12, 1894. She gave birth to two sons, Bruce in 1895 and Eric in 1900. Robert and Elsie Reford were, by many accounts, an ideal couple. In 1902, they built a house on Drummond Street in Montreal. They both loved the outdoors and they spend several weeks a year in a log cabin they built at Lac Caribou, south of Rimouski. In the autumn they hunted for caribou, deer, and ducks. They returned in winter to ski and snowshoe. Elsie Reford also liked to ride. She had learned as a girl and spent many hours riding on the slopes of Mount Royal. And of course, there was salmon-fishing – a sport at which she excelled.
In her day, she was known for her civic, social, and political activism. She was engaged in philanthropic activities, particularly for the Montreal Maternity Hospital and she was also the moving force behind the creation of the Women’s Canadian Club of Montreal, the first women club in Canada. She believed it important that the women become involved in debates over the great issues of the day, « something beyond the local gossip of the hour ». Her acquaintance with Lord Grey, the Governor-General of Canada from 1904 to 1911, led to her involvement in organizing, in 1908, Québec City’s tercentennial celebrations. The event was one of many to which she devoted herself in building bridges with French-Canadian community.
During the First World War, she joined her two sons in England and did volunteer work at the War Office, translating documents from German into English. After the war, she was active in the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Montreal Council of Social Agencies, and the National Association of Conservative Women.
In 1925 at the age of 53 years, Elsie Reford was operated for appendicitis and during her convalescence, her doctor counselled against fishing, fearing that she did not have the strength to return to the river.”Why not take up gardening?” he said, thinking this a more suitable pastime for a convalescent woman of a certain age. That is why she began laying out the gardens and supervising their construction. The gardens would take ten years to build, and would extend over more than twenty acres.
Elsie Reford had to overcome many difficulties in bringing her garden to life. First among them were the allergies that sometimes left her bedridden for days on end. The second obstacle was the property itself. Estevan was first and foremost a fishing lodge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to a salmon river and its dramatic views – not for the quality of the soil.
To counter-act nature’s deficiencies, she created soil for each of the plants she had selected, bringing peat and sand from nearby farms. This exchange was fortuitous to the local farmers, suffering through the Great Depression. Then, as now, the gardens provided much-needed work to an area with high unemployment. Elsie Reford’s genius as a gardener was born of the knowledge she developed of the needs of plants. Over the course of her long life, she became an expert plantsman. By the end of her life, Elsie Reford was able to counsel other gardeners, writing in the journals of the Royal Horticultural Society and the North American Lily Society. Elsie Reford was not a landscape architect and had no training of any kind as a garden designer. While she collected and appreciated art, she claimed no talents as an artist.
Elsie Stephen Reford died at her Drummond Street home on November 8, 1967 in her ninety-sixth year.
In 1995, the Reford Gardens ("Jardins de Métis") in Grand-Métis were designated a National Historic Site of Canada, as being an excellent Canadian example of the English-inspired garden.(Wikipedia)
Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Reford
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS
Créés par Elsie Reford de 1926 à 1958, ces jardins témoignent de façon remarquable de l’art paysager à l’anglaise. Disposés dans un cadre naturel, un ensemble de jardins exhibent fleurs vivaces, arbres et arbustes. Le jardin des pommetiers, les rocailles et l’Allée royale évoquent l’œuvre de cette dame passionnée d’horticulture. Agrémenté d’un ruisseau et de sentiers sinueux, ce site jouit d’un microclimat favorable à la croissance d’espèces uniques au Canada. Les pavots bleus et les lis, privilégiés par Mme Reford, y fleurissent toujours et contribuent , avec d’autres plantes exotiques et indigènes, à l’harmonie de ces lieux.
Created by Elsie Reford between 1926 and 1958, these gardens are an inspired example of the English art of the garden. Woven into a natural setting, a series of gardens display perennials, trees and shrubs. A crab-apple orchard, a rock garden, and the Long Walk are also the legacy of this dedicated horticulturist. A microclimate favours the growth of species found nowhere else in Canada, while the stream and winding paths add to the charm. Elsie Reford’s beloved blue poppies and lilies still bloom and contribute, with other exotic and indigenous plants, to the harmony of the site.
Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada
Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
Gouvernement du Canada – Government of Canada
© Copyright
This photo and all those in my Photostream are protected by copyright. No one may reproduce, copy, transmit or manipulate them without my written permission.
Generally speaking, the order that our trip through Israel took.
Here was our full schedule:
Saturday, May 25 – NEW YORK
Sunday, May 26 – WELCOME TO ISRAEL
•Bus departs Ben Gurion International Airport to Moshav Givat Chen
•Arrive Hendal’e Restaurant, Moshav Givat Chen
oIntroductions and welcome dinner
•Depart Hendal’e to Prima Millennium Hotel
On arrival, all alight from bus and proceed to group check in area
Overnight bags preferred
Overnight Prima Millennium, Ra’anana, 2 Ha-Tidhar St, Ra’anana (t: +972-9-763-6363)
Monday, May 27 – CENTRAL ISRAEL and GALILEE
•Breakfast at hotel
•08:00amCheck out and bags on bus
•08:10amDepart to Hod Hasharon
•08:30amWelcome to Israel -Israel 101- with Rabbi Leor Sinai, Co-Executive Director, Alexander Muss High School in Israel
•Depart Hod Hasharon
•Fureidis
oGuest Speaker: Ibtissam Machmeed, Womens Rights and Interfaith Activist
oGuest Speaker: Professor Esther Herzog, Beit Berl College
•Proceed north
•Arrive to Daliat El-Carmel
oLunch at Nora’s Kitchen
oGuest Speaker: Druze community
•Depart Daliat El-Carmel
•Visit to Capernaum (proper attire required)
•Depart Capernaum
•Arrive at Ramot Hotel
•Evening Presentation – Special in Uniform
oGuest Speaker: Lt Col (Res.) Tiran Attia
•Dinner
oGuest: Efi Talbi - “Mom, it’s me”
oGuest: Lt Col (Res.) Tiran Attia
•OvernightRamot Resort and Hotel, Moshav Ramot (t:011-972-4-673-2636)
Tuesday, May 28 –GOLAN HEIGHTS and NORTHERN ISRAEL
•06:30amGrab and go Breakfast at hotel
•Mt Bental on the Golan Heights – Briefing with Lt Col (Res.) Tiran Attia
•Depart Mt Bental
•Stop at Beit Asher site, Kiryat Shmona
•Academic visit to Tel Hai Academic College
oWelcome and introduction
oIndividual meetings with Tel Hai Faculty
•Depart Tel Hai Academic College
•Sandwich lunch en route on bus
•Buza Ice Cream – Coexistence in a cup
•Continue to Galilee Medical Center (GMC)
•Visit to Galilee Medical Center (GMC)
oGuest Speaker: Dr. Eyal Sela
oGuest Speaker: Dr. Masad Barhoum
•Proceed to Akko
•Mini tour of Akko with Michal Shiloah-Galnoor, Western Galilee Now
•Return to bus and depart to Haifa
•Arrival to Haifa and check in to Dan Panorama Hotel
•07:00pmAs applicable, individual meetings with Technion and University of Haifa Faculty
•OvernightDan Panorama Hotel, 107 HaNassi Blvd 107, Haifa (t:011-972-4-835-2222)
Wednesday, May 29 – HAIFA
•07:00amBreakfast at hotel
•07:30amBags on bus and check out
•07:45amDepart by foot to Promenade
•Bahá’i Gardens and view of Shrine from Terrace 19 See Appendix A
oGuest Speaker: Carmel Irandoust, Deputy Secretary General of the Baha’i International Community Secretariat See Appendix A
•08:50amDepart to The Technion
•Arrival to The Technion–Polak Visitors Center
•Academics escorted to meetings at Technion.
•As applicable, bus departs Technion to University of Haifa and Hecht Museum
•10:30amAcademic meetings at the Technion
oIndividual meetings with Technion Faculty
•10:40amAcademic meetings at University of Haifa
oIndividual meetings with University of Haifa Faculty
•12:00pmPick up from Technion and University of Haifa
•Sandwich lunch en route on bus
•Brief stop at Roman Aqueduct - Caesaria
•Arrival to Jerusalem
•Proceed to Knesset – view of government quarter
•03:00pmArrival at Knesset
•Visit to Knesset (Israel’s Parliament)
•Passports required to proceed thru security
•Visitors should note that in accordance with the Knesset dress code, entrance to the Knesset is permitted only in dignified and appropriate attire (no tank/spaghetti tops, crop tops, clothing with political slogans, shorts or ¾–length trousers, ripped trousers, short skirts and dresses, tracksuits or sweatpants, flip-flops, or clogs).
oTour of the Knesset
oMeeting with Member of Knesset, Sharren Haskell, Likud Party
oMeeting with Member of Knesset, Yehiel Tropper, Blue & White Party
•Visit and meetings at Jewish National Fund, USA Jerusalem office
oLight buffet style dinner
oIndividual academic meetings
•07:20pmA journalist’s perspective on the Middle East
oGuest Speaker: Khaled Abu Toameh, Israeli /Palestinian independent journalist
•Depart to hotel
•Arrive at Dan Jerusalem Hotel and check in
•OvernightDan Jerusalem Hotel, 32 Lehi Street, Jerusalem (t: +972-2-533-1234)
Thursday, May 30 – JERUSALEM - HEBREW UNIVERSITY and YAD VASHEM
•06:45amBreakfast discussion at hotel
•07:15amDepart hotel
•Overlook at Mt Scopus
•08:00amDepartures (as applicable) from overlook to Hebrew University Agricultural School and Weizmann Institute, Rehovot
•08:30amDepartures (as applicable) from overlook to Jerusalem area
oAs applicable, transfer to Hebrew University Mt Scopus campus
oAs applicable, transfer to Hebrew University Givat Ram campus
oAs applicable, transfer to Hadassah Medical School, Ein Kerem
oAs applicable, transfer to Jerusalem College of Technology (JCT)
•09:30amIndividual meetings with Hebrew University Faculty (Mt Scopus and Givat Ram)
oIndividual meetings with Weizmann Institute Faculty
oIndividual meetings with Hebrew University Agricultural School Faculty
oIndividual meetings with Hadassah Medical School, Ein Kerem, Faculty
oIndividual meetings with Jerusalem College of Technology Faculty
oTour of Hebrew University Mt Scopus with Faith Segal
•11:00am Commencement of multi-campus collections
•Light sandwich lunch at bus
•01:00pm Yad Vashem International Institute for Holocaust Research
oGuest Speaker, Holocaust Survivor and discussion
oGuided tour
•Visit and tour of City of David
•Optional dinner at hotel
•Overnight Dan Jerusalem Hotel, 32 Lehi Street, Jerusalem (t: 011-972-2-533-1234)
Friday, May 31 – JERUSALEM
•06:30amBreakfast at hotel
•07:15am Depart hotel
•Visit to and tour of Western Wall and Tunnels See Appendix A
•Tour of the Old City
oJewish, Christian, Muslim and Armenian Quarters, Via Dolorosa, Church of the Holy Sepulcher, Arab Shuk and Jaffa Gate
•Dome of the Rock (entry for Muslim faith adherents only)
•Lunch in a Pita – A traditional on-the-go Israeli lunch in the Jewish Quarter
•Individual academic meetings at Dan Jerusalem Hotel See Appendix B
•King David’s Tomb and Room of the Last Supper
•Mahane Yehuda market (schedule and time permitting)
•Return to hotel – free time
•06:59pmLighting of Candles before Shabbat (Sabbath) begins at sunset
•07:30pm Shabbat dinner at hotel - private room
oGuest Shabbat Hosts: Rabbi Dov and Mrs. Dina Lipman
oGuest: Ilan Regenbaum
oAfter dinner, informal discussion on terrace overlooking Jerusalem
•Overnight Dan Jerusalem Hotel, 32 Lehi Street, Jerusalem (t: 011-972-2-533-1234)
Saturday, June 1 – MASADA and DEAD SEA
•06:45amShabbat breakfast at hotel
•07:20amCheck out and bags on bus
•07:30am Depart hotel
•Photo stop at Sea Level
•Visit to Jordan River – Qasr Al Yahud
•Visit and tour of Masada National Park
•Visit to Dead Sea Premier Beach
oLunch
oDead Sea swim experience (bring swimwear and flip flops – it is recommended not to shave at least 24 hours prior to entry into the Dead Sea
•Depart to Be’er Sheva
•View of Be’er Sheva River Park, Amphitheatre, Promenade and site of future Alexander Muss High School in Israel
•Ethiopian Experience at Ronald Lauder Employment Center, Old City
oGuest Speaker: Naftali Aklum
oGuest Speaker: Tamar Gil
•OvernightLeonardo Be’er Sheva , 4 Henrietta Szold St, Be’er Sheva (t:011-972-8-640-5444)
Sunday, June 2 – BE’ER SHEVA
•07:30amBreakfast at hotel
•08:10amCheck out and bags on bus
•Meet JNF Shorashim Birthright participants
•08:20amDepart hotel
•08:30amArrive Ben Gurion University
•09:00amAcademic Visit to Ben Gurion University See Appendix A
oGreetings and address by Professor Limor Aharonson-Daniel, Vice Rector for International Academic Affairs
oWelcome by Shai Kaplan, ASU-BGU Partnership project manager
oArrange take away sandwiches for bus from BGU
•Depart Ben Gurion University. Proceed to Hura
•Visit to Hura and Project Wadi Attir and visit to Bedouin Traditional Hospitality Tent See Appendix A
oGuest Speaker: Dr. Lina Alatawna
oGuest Speaker: Dr. Yasmeen Abu Fraiha
oGuest Speaker: Ghadir Hani on the status and role of Bedouin women with Project Wadi Attir
•Depart Hura and proceed to Rahat
•Visit and tour of SodaStream
•Depart Rahat
•Visit to Kibbutz Nirim
oGuest Speaker: Adele Raemer
•Depart Nirim and proceed to Sderot
•Visit and tour of Jewish National Fund’s Sderot Indoor Recreation Center
oSpeaker: Yedidya Harush
oSpeaker: Michal Uziyahu
oLight dinner
•Depart Sderot and proceed to Ashkelon
•OvernightLeonardo Ashkelon, Golani Street (t:011-972-8-911-1111)
Monday, June 3 – SDEROT and NORTHERN NEGEV
•Optional - Morning walk along beach with guide
•08:00amBreakfast at hotel
•08:40amCheck out and bags on bus
•08:50amDepart hotel
•09:30amAcademic visit to Sapir College See Appendix A
oWelcome greeting by Dr. Ronen Arbel
oGuest Speaker: Dr. Willy Abraham
oPTSD – the effects of long term trauma living on the border
•Depart Sderot to Sde Boker
•Academic Visit to Ben Gurion University - Zuckerberg Water Institute at Sde Boker
oTour of institute
oIndividual academic meetings with Zuckerberg Water Institute Faculty
oLunch
•Visit to Ben Gurion’s grave
•Proceed to Mitzpe Ramon
•View of Machtesh Mitzpe Ramon
•Proceed to Kibbutz Ketura (via rest stop at Neot Smadar)
•Arrive Kibbutz Ketura
•Free time
•07:30pmBBQ Dinner with AIES staff and kibbutz residents
•OvernightKeren Kolot Guest House, Kibbutz Ketura (c: 011-972-53-941-9109)
Tuesday, June 4 – ARAVA
•06:45amBags on bus
•07:00amBreakfast on Kibbutz Ketura
oTour of kibbutz
oMethusaleh tree and new trees
•08:30amAcademic visit to Arava Institute of Environmental Studies (AIES) See Appendix A
oGreetings and introduction by Executive Director, David Lehrer and Director of Diplomacy, Cathie Granit
oAIES Faculty David Lehrer, Dr Tareq Abu Hamed, Academic Director and Director for Renewable Energy and Energy Conservation, Dr Elaine Soloway, Director of the Center for Sustainable Agriculture, and Suleiman Halassah, research for the Center of Transboundary Water Management
oIndividual academic meetings with AIES faculty
oTour of Solar off-grid Village
•10:30amDepart Kibbutz Ketura
•Academic visit to Arava International Center for Agricultural Training (AICAT)
oDiscussion with Hanni Arnon, Director of Arava International Center for Agricultural Training
oIntroduction to Msc Plant Biology students from Nepal, Thailand, Vietnam, Myanmar and Kenya
oPresentation with AICAT Faculty and students
•12:30pmContinue to Vidor Center, Hatzeva
•12:50pmVisit to Vidor Visitors Center/Research and Development Station
oGuest speaker: Noa Zer, Regional Council Resources Development Director
oTour of research hothouses
oSandwich lunch on terrace
•02:30pmDepart Hatzeva to Tel Aviv (with rest stop en route)
•05:30pmArrive Nahlat Binyamin Arts and Crafts pedestrian precinct and Carmel Market, Tel Aviv
•Walking tour to hotel
•Check in
•07:30pmGuest Speaker in Private room – Former Member of Knesset, Merav Michaeli, Zionist Union/Labor Party (TBC)
•Free night
•Overnight Dan Panorama Hotel, 10 Kaufmann St, Tel Aviv (t: 011-972-3-519-0190)
Wednesday, June 5 – TEL AVIV
•07:00amBreakfast at hotel and informal discussion
•07:40amDepartures from hotel to:
oAs applicable, transfer to IDC Herzliya
oAs applicable, transfer to Volcani Institute
oAs applicable, transfer to Netanya Academic College
•07:45amBus departs to Tel Aviv University and Bar Ilan University
•08:30amAcademic visit to Tel Aviv University (TAU) See Appendix A
oGroup visit to Cymbalista Synagogue
oIndividual academic meetings with Tel Aviv University Faculty
•09:00amAcademic visits to Bar Ilan University, IDC Herzliya,and Holon Institute of Technology (as applicable)
oIndividual academic meetings with Tel Aviv University Faculty
oIndividual academic meetings with Bar Ilan University Faculty See Appendix B
oIndividual academic meetings with IDC Herzliya
oIndividual academic meetings with Netanya Academic College
oIndividual academic meetings with Volcani Institute
•10:30amCollections from IDC Herzliya, Volcani Institute, Netanya Academic College and Bar Ilan University to Ramat Aviv (as applicable)
•11:30amVisit and Guided Tour of Peres Center See Appendix A
oIntroduction and Guest Speaker: Nadav Tamir
•Quick bite on own at beachside kiosk
•01:45pmDepartures from Jaffa to (as applicable):
oTransfers to Tel Aviv University See Appendix A and Tel Hashomer
•02:05pmBus with remainder of group departs to Volcani Institute
•02:30pmAcademic visits to Tel Aviv University and Tel HaShomer,(as applicable)
oIndividual academic meetings with Tel Aviv University Faculty
oIndividual academic meeting with Tel HaShomer See Appendix B
•02:35pmArrive Volcani Institute
•Academic Visit to Volcani Institute
oGroup presentation
oIndividual academic meetings with Volcani Faculty
•04:00pmDepartures from Tel Aviv University and Tel HaShomer
•04:15pmBus departs Volcani Institute
•05:00pmTour of Old Jaffa (all vehicles meet and rejoin)
•06:30pmProceed to Dan Gourmet Cooking School
•Overnight Dan Panorama Hotel, 10 Kaufmann St, Tel Aviv (t: 011-972-3-519-0190)
Thursday, June 6 – TEL AVIV
•08:00amBreakfast at hotel
•08:30amGuest Speaker Joe Hyams – Start Up Nation – Honest Reporting
oChuck Fax – Positively Israel
•09:45amBags on bus and check out
•Walk Shalom Building/Bauhaus
•11:00amDepart Tel Aviv
•11:30amVisit to Rabin Center
oPrivate tour of center with Rabin Center guide
oPrivate room - Guest Speaker: Dalia Rabin, Chair of the Yitzhak Rabin Center and daughter of former Prime Minister, Yitzhak Rabin.
•Depart to Tel Aviv
•Pass by Rabin Memorial at City Hall
•02:00pmArrive Sarona
oOverview of Sarona and area by Jacob
oIndividual academic meetings at Sarona
oQuick bite on own at Sarona Food Hall/Market/Outdoor cafes
•03:00pmDepart Sarona
•03:30pmVisit to Biblical Forest at Neot Kedumim
•Opportunity for each participant to plant a tree
•Return to Tel Aviv
•06:00pmFarewell dinner – Keren and Yael at Lilienblum
oSpecial Guest: Titi Ayenew – Former Miss Israel and international model
oSpecial Guests: Israel's Gold medal Judo winners, Ori Sasson, Peter Palchik and Sagi Muki. The three will share their individual experiences, including having Israel's national anthem, Hatikvah, played for the first time in Abu Dhabi, and having games forfeited, decisions made by Iranian and Egyptian officials who would not allow their players to compete with an Israeli.
Appendix A
APPENDIX A: Program Component Background Information
Monday, May 27th
•Fureidis
Fureidis is a town situated on the coastal plain with approximately 10,000 predominantly Arab residents.
•Daliat El-Carmel
Sitting high on the slopes of Mt Carmel, this Druze town has an exceptionally unique character. It is a colorful town that offers wonderful hospitality with a smile and is also very interesting. The Druze is an ethnic group that split off from Islam in Egypt about 1,000 years ago. According to the Druze, their religion is the renewal of an ancient faith that became a secret known only to the group’s sages. Daliat El-Carmel was founded in the 17th century by Druze from Mt. Lebanon.
•Tiran Attia
Lt. Col. (Res.) Tiran Attia serves as Director of Special in Uniform, an innovative program that aims to integrate young people with autism and other disabilities into the IDF and, in turn, into Israeli society. After their service, Special in Uniform helps usher its graduates toward a self-sufficient life, through employment or other meaningful societal involvement, once they are discharged from the army.
Over the course of his distinguished 28-year career in the Israel Defense Forces, Lt. Col. Attia commanded a tank, the IDF's Technology and Logistics Forces training program, and the Sar-El program for army volunteers from around the world.
Tuesday, May 28th
•Tel Hai College
Tel-Hai College is the leading public academic college in Israel and an engine of change for the educational, economic and social development of the Upper Galilee. Since becoming an independent academic institution in 1996, Tel-Hai's innovative curriculum, diverse student life and pluralistic atmosphere, and growing reputation for academic excellence have attracted students from across the country to join in building our unique community of learning and gained the attention of scholars and researchers around the world. Tel-Hai strives for the best where it is needed most - doing our utmost to serve the people of the northern periphery of Israel and tap into the region's extraordinary potential. We believe we can see the future from here, and that we are building it every day in both the classroom and the community. We invite you to explore that work with us by learning more about our courses, our faculty and our wonderful students, as well as our passion to make the Galilee a place where more Tel-Hai graduates - and more Israelis - will want to live, work and make their home.
•Galilee Medical Center
Galilee Medical Center is a hospital located in the coastal city of Nahariya, and is the second largest hospital in northern Israel (after Rambam Hospital in Haifa). It was established in 1956.
The hospital located on the outskirts of Nahariya, three kilometers from the city center, serving half a million residents of the western Galilee, from Karmiel to the coast.
Since its modest beginning as a small maternity hospital, The WGH has grown into a 651-bed facility. The emergency room receives about 400 people every day and the number of hospitalizations is about 60,000 a year. Approximately 420 physicians’ practice in this government owned hospital, while the total number of employees is about 2200. The hospital staff is a reflection of the Multi-ethnic demography of the Western Galilee; consisting of Jews, Muslims, Christians, Druze and others. In 2007, the Western Galilee Hospital was the first to appoint an Arab Israeli, Dr. Masad Barhoum, as its director.
•Dr. Eyal Sela
Dr. Eyal Sela, Director of Otolaryngology Head & Neck Surgery, joined Galilee Medical Center’s administration in 2013. Since then Dr. Sela and his inspiring staff have been leaders in the medical revolution sweeping the Western Galilee by providing new and innovative services to the residents of Israel’s northern periphery.
As Head of the Ear, Nose, Throat, and Head and Neck (ENT) Student Program, Bar-Ilan University Faculty of Medicine in the Galilee, Dr. Sela is leading the training of Israel’s newest ENT practitioners. Formerly a lecturer at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology Medical School in Haifa, Israel (the "Technion"), Dr. Sela was recognized for his excellence in teaching for three consecutive academic years as an outstanding lecturer at Bar-Ilan University and the Technion.
Dr. Sela graduated medical school at the Technion in 1997 followed by a residency at the Carmel Medical Center in Haifa. Moreover, he completed a two-year Fellowship in Head and Neck Oncologic and Reconstructive Surgery at Jewish General Hospital, McGill
University, in Montreal, Canada during 2010 – 2012. Prior to his Fellowship, he was an
ENT Specialist on the full-time staff in the Otolaryngology Department at Carmel
Medical Center in Haifa, Israel from 2006 – 2010. Additionally, he served as a Facial Cosmetic Consultant and Surgeon, for Clalit Aesthetics during 2009 and 2010.
Dr. Sela has published numerous studies and presented at many national and international conferences. As the Head of the department of ENT, Dr. Sela is leading vast prospective and retrospective academic research along with his senior and junior staff and engaging medical students at the cutting-edge of medicine for new treatments.
Dr. Sela also acts as a key speaker for visitors and media outlets wishing to understand the treatment of victims of Syrian violence as head of one of the main departments caring for many of the more than 2,000 patients who have escaped Syrian violence to seek care at Galilee Medical Center since March 2013. Dr. Sela has received wide international attention for his presentation, highlighting some of the Department’s more unique trauma cases to arise from the care of Syrian patients. Dr. Sela is a shining beacon for Galilee Medical Center’s driving focus, “Adam l’Adam, Adam” meaning a "Person should relate to another person as a human being" or “People to People” medicine.
• Dr. Masoud Barhoum
Dr. Masoud Barhoum was born in Shefaram, Israel, to Arab Christian parents who emphasized the human values of moral integrity. Dr. Barhoum is married to Dr. Marie Barhoum, a pediatric endocrinologist, and they are the parents of 3 daughters.
Dr. Barhoum began his medical studies in 1979 at Rappaport Faculty of Medicine,
Technion Institute of Technology, and in 1985 completed his internship at Rambam Medical Center, Haifa. He was an internal medicine resident from 1986-1990, but chose to transfer to family medicine, partially in order to take upon himself an equal part of the tasks at home, including child-rearing.
In 1990, Dr. Barhoum and his family took up residence in Kibbutz Ramat Hashofet for the next 10 years, living as an integral part of the kibbutz family, while completing his residency in family medicine and receiving a Maste's Degree in Public Health
Administration from Haifa University. In the latter years of the 1990's, Dr. Barhoum was appointed director of the Clalit HMO’s Home Care System in Haifa and the Western Galilee, followed by director of its northern region Home Hospitalization Unit.
Wednesday, May 29th
•Bahá’i Temple and Gardens
Haifa is the international headquarters for the Bahá’í Faith, which began amidst persecution in Persia in the mid-19th century. They believe in the unity of all religions and believe that messengers of God like Moses, Jesus and Muhammad have been sent at different times in history with doctrines varying to fit changing social needs but bringing substantially the same message.
The beautiful gardens were originally planned by Shoghi Effendi, the late Guardian of the Faith, and they have recently undergone a massive redesign aimed at putting them on the world's horticultural map.
The Bahá’í gardens are now a geometric cascade of hanging gardens and terraces down to Ben Gurion Boulevard -a gift of visual pleasure to the city that gave the Baha'i religion its home and headquarters.
•Technion – Israel’s Institute of Technology
After some years of intense pioneering activities, with which Prof. Albert Einstein's deep involvement, the Technion opened its doors in 1924, becoming Israel’s first modern university.
The developing state created new demands on the veteran university. To meet these needs, Technion launched a variety of ambitious projects, including the establishment of the Department of Aeronautical Engineering in 1949, which laid the foundation for Israel’s successful aerospace industries and Air Force.
Recognizing the growing trend in interdisciplinary activity, Technion established several new departments, including Biomedical Engineering, Computer Science, Applied Mathematics, and the SolidState Institute. Throughout the upheaval and change, Technion remained at the forefront of the nation's activities – from producing technologies for guaranteeing Israel's future security, to planning cooperative regional research projects in subjects such as desalination and nuclear energy. The Technion's world-wide reputation for excellence has been strengthened through intensified research in various fields spanning from nuclear power options for Israel to a new program in marine engineering, and pioneer work in the field of industrial robotics. In 1998, Technion successfully launched the "Gurwin TechSat II" microsatellite, making Technion one of five universities with a student program that designs, builds, and launches its own satellite.
•Haifa University
The campus of the University of Haifa spreads along the Carmel Mountain ridge southeast of the city of Haifa and is surrounded by the Carmel National Park. The University was established in 1963 under the joint auspices of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Haifa Municipality. In 1972, it gained academic accreditation as a separate institution from the Council for Higher Education. The University of Haifa is the most pluralistic institution of higher education in Israel: sons and daughters of both veteran cities and development towns, kibbutzim and moshavim, new immigrants, Jews, Arabs, and Druze, IDF officers and security personnel—all sitting together on the bench of knowledge in an atmosphere of coexistence, tolerance, and mutual respect. The University considers the link-up between academic excellence and social responsibility as its flagship, and service to the community as one of its important goals.
There are over 17,000 students studying towards a degree (B.A., M.A., or Ph.D.). The University offers six Faculties: Humanities, Social Sciences, Sciences and Science Education, Law, Social Welfare and Health Studies, and Education and five Schools: Business Administration.
•Member of Knesset Sharren Haskel
Sharren Haskel is an Israeli member of the Knesset for Likud. She is the youngest member of Likud and the second youngest member of the 20th Knesset.
Haskel lived in Australia and volunteered at WIRES, an organization that rescue wild animals, treat them and release them back into the wild. She is active on environmental and animal rights issues, with a particular focus on water pollution coming out of areas under the control of the Palestinian Authority.
Haskel has been labeled the most active and influential Member of Knesset for civil freedom, individual rights and economic freedom in Israel for 2016. In May 2016 MK Haskel was recognized by the "Jewish Journal" the United States as a leader of new generation of woman in politics, mainly for her extensive work around the world to defend Israel’s policy and government.
•Member of Knesset Yehiel Tropper
MK Tropper was born in Jerusalem, one of nine children of Rabbi Daniel Tropper. During his national service in the Israel Defense Forces, he was part of the Duvdevan Unit. He subsequently became a social worker and earned a BA in humanities from the Open University and an MA in Jewish history and education from the Lander Institute. He worked for the Bat Yam municipality and also ran the Branco Weiss School in Ramle.
Prior to the 2013 Knesset elections Tropper was placed twenty-third on the Labor Party list but the party won only 15 seats. He was subsequently appointed as an advisor to Minister of Education Shai Piron. When Piron left the government in 2015, Tropper became Director of the Education, Welfare and Culture Division in Yeruham.
In the build-up to the 2019 elections he joined the new Israel Resilience Party founded by his friend Benny Gantz. He was elected to the Knesset as Blue and White.
Tropper is married with four children and lives in Nes Harim.
• Khaled Abu Toameh
Khaled Abu Toameh is the West Bank and Gaza correspondent for The Jerusalem Post and U.S. News and World Report. He previously served as a senior writer for the Jerusalem Report, and was a correspondent for Al-Fajr. He has produced several documentaries on the Palestinians for the BBC and many other networks, including ones that exposed the connection between Arafat and payments to the armed wing of Fatah and the financial corruption within the Palestinian Authority.
Mr. Abu Toameh was born in the West Bank city of Tulkarem in 1963 to an Israeli Arab father and a Palestinian Arab mother from the West Bank. AbuToameh received his BA in English Literature from the Hebrew University.
Thursday, May 30th
•Hebrew University
The dream of establishing a "University of the Jewish People" in the Land of Israel formed an integral part of the early Zionist vision. With the acquisition of the Gray Hill estate atop Mount Scopus, and the laying of the cornerstone for the university-to-be in 1918, the realization of the dream was on its way. Seven years later, on April 1, 1925, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem was opened.
Today, HUJI researchers figure at the forefront of international science - from biotechnology and computer science to astrophysics and cancer research, from microbiology to solar energy and genetic engineering, as well as the humanities, including Jewish studies, social sciences and law. Nearly 40% of all civilian scientific research in Israel is conducted at the Hebrew University. The University is home to 100 subject-related and interdisciplinary research centers. Thirty percent of all doctoral candidates in Israel are enrolled at HUJI. Sixteen percent of all the research conducted at the University finds application in high-tech industry.
More than 24,000 students are enrolled at the University, including 12,000 undergraduates, 7600 master's degree students, 2,600 doctoral candidates, and 1000 at the Rothberg School for Overseas Students.
•Yad Vashem
Yad Vashem, Israel’s national Holocaust museum, presents a profoundly Jewish memorial of the Shoah. You will listen to survivors’ testimonies, view personal possessions belonging to victims and examine state-of-the-art displays aimed at preserving the story of each of the six million victims. From its dramatic structure designed by world-renowned architect Moshe Sadie – which cuts through the mountain in the form of a spike – to its powerful exhibits, such as the labyrinthine Valley of the Communities.
The tour of Yad Vashem will be a special experience which will both allow you to explore the museum in a more independent manner.
Friday, May 31st
•City of David
The story of the City of David, known in Hebrew as Ir David, began over 3,000 years ago, when King David left the city of Hebron for a small hilltop city known as Jerusalem, establishing it as the unified capital of the tribes of Israel.
Years later, David's son, King Solomon, built the First Temple next to the City of David on top of Mount Moriah, the site of the binding of Isaac, and with it, this hilltop became one of the most important sites in the world.
Today, the story of the City of David continues. Deep underground, the City of David is revealing some of the most exciting archeological finds of the ancient world. While above ground, the city is a vibrant center of activity with a visitor's center that welcomes visitors for an exciting tour to the site where much of the Bible was written.
•The Old City
The Old City in Jerusalem, is a 0.9 square kilometers (0.35 sq. mi) walled area within the modern city of Jerusalem. Until 1860, when the Jewish neighborhood, Mishkenot Sha'ananim, was established, this area constituted the entire city of Jerusalem. The Old
City is home to several sites of key religious importance: the Temple Mount and its Western Wall for Jews, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher for Christians, and the Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa Mosque for Muslims.
Traditionally, the Old City has been divided into four quarters, although the current designations were introduced only in the 19th century. Today, the Old City is roughly divided into the Muslim Quarter, the Christian Quarter, the Jewish Quarter and the Armenian Quarter. Following the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the Old City was occupied by Jordan and the Jewish residents were evicted. Today, Israel controls the entire area, which it considers as part of its national capital. In 2010, Jerusalem's oldest fragment of writings was found outside of the Old City's walls.
•Western Wall and Tunnels
The Western Wall in the midst of the Old City in Jerusalem is the section of the Western supporting wall of the Temple Mount which has remained intact since the destruction of the Second Jerusalem Temple (70 C.E.). It became the most sacred spot in Jewish religious and national consciousness and tradition by virtue of its proximity to the Western Wall of the Holy of Holies in the Temple, from which, according to numerous sources, the Divine Presence never departed. It became a center of mourning over the destruction of the Temple and Israel's exile, on the one hand, and of religious - in 20th century also national - communion with the memory of Israel's former glory and the hope for its restoration, on the other.
The Western Wall Tunnel is an underground tunnel exposing the full length of the Western Wall. The tunnel is adjacent to the Western Wall and is located under buildings of the Old City of Jerusalem, Israel. While the open-air portion of the Western Wall is approximately 60 meters (200 ft.) long, the majority of its original length is hidden underground. The tunnel allows access to an additional 485 meters (1,591 ft.) of the wall.
•Shabbat
Six days a week, we compete with the natural world, building, subduing and struggling to overcome. On Shabbat, we experience a rest from this effort – it becomes a time for the spirit to rejuvenate, study, reconnect with family, friends and, just as important as oneself.
Shabbat offers the Jews a powerful spiritual opportunity to develop as individuals and as a nation. On the Sabbath, when we cease our daily activities, we allow our soul to dominate and perhaps, ascend to a higher spiritual plane. In a sense, each Sabbath is a chance for each individual to bring about the kabalistic principle of tikunolam, the mending of the universe. Shabbat is often referred to as the Shabbat Kallah, the Sabbath bride, a theme found throughout the traditional night prayers. Sixteenth century mystics of Safed created the Friday evening service, called in Hebrew, Kabalat Shabbat, which means Welcoming the Sabbath
•MK Dov Lipman
Dov, born in Washington D.C., served as a member of Knesset (2013-2015) with the Yesh Atid party. Lipman was the first American-born member in nearly 30 years. During this time, he served on several committees including the Finance Committee, The Immigration Committee, the Absorption and Dispora Affairs Committee, the Knesset
House Committee, and the special committee for the legislation drafting the ultraOrthodox into military and national service. Lipman earned his Master’s in Education at John Hopkins University and is an ordained Rabbi.
•Lone Soldiers
In the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), a lone soldier is defined as a serviceman or woman without immediate family in Israel. Lone soldiers serve in regular units and receive various forms of support from the IDF, Israeli government ministries and other organizations.
Their exact number fluctuates over time, but is consistently in the thousands; the Jewish
Telegraphic Agency reported in April 2012 that there were an "estimated 5,000". About 40% of them serve in combat units. According to an IDF spokeswoman, 8,217 personnel born outside Israel enlisted between 2009 and August 2012. The most represented countries of origin were Russia and the United States, with 1,685 and 1,661 recruits respectively.
Saturday, June 1st
• Masada
Masada (Hebrew for fortress), is situated atop an isolated rock cliff at the western end of the Judean Desert, overlooking the Dead Sea. It is a place of gaunt and majestic beauty.
Some 75 years after Herod’s death, at the beginning of the Revolt of the Jews against the Romans in 66 CE, a group of Jewish rebels overcame the Roman garrison of Masada. After the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple (70 CE) they were joined by zealots and their families who had fled from Jerusalem. With Masada as their base, they raided and harassed the Romans for two years. Then, in 73CE, the Roman governor Flavius Silva marched against Masada with the Tenth Legion, auxiliary units and thousands of Jewish prisoners-of-war. The Romans established camps at the base, laid siege to it and built a circumvallation wall. They then constructed a rampart of thousands of tons of stones and beaten earth against the western approaches of the fortress. In the spring of 74 CE, they moved a battering ram up the ramp and breached the wall of the fortress.
The defenders, approx. 1,000 men, women and children, led by Eleazar ben Yair, decided to burn the fortress and end their own lives, rather than be taken alive. They cast lots to choose 10 men to kill the remainder. They then chose the one man who would kill the survivors. That last Jew then killed himself.
The heroic story of Masada and its dramatic end attracted many explorers to the Judean desert in attempts to locate the remains of the fortress. To the Israelis, Masada symbolizes the determination of the Jewish people to be free in its own land.
• Dead Sea
The Dead Sea is the lowest place on earth, roughly 1,300 feet (400 meters) below sea level. It is 34 miles (55 km.) long and varies between 11 miles (18 km.) and 2 miles (3 km.) in width. The Sea is 1,400 feet (430 m.) deep. This unique sea is fed by the Jordan River. There is no outflow; and the exceptionally high rate of evaporation (high temperatures, low humidity) produces large quantities of raw chemicals. These are extracted and exported throughout the world for use in medicine, agriculture and industry.
The Dead Sea is actually shrinking. The southern end is now fed by a canal maintained by the Dead Sea Works, a company that converts the Sea's raw materials, particularly phosphates, into commercial products
Naftali Aklum
Naftali Aklum was born in Ethiopia in 1979. The following year, in 1980, Aklum’s parents were among the first groups to make Aliya to Israel via Sudan in what later became known as “Operation Moses.” Aklum is the youngest of twelve brothers and sisters, his late brother Ferede Aklum was the first Ethiopian Jew to make the journey to Jerusalem via Sudan, with Ferede then setting the stage for others to follow: after reaching Sudan in 1978, the letter Ferede wrote requesting assistance to make Aliya found its way to Menachem Begin, who then set in motion the remarkable, secret operation in which
North America Jewry played such a vital role. In his footsteps, literally, over 8,000 – off 12,000 successfully reached Jerusalem after 2,500 years of yearning
Aklum was raised and educated in Beersheba. In the army he served as a firefighter. Afkum graduated from Ben Gurion University in 2008 with a concentration in politics, government, history and Middle Eastern Studies.
Aklum participated in a number of delegations, including a 1996 visit to the United
States with the Anti-Defamation League, and in 2002, he spent a year with “Israel at Heart,” sharing the story of Israel and Ethiopian Jewry. Aklum volunteeres to help children in the city of Beersheba through its Council for the Well-Being of Children, and he served as a mentor to other Ethiopian-Israeli academics to assist them in their job placement efforts
Since 2010, Aklum have played a critical role in ENP’s SPACE (School Performance and
Community Empowerment) Scholastic Assistance Program. In his capacity as Director of
Educational Programs. He is responsible for the emotional and social well-being of 150 7th through 12th graders and oversees 15 teachers who provide intensive scholastic assistance to ENP participants.
Through Naftali’s work over the years, thousands of children have been inspired and motivated to succeed, knowing they have a mentor, a friend and a big brother who will do everything in his power to help them succeed.
Sunday, June 2nd
• Ben Gurion University
Ben-Gurion University of the Negev was established with the aim to spearhead the development of the Negev, a desert area comprising more than sixty percent of the country. The University was inspired by the vision of Israel's first Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, who believed that the future of the country lay in this region.
Today, Ben-Gurion University is a major center for teaching and research, with over
17,000 students enrolled in the faculties of Engineering Sciences, Health Sciences, Natural Sciences, Humanities and Social Sciences, the Guilford Glazer School of Business and Management and the Kreitman School of Advanced Graduate Studies.
Ben-Gurion University is a world leader in arid zone research, offering its expertise to many developing countries. Its world-famous Joyce and Irving Goldman Medical School has become a model for community-oriented and global medicine. In keeping with its mandate, it plays a key role in promoting industry, agriculture and education in the Negev. Its students are known for their activities in the community, and thousands of them take part in special tutoring projects.
• Professor Limor Aharonson-Daniel
Prof. Limor Aharonson-Daniel, Vice-Rector for International Academic Affairs is the founding director of the PREPARED Center for Emergency Response Research at BenGurion University of the Negev. Limor has a BSc in Statistics from Tel-Aviv University and a PhD in Community Medicine from The University of Hong Kong. She joined BGU in 2008 after being the deputy director of The Israel National Center for Trauma and Emergency Medicine Research. In 2009 she opened and headed the Masters’ Program in Emergency Preparedness and Response (Dept. of Emergency Medicine). She then became head of the department of Emergency Medicine (2011-2016).
Limor is an expert in injury epidemiology. Apart from her contribution to international classification of injury, several of her studies resulted in innovative approaches and instruments to facilitate practically oriented studies of disasters and emergency situations. Among these are the Barell Matrix and the Conjoint Community Resiliency Assessment Measure (CCRAM). Limor has published extensively in peer reviewed journals and authored several book chapters both on Injury Research Methods and on Disaster Preparedness Assessment.
As Vice Rector for International Academic Affairs and head of BGU International, Limor strives to increase the number of courses and programs taught in English at BGU, and to increase student and staff academic mobility and exchange.
Project Wadi Attir
Located near the Bedouin town of Hura, Project Wadi Attir seeks to develop and demonstrate a model for sustainable, community-based agricultural enterprise, adapted to a desert environment.
It is designed to combine Bedouin aspirations, values and experience with sustainability principles, modern day science and cutting-edge technologies. The project was initiated in order to showcase a breakthrough approach to environmentally-sound sustainable development. It will make a real difference locally and will serve as a model for arid regions in other parts of the world.
•Ghadir Hani
Director, Public Relations, Project Wadi Atir and Organizer, Department of Economic Development, Arab-Jewish Center for Equality, Empowerment and Cooperation, Negev Institute for Strategies of Peace and Development.
•SodaStream
SodaStream International Ltd. is an Israeli drinks company best known as the maker of the consumer home carbonation product of the same name. The device, like a soda syphon, carbonates water by adding carbon dioxide from a pressurized cylinder to create soda water (or carbonated water) to drink. The company also sells more than 100 types of concentrated syrups and flavorings to make carbonated drinks.
The company was founded in 1903 in England. After the company merged with SodaClub in 1998, it was relaunched with an emphasis on healthier drinks. It went public on the NASDAQ stock exchange in November 2010. SodaStream is headquartered in Lod, Israel and has 13 production plants. Until 2015 its principal manufacturing facility was located in the Mishor Adumim Industrial Park in the West Bank, creating controversy and a boycott campaign. The boycott campaign resulted in the closing of the
SodaStream factory in Ma'ale Adumim in October 2015, with more than 500 Palestinian workers losing their jobs. The factory moved to a new facility in Lehavim.
•Adele Raemer
Born and raised in the Bronx, Adele Raemer, a former member of Young Judea Zionist Youth Movement, made Aliyah in 1973. She has lived in Kibbutz Nirim, on the border with the Gaza Strip since 1975, when she moved there as part of her IDF service. In recent years, Adele has become the unofficial voice of Israelis living in the Western Negev’s border communities. She gives talks about her region and tours of her borderlying kibbutz, helping visitors to understand the realities of living in the shadow of rockets and on the frontlines every day. During Operation Pillar of Defense, Adele became an unwitting war correspondent, being interviewed by various news media outlets. During Operation Protective Edge, she had the harrowing experience of escorting areporter into a terror tunnel located near her home.
Adele is a teacher of English as a Foreign Language, as well as a teacher trainer and counselor for the Israeli Ministry of Education. She blogs for The Times of Israel, and is the founder and moderator of the Facebook page “Life on the Border with Gaza.” Here Adele and her neighbors depict what life is really like in the Gaza envelope.
•Sderot
Sderot lies one kilometer (0.62 miles) from the Gaza Strip and town of Beit Hanoun. Since the beginning of the Second Intifada in October 2000, the city has been under constant rocket fire from Qassam rockets launched by Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Despite the imperfect aim of these homemade projectiles, they have caused deaths and injuries, as well as significant damage to homes and property, psychological distress and emigration from the city. The Israeli government has installed a "Red Dawn" alarm system to warn citizens of impending rocket attacks, although its effectiveness has been questioned. Citizens only have 15 seconds to reach shelter after the sounding of the alarm. Thousands of Qassam rockets have been launched since Israel's disengagement from the Gaza Strip in September 2005.
In May 2007, a significant increase in shelling from Gaza prompted the temporary evacuation of thousands of residents. Over 6,300 rockets have fallen on the city.
•Sderot Indoor Playground
In 10 short months Jewish National Fund (JNF) did what no one thought could be done – built the largest secure indoor recreation center for the children of Sderot.
Over the past few years, the Israeli communities on the border with Gaza have endured continual Kassam rocket attacks. These attacks are untargeted, but some have hit residences and schools, killing 11 citizens and hurting hundreds more. The city of Sderot, located on the border with Gaza, has been hardest hit — its children growing up in the shadow of violence, fear, and uncertainty.
To directly impact the lives of the children of Sderot and provide them with the chance to simply be kids, Jewish National Fund embarked on a massive project: building the largest indoor playground in Israel in Sderot. The all-inclusive Indoor Recreational Center opened on March 10, 2009 to provide Sderot’s youth, (also its senior citizens), with a place to have fun, connect with friends, enjoy stimulating classes, and be children, beyond the conflict. A place to feel strong and free, away from their daily helplessness and anxiety and parents can have peace of mind knowing that their children are playing and learning in an environment that is safe and secure.
Yedidyah Harush
Yedidya Harush is the community representative for Israeli residents living on the GazaEgypt border in the Halutza region, which was established after Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip (Gush Katif) in 2005. Growing up there, Yedidya was recruited to play basketball in the New York Yeshiva league, in a joint effort to help the children and young adults of Gush Katif evacuees lead a normal life while their families and homes were in distress.
Last year, during Operation Protective Edge, when repeated rocket attacks struck southern Israel, Yedidya’s reserve elite IDF unit and Halutza’s residents helped secure the local border and protect the country.
Yedidya is inspired to make Ben Gurion's dream in the Negev a reality. The community faces many challenges in this remote area, and building a medical center is a high priority.
• Michal Uziyahu
Michal Uziyahu is now the executive assistant to the Mayor of Eshkol regional council who is located on the border triangle with Gaza and Egypt. During the last four years she served as the Israeli Emissary in the Jewish Community in Colorado.
Michal was born and raised in Negev. After earning her Bachelors’ degree and her MBA, Michal and her husband decided to stay in the Negev and raise their three wonderful children.
Michal worked for the Negev Development Authority for six years and collaborated with JNF on developing the Negev. Michal’s Jewish identity was strengthened during her stay in the US. In addition, she was made aware of the importance of the US and Israel’s relationship.
Monday, June 3rd
•Sapir College
Sapir College is in the northern Negev. The beautifully landscaped campus is composed of dozens of buildings, in the rural setting of the surrounding kibbutzim.
Among members of Sapir’s teaching faculty are outstanding lecturers from Israel’s leading universities. Over 8,000 students, from Israel and overseas, are currently attending Sapir. Many of the Israeli students are from the Galilee, central Israel and, of course, from the south. They are offered a wide range of applied study tracks that assure graduates quick inclusion in the job market and admission to post-graduate degrees in universities in Israel and elsewhere.
•Ben Gurion University – Zuckerberg Institute of Water Research
ZIWR scientists use experimental and theoretical approaches to conduct fundamental research related to water in order to understand wide-ranging phenomena.
Our broad-based research encompasses nanoscience and pore scale phenomena and extends to pilot projects and field studies
.
Our interdisciplinary team includes hydrologists, soil scientists, geologists, chemists, microbiologists, and engineers. The result is a unique scientific environment facilitating the investigation of environmental challenges and the development of engineering solutions for water-related problems. Young and dynamic, the Zuckerberg Institute for Water Research is open to change, and research topics are “fine-tuned" to remain responsive to constantly evolving needs and challenges
.
ZIWR members are actively engaged in research projects within Israel and collaborate with other scientists worldwide. Emphasis is placed on research and development of water resources in drylands in general, and on the local conditions of the Negev in particular. Ben-Gurion University of the Negev remains mindful of its founding mission to spearhead development of Israel's southern region while taking its place in the global scientific community.
• Machtesh Ramon
Machtesh Ramon is a geological feature of Israel's Negev desert. Located at the peak of Mount Negev 85 km south of the city of Beersheba, the landform is not an impact crater from a meteor nor a volcanic crater formed by a volcanic eruption but rather is the world's largest "erosion cirque" (steep head valley or box canyons). The formation is 40 km long, 2–10 km wide and 500 meters deep, and is shaped like an elongated heart. The only settlement in the area is the small town of Mitzpe Ramon ("Ramon Lookout") located on the northern edge of the depression. Today the area forms Israel's largest national park, the Ramon Nature Reserve.
Kibbutz Ketura
Ketura was founded by a small group of young North Americans, graduates of the Young Judaea Year-In-Israel Course, at the close of the Yom Kippur War in November 1973. The first years of the kibbutz's existence were marked by great difficulties and frustrations, leading many of the founders to leave. In time, the core group of these who remained were joined by other Young Judaeans, a variety of immigrants, and graduates of the Israeli Scout movement. As Ketura grew, a more stable lifestyle was created, and the members began raising families in this, their new home. Today, Ketura has grown to be the second largest settlement in the region, with 140 members and candidates and over 147 children. One-third of the members are native Israelis; most immigrants come from English-speaking countries, with a smaller number from Europe and the former USSR.
Tuesday, June 4th
• Arava Institute
The Arava Institute for Environmental Studies (AIES) is the premier environmental education and research program in the Middle East, preparing future Jewish and Arab leaders to cooperatively solve the region's environmental challenges.
Affiliated with Ben-Gurion University, AIES’s academic programs, research, and international cooperation initiatives cover environmental concerns and challenges.
Students at AIES study a range of environmental issues from a trans-boundary and interdisciplinary perspective while learning peace-building and leadership skills. With a student body comprised of Jordanians, Palestinians, Israelis, and students from around the world, the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies offers students a unique opportunity to study and live together for an extended period of time; building networks and developing understanding that will enable future cooperative work and activism in the Middle East and beyond.
Here, the idea that nature knows no political borders is more than a belief. It is a fact, a curriculum, and a way of life.
•Cathie Granit
Cathie immigrated to Israel from New Zealand. She currently holds the position of Director of Diplomacy at the Arava Institute of Environmental Studies. Cathie lives on Kibbutz Ketura with her husband and children.
•Dr. Tareq Abu Hamed
Dr. Abu Hamed from East Jerusalem holds a Bachelor and a Master of Science in Chemical Engineering from Gazi University (Turkey), and a Ph.D in Chemical Engineering from Ankara University (Turkey), and has completed two terms of postdoctoral research at the Environmental Science and Energy Research Department of the Weizman Institute (Israel), and the University of Minnesota’s Mechanical Engineering Department Solar Energy Lab.
In 2008, he established the Center for Renewable Energy and Energy Conservation
(CREEC) at the Arava Institute. He left the Institute in 2013 to become the Israeli Ministry of Science’s Deputy Chief Scientist, and later the Acting Chief Scientist, the highest ranking Palestinian in the Israeli government. He returned to the Arava Institute in 2016 as Director of CREEC and Academic Director.
Dr. Elaine M. Solowey
Dr. Solowey was born in 1953. She has studied commercial horticulture, desert agriculture, land reclamation, and tree surgery. She received her BSc from the University of California-Davis, her MSc from Penn State University, and her PhD from Weber State University. A member of Kibbutz Ketura since 1975 she has planted and managed orchards, introduced new crops, and founded the Center for Sustainable Agriculture at the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies. In 2005, she notoriously cultivated a date tree from a biblical age-seed found in the excavations of Masada. Dr. Solowey has been teaching at Institute since 1996, and she continues to work on the cultivation and domestication of rare medicinal plants.
•Suleiman Halasah
Acting Associate Director, Center for Trans-Boundary Water Management
Suleiman Halasah is an electrical engineer with a BSc. from the University of Jordan, and a MSc. from Ben Gurion University. After completing his first degree, Suleiman worked as a research assistant for the Department of Computer Engineering at the University of Jordan. He also served as a control engineer for the Jordan Valley Authority in the Jordanian Ministry of Water and Irrigation. In this position, he was responsible for the SCADA System in the Southern Ghors Irrigation Project.
While working on his M Sc., Suleiman continued his professional work in the field of renewable energy, water and the environment. Suleiman became a cofounder of Global Sun Partners, a renewable energy company that works on building solar energy PV power plants in several countries in the world. Suleiman has served as a panel member on the topic of water security and climate change at the UN Department of Public Information/ NGO Conference in New York in 2007. In the same year, he was invited to speak at the First International Conference on Sustainable Energy as a Catalyst for Regional Development at the Eilat/Eilot Regional Council. Suleiman established Integrated GREEN Solutions (i.GREENs) which aims to improve the environmental awareness and introduce green solutions in Jordan and the Middle East.
•Arava International Center for Agricultural Training (AICAT)
Located in Sapir, the regional service center for Central Arava, AICAT aims to establish itself as the national and international leading authority in sophisticated arid lands agricultural studies and training and is a central platform for global collaborations in the agriculture arena. AICAT provides not only an invaluable contribution to developing countries and their students who attend it, but also provides additional workplaces for residents and extra working hands to the local agricultural industry. Under a single roof, with a multitude of cultures and shared human attributes, students receive professional agricultural training and live a unique experience that enables them to discover their capabilities and the means for fulfilling their potential.
Over the years the Center has received students from various Asian countries, including
Thailand, Cambodia, Myanmar, Nepal, Vietnam, Laos, Philippines, India, Ethiopia,
Southern Sudan, Jordan and Tibet. As the number of participating countries increases and the center becomes the global hub for agricultural training, the student population will more than triple over the next five years bringing the need for a larger campus.
•Hanni Arnon
Hanni Arnon is the founder and director of AICAT. AICAT was established in 1994. Hanni has lived on Moshav Idan since 1986.
•Vidor Center
The Vidor Center introduces you to the Arava in all its variety, covering topics such as the region's uniquely advanced agriculture alongside its water and soil challenges, the history of the Arava communities, geology, aquaculture, the local fascinating colorful crops and much more.
•Noa Zer
Born and raised in the suburbs of Tel Aviv, Noa Zer moved to Moshav Paran in the
Central Arava in April 2011 and heads the Resource Development Department at the Central Arava Regional Council, where she is responsible for fundraising as well as foreign affairs and connections to Jewish communities in the Diaspora. Zer is married to a second-generation farmer from Paran and together they are starting their second agricultural season as pepper growers. She is also writing her master’s thesis for the department of public policy at Tel Aviv University.
•Hatzeva
Hatzeva is a moshav in southern Israel. Located in the Arava, 12 kilometers north of Ein Yahav. It falls under the jurisdiction of Central Arava Regional Council. In 2017 it had a population of 584.
Hatzeva was founded in 1965 as a Nahal settlement near the Arava Road and became a moshav in 1968. It was named after the nearby Hatzeva Fortress. In 1971 its location changed slightly. Near the moshav's access road lies the Hatzeva field school (Gidron), located where the moshav was until 1971.
•Merav Michaeli
Merav Michaeli was a Member of Knesset where she served as faction head of the Labor
Party and Opposition Whip. Former MK Michaeli played an active role as Chair of the Caucus for Female Knesset Members and was a member of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committees.
Her legislative agenda focused on economic justice and women’s rights, with successes in revising bankruptcy law and increasing financial support for Holocaust survivors. As a prominent journalist, TV anchor, radio broadcaster, and activist, she is known for her powerful feminist voice, her ability to challenge conventional views, and as a fierce defender of minority rights, equality and democracy in Israel.
Wednesday, June 5th
•The Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya (IDC)
IDC Herzliya was established in 1994 by Prof. Uriel Reichman, as the first private institution of higher education in Israel. Now in its second decade of activity, its schools and research institutes have won renown internationally.
Since its establishment, IDC Herzliya has been an academic avant-garde. As such, its faculty takes part in the fascinating process that is reshaping Israel. They deal with constitutional and governmental reconstruction, economic growth, reevaluation of Israel’s strategy and policies of foreign relations, as well as the country’s social and moral agenda.
IDC Herzliya is unique in its educational methods, which are based on an interdisciplinary approach, teaching of information technology and global markets. IDC combines theory with real world experience and provides its students with proficiencies. Its basic outlook, which is rooted in the twin concepts of individual freedom and responsibility, emphasizes student’s entrepreneurship and leadership alongside commitment to community service.
•Tel Aviv University
Located in Israel's cultural, financial and industrial heartland, Tel Aviv University is the largest university in Israel and the biggest Jewish university in the world. It is a major center of teaching and research, comprising nine faculties, 106 departments, and 90 research institutes. Its origins go back to 1956, when three small education units - The Tel Aviv School of Law and Economics, an Institute of Natural Sciences, and an Institute of Jewish Studies - joined together to form the University of Tel Aviv.
In addition to its basic functions of research and teaching, Tel Aviv University contributes its expertise to the welfare of society at large; plays a part in all aspects of national life; and addresses regional and international issues.
Faculty members serve in the Knesset and the Cabinet, in government agencies, and in professional organizations and public bodies. Students are encouraged to tutor disadvantaged children, volunteer services to the elderly, and aid the community through a broad range of social involvement programs, such as TAU's wide-scale Price-Brodie
Initiative in Jaffa.
Middle Eastern history, strategic studies, and the search for peace are central concerns for Tel Aviv University researchers. The Institute for Diplomacy and Regional Cooperation, founded by the Peres Center for Peace, the Armand Hammer Fund for Economic Cooperation in the Middle East, the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African History, the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies, the Tami Steinmetz Center for Peace Research and the Morris E. Curiel Center for International Studies are respected sources of information for government and private institutions, the press and the public.
•Bar Ilan University
Bar Ilan University is the second largest university in Israel, with a student population of approximately 24,500 at the main campus in Ramat Gan, and at the four regional colleges operating under its auspices – in the Jordan Valley, in Safed, in the western Galilee and in Ashkelon.
The university regards the sacred principles of Judaism as the manifestation of the Jewish people's uniqueness, in accordance with the principles defined upon its establishment. The university's basic roles include supporting the safeguarding of these principles out of love and with the purpose of training and producing scholars, researchers and men of science knowledgeable in the Torah and imbued with the original Jewish spirit and love of one's brethren. Aiming to excel in research, in recent years Bar-Ilan University has placed ma
Louise Tanguay has photographed nature in all its varied moods. She has been involved in several books about Quebec gardens and her photographs have been published in a number of magazines and newspapers, including L'actualité, Canadian Geographic, Equinox, La Presse, The Globe and Mail and Winds. She is also the author of Natura and Flora, published by les Éditions de l'Homme.
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
Elsie Stephen Meighen - born January 22, 1872, Perth, Ontario - and Robert Wilson Reford - born in 1867, Montreal - got married on June 12, 1894.
Elsie Reford was a pioneer of Canadian horticulture, creating one of the largest private gardens in Canada on her estate, Estevan Lodge in eastern Québec. Located in Grand-Métis on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, her gardens have been open to the public since 1962 and operate under the name Les Jardins de Métis and Reford Gardens.
Born January 22, 1872 at Perth, Ontario, Elsie Reford was the eldest of three children born to Robert Meighen and Elsie Stephen. Coming from modest backgrounds themselves, Elsie’s parents ensured that their children received a good education. After being educated in Montreal, she was sent to finishing school in Dresden and Paris, returning to Montreal fluent in both German and French, and ready to take her place in society.
She married Robert Wilson Reford on June 12, 1894. She gave birth to two sons, Bruce in 1895 and Eric in 1900. Robert and Elsie Reford were, by many accounts, an ideal couple. In 1902, they built a house on Drummond Street in Montreal. They both loved the outdoors and they spend several weeks a year in a log cabin they built at Lac Caribou, south of Rimouski. In the autumn they hunted for caribou, deer, and ducks. They returned in winter to ski and snowshoe. Elsie Reford also liked to ride. She had learned as a girl and spent many hours riding on the slopes of Mount Royal. And of course, there was salmon-fishing – a sport at which she excelled.
In her day, she was known for her civic, social, and political activism. She was engaged in philanthropic activities, particularly for the Montreal Maternity Hospital and she was also the moving force behind the creation of the Women’s Canadian Club of Montreal, the first women club in Canada. She believed it important that the women become involved in debates over the great issues of the day, « something beyond the local gossip of the hour ». Her acquaintance with Lord Grey, the Governor-General of Canada from 1904 to 1911, led to her involvement in organizing, in 1908, Québec City’s tercentennial celebrations. The event was one of many to which she devoted herself in building bridges with French-Canadian community.
During the First World War, she joined her two sons in England and did volunteer work at the War Office, translating documents from German into English. After the war, she was active in the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Montreal Council of Social Agencies, and the National Association of Conservative Women.
In 1925 at the age of 53 years, Elsie Reford was operated for appendicitis and during her convalescence, her doctor counselled against fishing, fearing that she did not have the strength to return to the river.”Why not take up gardening?” he said, thinking this a more suitable pastime for a convalescent woman of a certain age. That is why she began laying out the gardens and supervising their construction. The gardens would take ten years to build, and would extend over more than twenty acres.
Elsie Reford had to overcome many difficulties in bringing her garden to life. First among them were the allergies that sometimes left her bedridden for days on end. The second obstacle was the property itself. Estevan was first and foremost a fishing lodge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to a salmon river and its dramatic views – not for the quality of the soil.
To counter-act nature’s deficiencies, she created soil for each of the plants she had selected, bringing peat and sand from nearby farms. This exchange was fortuitous to the local farmers, suffering through the Great Depression. Then, as now, the gardens provided much-needed work to an area with high unemployment. Elsie Reford’s genius as a gardener was born of the knowledge she developed of the needs of plants. Over the course of her long life, she became an expert plantsman. By the end of her life, Elsie Reford was able to counsel other gardeners, writing in the journals of the Royal Horticultural Society and the North American Lily Society. Elsie Reford was not a landscape architect and had no training of any kind as a garden designer. While she collected and appreciated art, she claimed no talents as an artist.
Elsie Stephen Reford died at her Drummond Street home on November 8, 1967 in her ninety-sixth year.
In 1995, the Reford Gardens ("Jardins de Métis") in Grand-Métis were designated a National Historic Site of Canada, as being an excellent Canadian example of the English-inspired garden.(Wikipedia)
Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Reford
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS
Créés par Elsie Reford de 1926 à 1958, ces jardins témoignent de façon remarquable de l’art paysager à l’anglaise. Disposés dans un cadre naturel, un ensemble de jardins exhibent fleurs vivaces, arbres et arbustes. Le jardin des pommetiers, les rocailles et l’Allée royale évoquent l’œuvre de cette dame passionnée d’horticulture. Agrémenté d’un ruisseau et de sentiers sinueux, ce site jouit d’un microclimat favorable à la croissance d’espèces uniques au Canada. Les pavots bleus et les lis, privilégiés par Mme Reford, y fleurissent toujours et contribuent , avec d’autres plantes exotiques et indigènes, à l’harmonie de ces lieux.
Created by Elsie Reford between 1926 and 1958, these gardens are an inspired example of the English art of the garden. Woven into a natural setting, a series of gardens display perennials, trees and shrubs. A crab-apple orchard, a rock garden, and the Long Walk are also the legacy of this dedicated horticulturist. A microclimate favours the growth of species found nowhere else in Canada, while the stream and winding paths add to the charm. Elsie Reford’s beloved blue poppies and lilies still bloom and contribute, with other exotic and indigenous plants, to the harmony of the site.
Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada
Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
Gouvernement du Canada – Government of Canada
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German collectors card in the series 'Vom Werden deutscher Filmkunst - Der Tonfilm', album no. 11, picture no. 124. Photo: Terra-Film / Ross Verlag. Sepp Rist in Die Reiter von Deutsch-Ostafrika/The Riders of German East Africa (Herbert Selpin, 1934).
Sepp Rist (1900-1980) was a top skier, who was spotted for the Mountain films by Arnold Fanck. Later the Athletic German actor with the typical tanned and weathered face played, hunters, foresters and other rugged characters in several Heimat films.
Sepp Rist was born in 1900 in Bad Hindelang in Bavaria. During the First World War, Rist was a stoker on a torpedo boat, and later radio telegrapher on the 1st Submarine Chaser-half-flotilla. From 1920 he worked for the Nuremberg police as a radio operator, and also worked temporarily at the airport in Fürth. He was also a talented athlete who participated at the 1927 German Ski Championships in Garmisch-Partenkirchen and at other cross-country and jump skiing championships. At a ski race in Gurgl, cameraman Sepp Allgeier spotted him for the film. Rist’s first film part was the male lead in Arnold Fanck's mountain film Stürme über dem Mont Blanc/Storm Over Mont Blanc (Arnold Fanck, 1930) opposite Leni Riefenstahl. Rist plays meteorologist Hannes who works alone at the Mont Blanc weather station gathering data. His only contact with the world below is via Morse code signals. He is joined by a woman friend, who helps him survive a terrible storm over the mountain. Filmed on location in Arosa, Switzerland, Babelsberg Observatory in Potsdam, Germany, and Mont-Blanc in Chamonix, France, Wikipedia writes that Stürme über dem Mont Blanc is notable for its dramatic mountain footage and depictions of a violent snow storm. It was shot as a silent film and was later dubbed in the studio. Stürme über dem Mont Blanc was followed by numerous other films in which Rist always embodied the seasoned Bavarian man image. He reunited with Fanck and Riefenstahl for the German-US drama S.O.S. Eisberg/S.O.S. Iceberg (Arnold Fanck, 1933). S.O.S. Eisberg was a combination of Mountain film and Disaster film, written by Tom Reed based on a story by Arnold Fanck. An Arctic expedition goes in search of a party that was lost the previous year. S.O.S. Eisberg was filmed on location in Umanak, on the west coast of Greenland, in Iceland, and in the Bernina Alps, on the border between Italy and Switzerland. It was filmed simultaneously in German and English, and released by Universal Studios in both Germany and the United States. Rist appeared in both versions. He appeared with Brigitte Horney in the Mountain film Der ewige Traum/The Eternal Dream (Arnold Fanck, 1934). In Die Reiter von Deutsch-Ostafrika/The Riders of German East Africa (Herbert Selpin, 1934), he played a German farmer in German East Africa, who is conscripted into the Schutztruppe (German armed colonial force) at the beginning of the First World War. He had a supporting part as a Gestapo commissioner in the propaganda film Verräter/The Traitor (Karl Ritter, 1936) starring Lída Baarová.
Quite the adventurer in real life, Sepp Rist was most at home filming in far-flung and exotic locations around the world. In Japan, he appeared in Kokumin no chikai/ The sacred goal (Hiromasa Nomura, 1938). During the Second World War, Sepp Rist made the Heimat film Die Geierwally/Vulture-Wally (Hans Steinhoff, 1940) with Heidemarie Hatheyer, and Titanic (Werner Klingler, Herbert Selpin, 1943), which used the sinking of the RMS Titanic as a setting for an attempt to discredit British and American capitalist dealings and glorify the bravery and selflessness of German men. After the war, Sepp Rist frequently appeared in Heimat films, but only in small roles in which he played primarily hunters and foresters. He appeared in the American thriller The Devil Makes Three (Andrew Marton, 1952), set in post-World War II Germany, and starring Gene Kelly and Pier Angeli. More recently, he played in episodes of such television series as the Krimi Der Kommissar/The Commissioner (1969-1970) with Erik Ode, and Königlich Bayerisches Amtsgericht/Royal Bavarian District Court (1970-1971). His final films were the Heimat dramas Schloß Hubertus/ Hubertus Castle (Harald Reinl, 1973) starring Robert Hoffmann, and Der Jäger von Fall/The Hunter from Fall (Harald Reinl, 1974). Sepp Rist was married with actress Carla Rust. In 1980, Sepp Rist died at the age of 80 years. His wife had died three years before him.
Sources: Stephanie d’Heil (Steffi-line - German), Thomas Staedeli (Cyranos – German), Nicole Gagne (AllMovie), Wikipedia (German) and IMDb.
For more cards of this series, check out our album Vom Werden Deutscher Filmkunst.
Wrapping up my Southern Arizona Adventure 2024 with a visit to Amerind Foundation and Texas Canyon. This is stage 9 of 9.
The light and shadows were very dynamic and I was chasing them.
www.amerind.org/texascanyonnaturepreserve/
Chat GPT
Texas Canyon is a striking natural area located in Cochise County, southeastern Arizona, along Interstate 10 between Benson and Willcox. It is renowned for its dramatic landscape, characterized by massive granite boulders scattered across the desert terrain, creating a rugged and picturesque environment.
The granite boulders in Texas Canyon were formed through millions of years of erosion and weathering. These formations, often precariously balanced, provide a unique and photogenic sight, making the canyon a popular stop for travelers and photographers.
The area is surrounded by the Chiricahua Mountains to the south and other nearby ranges, offering expansive views of the Sonoran Desert with its mix of desert vegetation, including cacti and mesquite trees. The light, especially at sunrise and sunset, enhances the golden hues of the rocks, adding to the area's charm.
Texas Canyon has a rich history tied to the Chiricahua Apache people, who once roamed these lands. Later, it became home to early settlers.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Canyon
Texas Canyon is a valley in Cochise County, Arizona,[1] about 20 miles east of Benson on Interstate 10. Lying between the Little Dragoon Mountains to the north and the Dragoon Mountains to the south and known for its giant granite boulders, the canyon attracts rockhounds and photographers.
www.arizonahighways.com/article/texas-canyon-nature-preserve
The giant granite boulders along Interstate 10 in Southeastern Arizona have been gracing postcards for decades, but that otherworldly landscape was always off-limits to the general public. Not anymore. Thanks to the Amerind Foundation, 6 miles of trails in the brand-new Texas Canyon Nature Preserve are now available to those who want a closer look.
By Suzanne Wright
Zipping past Texas Canyon, an hour southeast of Tucson, it's impossible not to notice the boulders - giant, eye-catching piles of granite, like something out of The Flintstones. But other than providing scenery along Interstate 10 â particularly at a rest area just down the highway from the kitschy attraction known as The Thing â the area has long been off-limits to curious travelers who wanted to stretch their legs and get a closer look.
There are several private landowners in Texas Canyon, including Triangle T Guest Ranch, which has some trails for its guests. But none had opened its trails to the public until this past October, when the portion of the area owned and managed by the Amerind Foundation had its ribbon-cutting. After a multi-year campaign that raised $250,000, the Texas Canyon Nature Preserve â on land previously closed to the public for 85 years, and where the organization's founding family raised quarter horses until 1968 â is open to all.
The idea had been percolating with the Amerind Foundation board and management for years, says Eric Kaldahl, the president, CEO and chief curator of the foundation. The response from the surrounding community has been very enthusiastic. We welcomed more visitors last October than we've seen for the past 10 years.
The preserve, located just off I-10 between Benson and Willcox, is part of a 1,900-acre campus that includes the Amerind Museum. More than 6 miles of trails wind past balanced rocks, fantastical shapes and rocky spires in open, sun-warmed high-desert grasslands studded with cactuses, wildflowers and trees. The trail is self-guided, although Kaldahl hopes to offer guided sunrise and sunset hikes in the next year. Visitors can pay a $12 admission fee for just the trails or $20 to visit both the trails and the museum.
Trail designer Sirena Rana knows the landscape can look intimidating, but she purposely designed the trails to be perfect little morsels. Rana didn't grow up hiking, so she aimed to make the trails a comfortable experience for all ages and abilities. There are no steep elevation gains, and dirt, rather than gravel, makes for more stability. And Rana recalls walking for miles and miles over several months to understand the land and ensure the trails were constructed to shed water, limit erosion and provide firebreaks.
Texas Canyon is one of the most unique landscapes in the Southwest, formed by millions of years of wind and rain weathering the granite, she says, likening it to Joshua Tree National Park and the Wilderness of Rock on Mount Lemmon. It's very unusual that it's right off a major interstate and just an hour from a major metropolitan area, she adds. This is one of the greatest outdoor sculpture gardens in the world designed by Mother Nature. I'm so pleased with how it turned out.
Elsewhere along the trail, signage reflects the Amerind Museum's mission of fostering knowledge and understanding of Indigenous peoples. Acknowledging that these are ancestral lands, the signs feature O'odham, English and Spanish text, in that order â and Kaldahl hopes to add Apache, too.
Additionally, Indigenous people have collected basket-weaving materials from these lands for generations, and they remain free to access the grounds.
Haiku Thoughts:
Stone giants whisper,
Texas Canyon's quiet grace,
Time's hand carves the sky.
Southern Arizona Adventure 2024
The beautiful and now tranquil setting of Augustinian Lanercost Priory belies an often troubled history. Standing close to Hadrian's Wall, it suffered frequent attacks during the long Anglo-Scottish wars, once by Robert Bruce in person. The mortally sick King Edward I rested here for five months in 1306-7, shortly before his death on his final campaign.
The east end of the 13th-century church survives to its full height, housing within its dramatic triple tier of arches some fine monuments.
More photos of Lanercost Priory here: www.flickr.com/photos/davidambridge/albums/72157624989399623
The Colorado River is the principal river of the Southwestern United States and northwest Mexico. The 1,450-mile (2,330 km) river drains an expansive, arid watershed that encompasses parts of seven U.S. and two Mexican states. Rising in the central Rocky Mountains in the U.S., the river flows generally southwest across the Colorado Plateau and through the Grand Canyon before reaching Lake Mead on the Arizona–Nevada line, where it turns south toward the international border. After entering Mexico, the Colorado approaches the large Colorado River Delta where it naturally emptied into the Gulf of California between Baja California and Sonora, though it no longer reaches its delta or the sea.
Known for its dramatic canyons and whitewater rapids, the Colorado is a vital source of water for agricultural and urban areas in the southwestern desert lands of North America. The river and its tributaries are controlled by an extensive system of dams, reservoirs, and aqueducts, which divert 90% of its water in the U.S. alone to furnish irrigation and municipal water supply for almost 40 million people both inside and outside the watershed. The Colorado's large flow and steep gradient are used for generating hydroelectric power, and its major dams regulate peaking power demands in much of the Intermountain West. Since the mid-20th century, intensive water consumption has dried the lower 100 miles (160 km) of the river such that it has not consistently reached the sea since the 1960s.
Beginning with small bands of nomadic hunter-gatherers, Native Americans have inhabited the Colorado River basin for at least 8,000 years. Between 2,000 and 1,000 years ago, the river and its tributaries fostered large agricultural civilizations, which may have been some of the most sophisticated indigenous cultures in North America. These societies are believed to have collapsed because of a combination of severe drought and poor land use practices. Most native peoples that inhabit the basin today are descended from other groups that settled in the region beginning about 1,000 years ago. Europeans first entered the Colorado Basin in the 16th century, when explorers from Spain began mapping and claiming the area, which later became part of Mexico upon its independence in 1821. Early contact between foreigners and natives was generally limited to the fur trade in the headwaters and sporadic trade interactions along the lower river.
After the greater Colorado River basin became part of the U.S. in 1846, the bulk of the river's course was still largely the subject of myths and speculation. Several expeditions charted the Colorado in the mid-19th century, one of which, led by John Wesley Powell in 1869, was the first to run the rapids of the Grand Canyon. American explorers collected valuable information that would later be used to develop the river for navigation and water supply. Large-scale settlement of the lower basin began in the mid- to late-19th century, with steamboats providing transportation from the Gulf of California to landings along the Colorado River that linked to wagon roads into the interior of New Mexico Territory. Lesser numbers settled in the upper basin, which was the scene of major gold strikes in Arizona and Nevada in the 1860s and 1870s.
Major engineering of the river basin began around the start of the 20th century, with many guidelines established in a series of domestic and international treaties known as the "Law of the River". The U.S. federal government was the main driving force behind the construction of hydraulic engineering projects in the river system, although many state and local water agencies were also involved. Most of the major dams in the river basin were built between 1910 and 1970, and the system keystone, Hoover Dam, was completed in 1935. The Colorado is now considered among the most controlled and litigated rivers in the world, with every drop of its water fully allocated.
The damming and diversion of the Colorado River system have been flashpoint issues for the environmental movement in the American Southwest because of their impacts on the ecology and natural beauty of the river and its tributaries. During the construction of Glen Canyon Dam, environmental organizations vowed to block any further development of the river, and a number of later dam and aqueduct proposals were defeated by citizen opposition. As demands for Colorado River water continue to rise, the level of human development and control of the river continues to generate controversy.
The Colorado begins at La Poudre Pass in the Southern Rocky Mountains of Colorado, at more than 2 miles (3 km) above sea level. After a short run south, the river turns west below Grand Lake, the largest natural lake in the state. For the first 250 miles (400 km) of its course, the Colorado carves its way through the mountainous Western Slope, a sparsely populated region defined by the portion of the state west of the Continental Divide. As it flows southwest, it gains strength from many small tributaries, as well as larger ones including the Blue, Eagle and Roaring Fork rivers. After passing through De Beque Canyon, the Colorado emerges from the Rockies into the Grand Valley, a major farming and ranching region where it meets one of its largest tributaries, the Gunnison River, at Grand Junction. Most of the upper river is a swift whitewater stream ranging from 200 to 500 feet (60 to 150 m) wide, the depth ranging from 6 to 30 feet (2 to 9 m), with a few notable exceptions, such as the Blackrocks reach where the river is nearly 100 feet (30 m) deep. In a few areas, such as the marshy Kawuneeche Valley near the headwaters and the Grand Valley, it exhibits braided characteristics.
Arcing northwest, the Colorado begins to cut across the eponymous Colorado Plateau, a vast area of high desert centered at the Four Corners of the southwestern United States. Here, the climate becomes significantly drier than that in the Rocky Mountains, and the river becomes entrenched in progressively deeper gorges of bare rock, beginning with Ruby Canyon and then Westwater Canyon as it enters Utah, now once again heading southwest. Farther downstream it receives the Dolores River and defines the southern border of Arches National Park, before passing Moab and flowing through "The Portal", where it exits the Moab Valley between a pair of 1,000-foot (300 m) sandstone cliffs.
In Utah the Colorado flows primarily through the "slickrock" country; characterized by its narrow canyons and unique "folds" created by the tilting of sedimentary rock layers along faults, this is one of the most inaccessible regions of the continental United States. Below the confluence with the Green River, its largest tributary, in Canyonlands National Park, the Colorado enters Cataract Canyon, named for its dangerous rapids, and then Glen Canyon, known for its arches and erosion-sculpted Navajo sandstone formations. Here, the San Juan River, carrying runoff from the southern slope of Colorado's San Juan Mountains, joins the Colorado from the east. The Colorado then enters northern Arizona, where since the 1960s Glen Canyon Dam near Page has flooded the Glen Canyon reach of the river, forming Lake Powell for water supply and hydroelectricity generation.
A narrow river flows through a narrow gorge flanked by high rocky bluffs
In Arizona, the river passes Lee's Ferry, an important crossing for early explorers and settlers and since the early 20th century the principal point where Colorado River flows are measured for apportionment to the seven U.S. and two Mexican states in the basin. Downstream, the river enters Marble Canyon, the beginning of the Grand Canyon, passing under the Navajo Bridges on a now southward course. Below the confluence with the Little Colorado River, the river swings west into Granite Gorge, the most dramatic portion of the Grand Canyon, where the river cuts up to one mile (1.6 km) into the Colorado Plateau, exposing some of the oldest visible rocks on Earth, dating as long ago as 2 billion years. The 277 miles (446 km) of the river that flow through the Grand Canyon are largely encompassed by Grand Canyon National Park and are known for their difficult whitewater, separated by pools that reach up to 110 feet (34 m) in depth.
At the lower end of Grand Canyon, the Colorado widens into Lake Mead, the largest reservoir in the continental United States, formed by Hoover Dam on the border of Arizona and Nevada. Situated southeast of metropolitan Las Vegas, the dam is an integral component for management of the Colorado River, controlling floods and storing water for farms and cities in the lower Colorado River basin. Below the dam the river passes under the Mike O'Callaghan–Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge – which at nearly 900 feet (270 m) above the water is the highest concrete arch bridge in the Western Hemisphere – and then turns due south towards Mexico, defining the Arizona–Nevada and Arizona–California borders.
After leaving the confines of the Black Canyon, the river emerges from the Colorado Plateau into the Lower Colorado River Valley (LCRV), a desert region dependent on irrigation agriculture and tourism and also home to several major Indian reservations. The river widens here to a broad, moderately deep waterway averaging 500 to 1,000 feet (150 to 300 m) wide and reaching up to 1⁄4 mile (400 m) across, with depths ranging from 8 to 60 feet (2 to 20 m). Before channelization of the Colorado in the 20th century, the lower river was subject to frequent course changes caused by seasonal flow variations. Joseph C. Ives, who surveyed the lower river in 1861, wrote that "the shifting of the channel, the banks, the islands, the bars is so continual and rapid that a detailed description, derived from the experiences of one trip, would be found incorrect, not only during the subsequent year, but perhaps in the course of a week, or even a day."
The LCRV is one of the most densely populated areas along the river, and there are numerous towns including Bullhead City, Arizona, Needles, California, and Lake Havasu City, Arizona. Here, many diversions draw from the river, providing water for both local uses and distant regions including the Salt River Valley of Arizona and metropolitan Southern California. The last major U.S. diversion is at Imperial Dam, where over 90 percent of the river's remaining flow is moved into the All-American Canal to irrigate California's Imperial Valley, the most productive winter agricultural region in the United States.
Below Imperial Dam, only a small portion of the Colorado River makes it beyond Yuma, Arizona, and the confluence with the intermittent Gila River – which carries runoff from western New Mexico and most of Arizona – before defining about 24 miles (39 km) of the Mexico–United States border. At Morelos Dam, the entire remaining flow of the Colorado is diverted to irrigate the Mexicali Valley, among Mexico's most fertile agricultural lands. Below San Luis Río Colorado, the Colorado passes entirely into Mexico, defining the Baja California–Sonora border; in most years, the stretch of the Colorado between here and the Gulf of California is dry or a trickle formed by irrigation return flows. The Hardy River provides most of the flow into the Colorado River Delta, a vast alluvial floodplain covering about 3,000 square miles (7,800 km2) of northwestern Mexico. A large estuary is formed here before the Colorado empties into the Gulf about 75 miles (120 km) south of Yuma. Before 20th-century development dewatered the lower Colorado, a major tidal bore was present in the delta and estuary; the first historical record was made by the Croatian missionary in Spanish service Father Ferdinand Konščak on July 18, 1746. During spring tide conditions, the tidal bore – locally called El Burro – formed in the estuary about Montague Island in Baja California and propagated upstream.
The Colorado is joined by over 25 significant tributaries, of which the Green River is the largest by both length and discharge. The Green takes drainage from the Wind River Range of west-central Wyoming, from Utah's Uinta Mountains, and from the Rockies of northwestern Colorado. The Gila River is the second longest and drains a greater area than the Green, but has a significantly lower flow because of a more arid climate and larger diversions for irrigation and cities. Both the Gunnison and San Juan rivers, which derive most of their water from Rocky Mountains snowmelt, contribute more water than the Gila did naturally.
In its natural state, the Colorado River poured about 16.3 million acre feet (20.1 km3) into the Gulf of California each year, amounting to an average flow rate of 22,500 cubic feet per second (640 m3/s). Its flow regime was not at all steady – indeed, "prior to the construction of federal dams and reservoirs, the Colorado was a river of extremes like no other in the United States." Once, the river reached peaks of more than 100,000 cubic feet per second (2,800 m3/s) in the summer and low flows of less than 2,500 cubic feet per second (71 m3/s) in the winter annually. At Topock, Arizona, about 300 miles (480 km) upstream from the Gulf, a maximum historical discharge of 384,000 cubic feet per second (10,900 m3/s) was recorded in 1884 and a minimum of 422 cubic feet per second (11.9 m3/s) was recorded in 1935. In contrast, the regulated discharge rates on the lower Colorado below Hoover Dam rarely exceed 35,000 cubic feet per second (990 m3/s) or drop below 4,000 cubic feet per second (110 m3/s). Annual runoff volume has ranged from a high of 22.2 million acre feet (27.4 km3) in 1984 to a low of 3.8 million acre feet (4.7 km3) in 2002, although in most years only a small portion of this flow, if any, reaches the Gulf.
The average annual discharge of the Colorado River has shown a slight but noticeable decreasing trend between 1895 and 2004.
Annual Colorado River discharge volumes at Lee's Ferry between 1895 and 2004
Between 85 and 90 percent of the Colorado River's discharge originates in snowmelt, mostly from the Rocky Mountains of Colorado and Wyoming. The three major upper tributaries of the Colorado – the Gunnison, Green, and San Juan – alone deliver almost 9 million acre feet (11 km3) per year to the main stem, mostly from snowmelt. The remaining 10 to 15 percent comes from a variety of sources, principally groundwater base flow and summer monsoon storms. The latter often produces heavy, highly localized floods on lower tributaries of the river, but does not often contribute significant volumes of runoff. Most of the annual runoff in the basin occurs with the melting of Rocky Mountains snowpack, which begins in April and peaks during May and June before exhausting in late July or early August.
Flows at the mouth have steadily declined since the beginning of the 20th century, and in most years after 1960 the Colorado River has run dry before reaching the sea. Irrigation, industrial, and municipal diversions, evaporation from reservoirs, natural runoff, and likely climate change have all contributed to this substantial reduction in flow, threatening the future water supply. For example, the Gila River – formerly one of the Colorado's largest tributaries – contributes little more than a trickle in most years due to use of its water by cities and farms in central Arizona. The average flow rate of the Colorado at the northernmost point of the Mexico–United States border (NIB, or Northerly International Boundary) is about 2,060 cubic feet per second (58 m3/s), 1.49 million acre feet (1.84 km3) per year – less than a 10th of the natural flow – due to upstream water use. Below here, all of the remaining flow is diverted to irrigate the Mexicali Valley, leaving a dry riverbed from Morelos Dam to the sea that is supplemented by intermittent flows of irrigation drainage water. There have been exceptions, however, namely in the early to mid-1980s, when the Colorado once again reached the sea during several consecutive years of record-breaking precipitation and snowmelt. In 1984, so much excess runoff occurred that some 16.5 million acre feet (20.4 km3), or 22,860 cubic feet per second (647 m3/s), poured into the sea.
The United States Geological Survey (USGS) operates or has operated 46 stream gauges to measure the discharge of the Colorado River, ranging from the headwaters near Grand Lake to the Mexico–U.S. border. The tables at right list data associated with eight of these gauges. River flows as gauged at Lee's Ferry, Arizona, about halfway along the length of the Colorado and 16 miles (26 km) below Glen Canyon Dam, are used to determine water allocations in the Colorado River basin. The average discharge recorded there was approximately 14,800 cubic feet per second (420 m3/s), 10.72 million acre feet (13.22 km3) per year, from 1921 to 2010. This figure has been heavily affected by upstream diversions and reservoir evaporation, especially after the completion of the Colorado River Storage Project in the 1970s. Prior to the completion of Glen Canyon Dam in 1964, the average discharge recorded between 1912 and 1962 was 17,850 cubic feet per second (505 m3/s), 12.93 million acre feet (15.95 km3) per year.
from Wikipedia
The dirt path descending to El Matador State Beach in Malibu, California. Known for its dramatic sea caves and massive rock pillars (sea stacks), this iconic spot is a favorite location for photography, coastal hikes, and sunset viewing along the Pacific Coast Highway.
📍 Location & Essential Info Address: 32350 Pacific Coast Hwy, Malibu, CA 90265Access: Requires a short but steep hike down a dirt trail and a series of wooden stairs to reach the shore. Best Time to Visit: Low tide is ideal for safely exploring the sea caves and walking among the rock formations.
Thingvellir is one of Iceland’s most important historical and natural sites, located about 45 km northeast of Reykjavík. In 930 AD, it became the meeting place of the Alþingi, one of the world's oldest continuously existing parliaments, making Þingvellir a cornerstone of Icelandic history and national identity. The area is also famous for its unique geology, situated in a rift valley between the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates.
Today, Þingvellir is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the three stops on Iceland’s famous Golden Circle route. Visitors come to explore its dramatic landscapes, historic assembly sites, lava fields, waterfalls, and crystal-clear fissures.
Notable locations within Þingvellir
Almannagjá – the largest rift in the park and the historic route to the assembly grounds.
Lögberg – the "Law Rock," where laws were recited and speeches delivered during Alþingi gatherings.
Öxarárfoss – a picturesque waterfall surrounded by lava formations.
Silfra – a famous water-filled fissure known for exceptional underwater visibility.
Þingvallavatn – Iceland’s largest natural lake.
REFORD GARDENS | LES JARDINS DE METIS
GIANT HIMALAYAN LILY: up to 3.5 meters tall, flowers blossom about once every 7 years.
From Wikipedia:
Cardiocrinum giganteum, the giant Himalayan lily, is the largest species of any of the lily plants, growing up to 3.5 metres high. It is found in the Himalayas, China and Myanmar (Burma).
Two varieties are recognized.
C. giganteum var. giganteum - up to 3 metres tall, the outer part of the flower greenish and the inside streaked with purple - Tibet, Bhutan, Assam, Myanmar, Nepal, Sikkim
C. giganteum var. yunnanense - 1–2 metres tall, the outer part of the flower white and the inside streaked with purplish red - Myanmar, Gansu, Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Henan, Hubei, Hunan, Shaanxi, Sichuan, Yunnan
The plant was first described scientifically in 1824 by Nathaniel Wallich. The species was introduced into commercial production (as Lilium giganteum) in Britain in the 1850s. A bulb grown from seed collected by Major Madden flowered in Edinburgh in July 1852, while those collected by Thomas Lobb were first exhibited in flower in May 1853.
See: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiocrinum_giganteum
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
From Wikipedia:
Elsie Stephen Meighen - born January 22, 1872, Perth, Ontario - and Robert Wilson Reford - born in 1867, Montreal - got married on June 12, 1894.
Elsie Reford was a pioneer of Canadian horticulture, creating one of the largest private gardens in Canada on her estate, Estevan Lodge in eastern Québec. Located in Grand-Métis on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, her gardens have been open to the public since 1962 and operate under the name Les Jardins de Métis and Reford Gardens.
Born January 22, 1872 at Perth, Ontario, Elsie Reford was the eldest of three children born to Robert Meighen and Elsie Stephen. Coming from modest backgrounds themselves, Elsie’s parents ensured that their children received a good education. After being educated in Montreal, she was sent to finishing school in Dresden and Paris, returning to Montreal fluent in both German and French, and ready to take her place in society.
She married Robert Wilson Reford on June 12, 1894. She gave birth to two sons, Bruce in 1895 and Eric in 1900. Robert and Elsie Reford were, by many accounts, an ideal couple. In 1902, they built a house on Drummond Street in Montreal. They both loved the outdoors and they spend several weeks a year in a log cabin they built at Lac Caribou, south of Rimouski. In the autumn they hunted for caribou, deer, and ducks. They returned in winter to ski and snowshoe. Elsie Reford also liked to ride. She had learned as a girl and spent many hours riding on the slopes of Mount Royal. And of course, there was salmon-fishing – a sport at which she excelled.
In her day, she was known for her civic, social, and political activism. She was engaged in philanthropic activities, particularly for the Montreal Maternity Hospital and she was also the moving force behind the creation of the Women’s Canadian Club of Montreal, the first women club in Canada. She believed it important that the women become involved in debates over the great issues of the day, « something beyond the local gossip of the hour ». Her acquaintance with Lord Grey, the Governor-General of Canada from 1904 to 1911, led to her involvement in organizing, in 1908, Québec City’s tercentennial celebrations. The event was one of many to which she devoted herself in building bridges with French-Canadian community.
During the First World War, she joined her two sons in England and did volunteer work at the War Office, translating documents from German into English. After the war, she was active in the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Montreal Council of Social Agencies, and the National Association of Conservative Women.
In 1925 at the age of 53 years, Elsie Reford was operated for appendicitis and during her convalescence, her doctor counselled against fishing, fearing that she did not have the strength to return to the river.”Why not take up gardening?” he said, thinking this a more suitable pastime for a convalescent woman of a certain age. That is why she began laying out the gardens and supervising their construction. The gardens would take ten years to build, and would extend over more than twenty acres.
Elsie Reford had to overcome many difficulties in bringing her garden to life. First among them were the allergies that sometimes left her bedridden for days on end. The second obstacle was the property itself. Estevan was first and foremost a fishing lodge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to a salmon river and its dramatic views – not for the quality of the soil.
To counter-act nature’s deficiencies, she created soil for each of the plants she had selected, bringing peat and sand from nearby farms. This exchange was fortuitous to the local farmers, suffering through the Great Depression. Then, as now, the gardens provided much-needed work to an area with high unemployment. Elsie Reford’s genius as a gardener was born of the knowledge she developed of the needs of plants. Over the course of her long life, she became an expert plantsman. By the end of her life, Elsie Reford was able to counsel other gardeners, writing in the journals of the Royal Horticultural Society and the North American Lily Society. Elsie Reford was not a landscape architect and had no training of any kind as a garden designer. While she collected and appreciated art, she claimed no talents as an artist.
Elsie Stephen Reford died at her Drummond Street home on November 8, 1967 in her ninety-sixth year.
In 1995, the Reford Gardens ("Jardins de Métis") in Grand-Métis were designated a National Historic Site of Canada, as being an excellent Canadian example of the English-inspired garden.(Wikipedia)
Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Reford
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS
Créés par Elsie Reford de 1926 à 1958, ces jardins témoignent de façon remarquable de l’art paysager à l’anglaise. Disposés dans un cadre naturel, un ensemble de jardins exhibent fleurs vivaces, arbres et arbustes. Le jardin des pommetiers, les rocailles et l’Allée royale évoquent l’œuvre de cette dame passionnée d’horticulture. Agrémenté d’un ruisseau et de sentiers sinueux, ce site jouit d’un microclimat favorable à la croissance d’espèces uniques au Canada. Les pavots bleus et les lis, privilégiés par Mme Reford, y fleurissent toujours et contribuent , avec d’autres plantes exotiques et indigènes, à l’harmonie de ces lieux.
Created by Elsie Reford between 1926 and 1958, these gardens are an inspired example of the English art of the garden. Woven into a natural setting, a series of gardens display perennials, trees and shrubs. A crab-apple orchard, a rock garden, and the Long Walk are also the legacy of this dedicated horticulturist. A microclimate favours the growth of species found nowhere else in Canada, while the stream and winding paths add to the charm. Elsie Reford’s beloved blue poppies and lilies still bloom and contribute, with other exotic and indigenous plants, to the harmony of the site.
Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada
Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
Gouvernement du Canada – Government of Canada
© Copyright
This photo and all those in my Photostream are protected by copyright. No one may reproduce, copy, transmit or manipulate them without my written permission.
Louise Tanguay has photographed nature in all its varied moods. She has been involved in several books about Quebec gardens and her photographs have been published in a number of magazines and newspapers, including L'actualité, Canadian Geographic, Equinox, La Presse, The Globe and Mail and Winds. She is also the author of Natura and Flora, published by Les Éditions de l'Homme.
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
Elsie Stephen Meighen - born January 22, 1872, Perth, Ontario - and Robert Wilson Reford - born in 1867, Montreal - got married on June 12, 1894.
Elsie Reford was a pioneer of Canadian horticulture, creating one of the largest private gardens in Canada on her estate, Estevan Lodge in eastern Québec. Located in Grand-Métis on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, her gardens have been open to the public since 1962 and operate under the name Les Jardins de Métis and Reford Gardens.
Born January 22, 1872 at Perth, Ontario, Elsie Reford was the eldest of three children born to Robert Meighen and Elsie Stephen. Coming from modest backgrounds themselves, Elsie’s parents ensured that their children received a good education. After being educated in Montreal, she was sent to finishing school in Dresden and Paris, returning to Montreal fluent in both German and French, and ready to take her place in society.
She married Robert Wilson Reford on June 12, 1894. She gave birth to two sons, Bruce in 1895 and Eric in 1900. Robert and Elsie Reford were, by many accounts, an ideal couple. In 1902, they built a house on Drummond Street in Montreal. They both loved the outdoors and they spend several weeks a year in a log cabin they built at Lac Caribou, south of Rimouski. In the autumn they hunted for caribou, deer, and ducks. They returned in winter to ski and snowshoe. Elsie Reford also liked to ride. She had learned as a girl and spent many hours riding on the slopes of Mount Royal. And of course, there was salmon-fishing – a sport at which she excelled.
In her day, she was known for her civic, social, and political activism. She was engaged in philanthropic activities, particularly for the Montreal Maternity Hospital and she was also the moving force behind the creation of the Women’s Canadian Club of Montreal, the first women club in Canada. She believed it important that the women become involved in debates over the great issues of the day, « something beyond the local gossip of the hour ». Her acquaintance with Lord Grey, the Governor-General of Canada from 1904 to 1911, led to her involvement in organizing, in 1908, Québec City’s tercentennial celebrations. The event was one of many to which she devoted herself in building bridges with French-Canadian community.
During the First World War, she joined her two sons in England and did volunteer work at the War Office, translating documents from German into English. After the war, she was active in the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Montreal Council of Social Agencies, and the National Association of Conservative Women.
In 1925 at the age of 53 years, Elsie Reford was operated for appendicitis and during her convalescence, her doctor counselled against fishing, fearing that she did not have the strength to return to the river.”Why not take up gardening?” he said, thinking this a more suitable pastime for a convalescent woman of a certain age. That is why she began laying out the gardens and supervising their construction. The gardens would take ten years to build, and would extend over more than twenty acres.
Elsie Reford had to overcome many difficulties in bringing her garden to life. First among them were the allergies that sometimes left her bedridden for days on end. The second obstacle was the property itself. Estevan was first and foremost a fishing lodge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to a salmon river and its dramatic views – not for the quality of the soil.
To counter-act nature’s deficiencies, she created soil for each of the plants she had selected, bringing peat and sand from nearby farms. This exchange was fortuitous to the local farmers, suffering through the Great Depression. Then, as now, the gardens provided much-needed work to an area with high unemployment. Elsie Reford’s genius as a gardener was born of the knowledge she developed of the needs of plants. Over the course of her long life, she became an expert plantsman. By the end of her life, Elsie Reford was able to counsel other gardeners, writing in the journals of the Royal Horticultural Society and the North American Lily Society. Elsie Reford was not a landscape architect and had no training of any kind as a garden designer. While she collected and appreciated art, she claimed no talents as an artist.
Elsie Stephen Reford died at her Drummond Street home on November 8, 1967 in her ninety-sixth year.
In 1995, the Reford Gardens ("Jardins de Métis") in Grand-Métis were designated a National Historic Site of Canada, as being an excellent Canadian example of the English-inspired garden.(Wikipedia)
Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Reford
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS
Créés par Elsie Reford de 1926 à 1958, ces jardins témoignent de façon remarquable de l’art paysager à l’anglaise. Disposés dans un cadre naturel, un ensemble de jardins exhibent fleurs vivaces, arbres et arbustes. Le jardin des pommetiers, les rocailles et l’Allée royale évoquent l’œuvre de cette dame passionnée d’horticulture. Agrémenté d’un ruisseau et de sentiers sinueux, ce site jouit d’un microclimat favorable à la croissance d’espèces uniques au Canada. Les pavots bleus et les lis, privilégiés par Mme Reford, y fleurissent toujours et contribuent , avec d’autres plantes exotiques et indigènes, à l’harmonie de ces lieux.
Created by Elsie Reford between 1926 and 1958, these gardens are an inspired example of the English art of the garden. Woven into a natural setting, a series of gardens display perennials, trees and shrubs. A crab-apple orchard, a rock garden, and the Long Walk are also the legacy of this dedicated horticulturist. A microclimate favours the growth of species found nowhere else in Canada, while the stream and winding paths add to the charm. Elsie Reford’s beloved blue poppies and lilies still bloom and contribute, with other exotic and indigenous plants, to the harmony of the site.
Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada
Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
Gouvernement du Canada – Government of Canada
© Copyright
This photo and all those in my Photostream are protected by copyright. No one may reproduce, copy, transmit or manipulate them without my written permission.
5360
REFORD GARDENS | LES JARDINS DE METIS
Gentiana Alpina | Gentiane des Alpes
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
From Wikipedia:
Elsie Stephen Meighen - born January 22, 1872, Perth, Ontario - and Robert Wilson Reford - born in 1867, Montreal - got married on June 12, 1894.
Elsie Reford was a pioneer of Canadian horticulture, creating one of the largest private gardens in Canada on her estate, Estevan Lodge in eastern Québec. Located in Grand-Métis on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, her gardens have been open to the public since 1962 and operate under the name Les Jardins de Métis and Reford Gardens.
Born January 22, 1872 at Perth, Ontario, Elsie Reford was the eldest of three children born to Robert Meighen and Elsie Stephen. Coming from modest backgrounds themselves, Elsie’s parents ensured that their children received a good education. After being educated in Montreal, she was sent to finishing school in Dresden and Paris, returning to Montreal fluent in both German and French, and ready to take her place in society.
She married Robert Wilson Reford on June 12, 1894. She gave birth to two sons, Bruce in 1895 and Eric in 1900. Robert and Elsie Reford were, by many accounts, an ideal couple. In 1902, they built a house on Drummond Street in Montreal. They both loved the outdoors and they spend several weeks a year in a log cabin they built at Lac Caribou, south of Rimouski. In the autumn they hunted for caribou, deer, and ducks. They returned in winter to ski and snowshoe. Elsie Reford also liked to ride. She had learned as a girl and spent many hours riding on the slopes of Mount Royal. And of course, there was salmon-fishing – a sport at which she excelled.
In her day, she was known for her civic, social, and political activism. She was engaged in philanthropic activities, particularly for the Montreal Maternity Hospital and she was also the moving force behind the creation of the Women’s Canadian Club of Montreal, the first women club in Canada. She believed it important that the women become involved in debates over the great issues of the day, « something beyond the local gossip of the hour ». Her acquaintance with Lord Grey, the Governor-General of Canada from 1904 to 1911, led to her involvement in organizing, in 1908, Québec City’s tercentennial celebrations. The event was one of many to which she devoted herself in building bridges with French-Canadian community.
During the First World War, she joined her two sons in England and did volunteer work at the War Office, translating documents from German into English. After the war, she was active in the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Montreal Council of Social Agencies, and the National Association of Conservative Women.
In 1925 at the age of 53 years, Elsie Reford was operated for appendicitis and during her convalescence, her doctor counselled against fishing, fearing that she did not have the strength to return to the river.”Why not take up gardening?” he said, thinking this a more suitable pastime for a convalescent woman of a certain age. That is why she began laying out the gardens and supervising their construction. The gardens would take ten years to build, and would extend over more than twenty acres.
Elsie Reford had to overcome many difficulties in bringing her garden to life. First among them were the allergies that sometimes left her bedridden for days on end. The second obstacle was the property itself. Estevan was first and foremost a fishing lodge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to a salmon river and its dramatic views – not for the quality of the soil.
To counter-act nature’s deficiencies, she created soil for each of the plants she had selected, bringing peat and sand from nearby farms. This exchange was fortuitous to the local farmers, suffering through the Great Depression. Then, as now, the gardens provided much-needed work to an area with high unemployment. Elsie Reford’s genius as a gardener was born of the knowledge she developed of the needs of plants. Over the course of her long life, she became an expert plantsman. By the end of her life, Elsie Reford was able to counsel other gardeners, writing in the journals of the Royal Horticultural Society and the North American Lily Society. Elsie Reford was not a landscape architect and had no training of any kind as a garden designer. While she collected and appreciated art, she claimed no talents as an artist.
Elsie Stephen Reford died at her Drummond Street home on November 8, 1967 in her ninety-sixth year.
In 1995, the Reford Gardens ("Jardins de Métis") in Grand-Métis were designated a National Historic Site of Canada, as being an excellent Canadian example of the English-inspired garden.(Wikipedia)
Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Reford
Visit : www.refordgardens.com
LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS
Créés par Elsie Reford de 1926 à 1958, ces jardins témoignent de façon remarquable de l’art paysager à l’anglaise. Disposés dans un cadre naturel, un ensemble de jardins exhibent fleurs vivaces, arbres et arbustes. Le jardin des pommetiers, les rocailles et l’Allée royale évoquent l’œuvre de cette dame passionnée d’horticulture. Agrémenté d’un ruisseau et de sentiers sinueux, ce site jouit d’un microclimat favorable à la croissance d’espèces uniques au Canada. Les pavots bleus et les lis, privilégiés par Mme Reford, y fleurissent toujours et contribuent , avec d’autres plantes exotiques et indigènes, à l’harmonie de ces lieux.
Created by Elsie Reford between 1926 and 1958, these gardens are an inspired example of the English art of the garden. Woven into a natural setting, a series of gardens display perennials, trees and shrubs. A crab-apple orchard, a rock garden, and the Long Walk are also the legacy of this dedicated horticulturist. A microclimate favours the growth of species found nowhere else in Canada, while the stream and winding paths add to the charm. Elsie Reford’s beloved blue poppies and lilies still bloom and contribute, with other exotic and indigenous plants, to the harmony of the site.
Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada
Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
Gouvernement du Canada – Government of Canada
© Copyright
This photo and all those in my Photostream are protected by copyright. No one may reproduce, copy, transmit or manipulate them without my written permission
The mosque is commonly thought to be the world's third-largest mosque after those in Mecca and Medina, and can accommodate 25,000 worshippers. Built and partially funded by King Hassan II (the remaining funds were gathered through a somewhat controversial public subscription process), the mosque complex was designed by French architect Michel Pinseau, took six years to build and was completed in 1993. Its dramatic location overhanging the ocean waves echoes verse from the Quran, which states that God’s throne was built upon the water. Believers pray on a centrally heated floor, and can see the Atlantic breaking over the rocks underneath the glass floor in the basement and feel the sunlight through the retractable roof
Taken @Casablanca, Morocco, North Africa
View from Mt Difficulty Vineyard in Bannockburn where we are having lunch. April 27, 2016 Central Otago in the South Island of New Zealand.
The Cellar Door at Mt Difficulty Wines is known as much for its dramatic views of rugged rock and thyme landscapes as it is for its stylish wine and food.
The unique microclimate of the Bannockburn area is partially created by the presence of Mount Difficulty which overlooks the southern Cromwell basin, and is the namesake of Mt Difficulty Wines. Mount Difficulty is integral in providing low rainfall and humidity for the region. Bannockburn enjoys hot summers, a large diurnal temperature variation and long cool autumns; conditions which bring the best out of the Pinot Noir grapes. These conditions, along with soils which are ideal for viticulture, provide an excellent basis not only for Pinot Noir, but also for Pinot Gris, Riesling, and Chardonnay. The soils are a mix of clay and gravels, but all feature a high pH level; grapes produce their best wines on sweet soils.
For More Info: www.mtdifficulty.co.nz/aboutus/ourstory.html
Copyright © Susanne Hupfer. All rights reserved.
Do you dare look into the abyss?
One of the interesting sights to explore at the fascinating Festung Königstein (Königstein Fortress) is a still-working well drilled 152.5 m (500 ft.) deep through solid rock. If you peer down, you can see (and hear) the water sloshing way, way, way down below.
This imposing castle sits majestically above the Elbe River -- about an hour away from Dresden, Germany -- and is very interesting to explore (and photograph). The beautiful surrounding countryside -- known as the Saxon Switzerland or Elbe Sandstone Mountains -- is known for its dramatic sandstone rock formations that are popular with rock climbers.
You can read more about Königstein Fortress here.
A striking perspective of Mount Arbel, the iconic landmark rising above the Kinneret, known for its dramatic cliffs and panoramic vistas.
Detail of the glass by Clayton & Bell in the central lancet of the north transept.
There is a danger of running out of superlatives when trying to describe Beverley Minster. It is not only the second finest non-cathedral church in the country but is architecturally a far finer building than most of our cathedrals themselves! It will come as a surprise to many visitors to find this grand edifice simply functions today as a parish church and has never been more than collegiate, a status it lost at the Reformaton. What had added to its mystique and wealth was its status as a place of pilgrimage housing the tomb of St John of Beverley, which drew visitors and revenue until the Reformation brought an end to such fortunes and the shrine was destroyed (though the saint's bones were later rediscovered and reinterred in the nave). That this great church itself survived this period almost intact is little short of a miracle in itself.
There has been a church here since the 8th century but little remains of the earlier buildings aside from the Saxon chair near the altar and the Norman font in the nave. The present Minster's construction spans the entirety of the development of Gothic architecture but forms a surprisingly harmonious whole nevertheless, starting with Early English in the 13h century choir and transepts (both pairs) with their lancet windows in a building phase that stopped at the first bays of the nave. Construction was then continued with the nave in the 14th century but only the traceried windows betray the emergent Decorated style, the design otherwise closely followed the work of the previous century which gives the Minster's interior such a pleasingly unified appearance (the only discernable break in construction within can be seen where the black purbeck-marble ceased to be used for certain elements beyond the eastern bay of the nave). Finally the building was completed more or less by 1420 with the soaring west front with its dramatic twin-towers in Perpendicular style (the east window must have been enlarged at this point too to match the new work at the west end).
The fabric happily survived the Reformation intact aside from the octagonal chapter-house formerly adjoining the north choir aisle which was dismantled to raise money by the sale of its materials while the church's fate was in the balance (a similar fate was contemplated for the rest of the church by its new owners until the town bought it for retention as a parish church for £100). The great swathes of medieval glass alas were mostly lost, though seemingly as much to neglect and storm-damage in the following century than the usual iconoclasm. All that survived of the Minster's original glazing was collected to form the patchwork display now filling the great east window, a colourful kaleidoscope of fragments of figures and scenes. Of the other furnishings the choir stalls are the major ensemble and some of the finest medieval canopied stalls extant with a full set of charming misericords (though most of these alas are not normally on show).
There are suprisingly few monuments of note for such an enormous cathedral-like church, but the one major exception makes up for this, the delightful canopied Percy tomb erected in 1340 to the north of the high altar. The tomb itself is surprisingly plain without any likeness remaining of the deceased, but the richly carved Decorated canopy above is alive with gorgeous detail and figurative embellishments. There are further carvings to enjoy adorning the arcading that runs around the outer perimeter of the interior, especially the north nave aisle which has the most rewarding carved figures of musicians, monsters and people suffering various ailments, many were largely restored in the 19th century but still preserve the medieval spirit of irreverent fun.
To summarise Beverley Minster would be difficult other than simply adding that if one enjoys marvelling at Gothic architecture at its best then it really shouldn't be missed and one should prioritise it over the majority of our cathedrals. It is a real gem and a delight to behold, and is happily normally open and welcoming to visitors (who must all be astonished to find this magnificent edifice is no more than a simple parish church in status!). I thoroughly enjoyed this, my second visit here (despite the best efforts of the poor weather!).
Smailholm Tower is located at Smailholm, around five miles (8 km) west of Kelso in the Scottish Borders. Its dramatic situation, atop a crag of Lady Hill, commands wide views over the surrounding countryside. The tower is now a Scheduled Ancient Monument in the care of Historic Scotland. In June 2007 it was awarded the maximum "five-star" status as a tourist attraction from VisitScotland, a rating bestowed on only eight other sites in Scotland.
Rouken Glen Park is a historic park located next to Thornliebank, Giffnock and Newton Mearns.
It contains a range of features and facilities including the pavilion visitor centre which hosts various exhibitions throughout the year ranging from health awareness days to old photo exhibits of the park and surrounding areas, play area, walled garden, the Glen with its dramatic water falls and woodland paths, and a boating pond. There is also a garden centre, café and restaurant and art gallery located in the park.
Throughout the year the park hosts many events ranging from local Community Gala Days to national events like Armed Forces Day.
Dag 11: Nagar and Hopper Valleys - Ganish village.
Nagar Valley.
Nagar Valley is a stunning high-altitude region in Gilgit-Baltistan, known for its dramatic mountains, glaciers and rich cultural heritage.
View from Mt Difficulty Vineyard in Bannockburn where we are having lunch. April 27, 2016 Central Otago in the South Island of New Zealand.
The Cellar Door at Mt Difficulty Wines is known as much for its dramatic views of rugged rock and thyme landscapes as it is for its stylish wine and food.
The unique microclimate of the Bannockburn area is partially created by the presence of Mount Difficulty which overlooks the southern Cromwell basin, and is the namesake of Mt Difficulty Wines. Mount Difficulty is integral in providing low rainfall and humidity for the region. Bannockburn enjoys hot summers, a large diurnal temperature variation and long cool autumns; conditions which bring the best out of the Pinot Noir grapes. These conditions, along with soils which are ideal for viticulture, provide an excellent basis not only for Pinot Noir, but also for Pinot Gris, Riesling, and Chardonnay. The soils are a mix of clay and gravels, but all feature a high pH level; grapes produce their best wines on sweet soils.
For More Info: www.mtdifficulty.co.nz/aboutus/ourstory.html
Sandwich, Kent.
I was first aware of this bird by its distinctive call.
This nondescript lowland farmland bird is the largest of the buntings and is most usually seen perched on a wire or post. It is a stout, dumpy brown bird which flies off with a fluttering flight and with its legs characteristically 'dangling'. Its dramatic population decline in the UK makes it a Red List species. RSPB
CRANE FLOWER
Strelitzia reginae, commonly known as the crane flower, bird of paradise, or isigude in Nguni, is a species of flowering plant native to the Cape Provinces and KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa. An evergreen perennial, it is widely cultivated for its dramatic flowers. In temperate areas it is a popular houseplant.
Our two granddaughters are moving 2 of them. There are 3 trees.
REFORD GARDENS | LES JARDINS DE METIS
Beautiful flowers at Reford Gardens.
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
A Japanese Tree Lilac / Lilas du Japon / Syringa Reticulata
I LIKE TO MOVE IT, 2015
DIXNEUFCENTQUATREVINGTSIX Architecture
Mathilde Gaudemet & Arthur Ozenne
PARIS, FRANCE
Visit: www.19-86.fr
(From the plaque)
In this garden, the visitor will face a seemingly wild meadow.Grasses and a few birch trees grow together against the backdrop of dense greenery. There seem to be little going on there.
But the straight lines at ground level, punctuating the space , create a rythm and attract the visitor's attention. On approaching one turns around, scans, wonders and finaly touches. This when the trees begin to move. Visitors can slide the trees along their tracks and create their own garden, The banal becomes strange. Nature domesticated transform the landscape into a garden.
Trees, immobile and mute, are rootless and move as living beings. All due to human interaction.
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Texte de la plaque:
Dans ce jardin, le visiteur se retrouve face à une parcelle en friche. De l'herbe, quelques bouleaux se fondant aux autres et au loin, une densité végétale. L'intervention de l'homme y semble inexistante.
Mais des lignes régulières , rythmant la perspective, attirent l'oeil du visiteur. Il se rapproche, tourne autour, scrute, s'interroge, finit par le toucher. Et l'arbre se met à bouger. Le visiteur peut le faire glisser et ainsi créer son propre jardin. Le banal devient insolite. La nature ainsi domestiquée transforme le paysage en jardin.
Les arbres, immobiles et muets, quintessence même de l'enracinement se déplacent tel des êtres vivants. À la merci de l'homme.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
REFORD GARDENS | LES JARDINS DE METIS
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
From Wikipedia:
Elsie Stephen Meighen - born January 22, 1872, Perth, Ontario - and Robert Wilson Reford - born in 1867, Montreal - got married on June 12, 1894.
Elsie Reford was a pioneer of Canadian horticulture, creating one of the largest private gardens in Canada on her estate, Estevan Lodge in eastern Québec. Located in Grand-Métis on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, her gardens have been open to the public since 1962 and operate under the name Les Jardins de Métis and Reford Gardens.
Born January 22, 1872 at Perth, Ontario, Elsie Reford was the eldest of three children born to Robert Meighen and Elsie Stephen. Coming from modest backgrounds themselves, Elsie’s parents ensured that their children received a good education. After being educated in Montreal, she was sent to finishing school in Dresden and Paris, returning to Montreal fluent in both German and French, and ready to take her place in society.
She married Robert Wilson Reford on June 12, 1894. She gave birth to two sons, Bruce in 1895 and Eric in 1900. Robert and Elsie Reford were, by many accounts, an ideal couple. In 1902, they built a house on Drummond Street in Montreal. They both loved the outdoors and they spend several weeks a year in a log cabin they built at Lac Caribou, south of Rimouski. In the autumn they hunted for caribou, deer, and ducks. They returned in winter to ski and snowshoe. Elsie Reford also liked to ride. She had learned as a girl and spent many hours riding on the slopes of Mount Royal. And of course, there was salmon-fishing – a sport at which she excelled.
In her day, she was known for her civic, social, and political activism. She was engaged in philanthropic activities, particularly for the Montreal Maternity Hospital and she was also the moving force behind the creation of the Women’s Canadian Club of Montreal, the first women club in Canada. She believed it important that the women become involved in debates over the great issues of the day, « something beyond the local gossip of the hour ». Her acquaintance with Lord Grey, the Governor-General of Canada from 1904 to 1911, led to her involvement in organizing, in 1908, Québec City’s tercentennial celebrations. The event was one of many to which she devoted herself in building bridges with French-Canadian community.
During the First World War, she joined her two sons in England and did volunteer work at the War Office, translating documents from German into English. After the war, she was active in the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Montreal Council of Social Agencies, and the National Association of Conservative Women.
In 1925 at the age of 53 years, Elsie Reford was operated for appendicitis and during her convalescence, her doctor counselled against fishing, fearing that she did not have the strength to return to the river.”Why not take up gardening?” he said, thinking this a more suitable pastime for a convalescent woman of a certain age. That is why she began laying out the gardens and supervising their construction. The gardens would take ten years to build, and would extend over more than twenty acres.
Elsie Reford had to overcome many difficulties in bringing her garden to life. First among them were the allergies that sometimes left her bedridden for days on end. The second obstacle was the property itself. Estevan was first and foremost a fishing lodge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to a salmon river and its dramatic views – not for the quality of the soil.
To counter-act nature’s deficiencies, she created soil for each of the plants she had selected, bringing peat and sand from nearby farms. This exchange was fortuitous to the local farmers, suffering through the Great Depression. Then, as now, the gardens provided much-needed work to an area with high unemployment. Elsie Reford’s genius as a gardener was born of the knowledge she developed of the needs of plants. Over the course of her long life, she became an expert plantsman. By the end of her life, Elsie Reford was able to counsel other gardeners, writing in the journals of the Royal Horticultural Society and the North American Lily Society. Elsie Reford was not a landscape architect and had no training of any kind as a garden designer. While she collected and appreciated art, she claimed no talents as an artist.
Elsie Stephen Reford died at her Drummond Street home on November 8, 1967 in her ninety-sixth year.
In 1995, the Reford Gardens ("Jardins de Métis") in Grand-Métis were designated a National Historic Site of Canada, as being an excellent Canadian example of the English-inspired garden.(Wikipedia)
Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Reford
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS
Créés par Elsie Reford de 1926 à 1958, ces jardins témoignent de façon remarquable de l’art paysager à l’anglaise. Disposés dans un cadre naturel, un ensemble de jardins exhibent fleurs vivaces, arbres et arbustes. Le jardin des pommetiers, les rocailles et l’Allée royale évoquent l’œuvre de cette dame passionnée d’horticulture. Agrémenté d’un ruisseau et de sentiers sinueux, ce site jouit d’un microclimat favorable à la croissance d’espèces uniques au Canada. Les pavots bleus et les lis, privilégiés par Mme Reford, y fleurissent toujours et contribuent , avec d’autres plantes exotiques et indigènes, à l’harmonie de ces lieux.
Created by Elsie Reford between 1926 and 1958, these gardens are an inspired example of the English art of the garden. Woven into a natural setting, a series of gardens display perennials, trees and shrubs. A crab-apple orchard, a rock garden, and the Long Walk are also the legacy of this dedicated horticulturist. A microclimate favours the growth of species found nowhere else in Canada, while the stream and winding paths add to the charm. Elsie Reford’s beloved blue poppies and lilies still bloom and contribute, with other exotic and indigenous plants, to the harmony of the site.
Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada
Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
Gouvernement du Canada – Government of Canada
© Copyright
This photo and all those in my Photostream are protected by copyright. No one may reproduce, copy, transmit or manipulate them without my written permission.
1176
Visit: www.refordgardens.com/
MECONOPSIS BETONICIFOLIA
REFORD GARDENS | LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS
From Wikipedia:
Elsie Stephen Meighen - born January 22, 1872, Perth, Ontario - and Robert Wilson Reford - born in 1867, Montreal - got married on June 12, 1894.
Elsie Reford was a pioneer of Canadian horticulture, creating one of the largest private gardens in Canada on her estate, Estevan Lodge in eastern Québec. Located in Grand-Métis on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, her gardens have been open to the public since 1962 and operate under the name Les Jardins de Métis and Reford Gardens.
Born January 22, 1872 at Perth, Ontario, Elsie Reford was the eldest of three children born to Robert Meighen and Elsie Stephen. Coming from modest backgrounds themselves, Elsie’s parents ensured that their children received a good education. After being educated in Montreal, she was sent to finishing school in Dresden and Paris, returning to Montreal fluent in both German and French, and ready to take her place in society.
She married Robert Wilson Reford on June 12, 1894. She gave birth to two sons, Bruce in 1895 and Eric in 1900. Robert and Elsie Reford were, by many accounts, an ideal couple. In 1902, they built a house on Drummond Street in Montreal. They both loved the outdoors and they spend several weeks a year in a log cabin they built at Lac Caribou, south of Rimouski. In the autumn they hunted for caribou, deer, and ducks. They returned in winter to ski and snowshoe. Elsie Reford also liked to ride. She had learned as a girl and spent many hours riding on the slopes of Mount Royal. And of course, there was salmon-fishing – a sport at which she excelled.
In her day, she was known for her civic, social, and political activism. She was engaged in philanthropic activities, particularly for the Montreal Maternity Hospital and she was also the moving force behind the creation of the Women’s Canadian Club of Montreal, the first women club in Canada. She believed it important that the women become involved in debates over the great issues of the day, « something beyond the local gossip of the hour ». Her acquaintance with Lord Grey, the Governor-General of Canada from 1904 to 1911, led to her involvement in organizing, in 1908, Québec City’s tercentennial celebrations. The event was one of many to which she devoted herself in building bridges with French-Canadian community.
During the First World War, she joined her two sons in England and did volunteer work at the War Office, translating documents from German into English. After the war, she was active in the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Montreal Council of Social Agencies, and the National Association of Conservative Women.
In 1925 at the age of 53 years, Elsie Reford was operated for appendicitis and during her convalescence, her doctor counselled against fishing, fearing that she did not have the strength to return to the river.”Why not take up gardening?” he said, thinking this a more suitable pastime for a convalescent woman of a certain age. That is why she began laying out the gardens and supervising their construction. The gardens would take ten years to build, and would extend over more than twenty acres.
Elsie Reford had to overcome many difficulties in bringing her garden to life. First among them were the allergies that sometimes left her bedridden for days on end. The second obstacle was the property itself. Estevan was first and foremost a fishing lodge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to a salmon river and its dramatic views – not for the quality of the soil.
To counter-act nature’s deficiencies, she created soil for each of the plants she had selected, bringing peat and sand from nearby farms. This exchange was fortuitous to the local farmers, suffering through the Great Depression. Then, as now, the gardens provided much-needed work to an area with high unemployment. Elsie Reford’s genius as a gardener was born of the knowledge she developed of the needs of plants. Over the course of her long life, she became an expert plantsman. By the end of her life, Elsie Reford was able to counsel other gardeners, writing in the journals of the Royal Horticultural Society and the North American Lily Society. Elsie Reford was not a landscape architect and had no training of any kind as a garden designer. While she collected and appreciated art, she claimed no talents as an artist.
Elsie Stephen Reford died at her Drummond Street home on November 8, 1967 in her ninety-sixth year.
In 1995, the Reford Gardens ("Jardins de Métis") in Grand-Métis were designated a National Historic Site of Canada, as being an excellent Canadian example of the English-inspired garden.(Wikipedia)
Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Reford
LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS
Créés par Elsie Reford de 1926 à 1958, ces jardins témoignent de façon remarquable de l’art paysager à l’anglaise. Disposés dans un cadre naturel, un ensemble de jardins exhibent fleurs vivaces, arbres et arbustes. Le jardin des pommetiers, les rocailles et l’Allée royale évoquent l’œuvre de cette dame passionnée d’horticulture. Agrémenté d’un ruisseau et de sentiers sinueux, ce site jouit d’un microclimat favorable à la croissance d’espèces uniques au Canada. Les pavots bleus et les lis, privilégiés par Mme Reford, y fleurissent toujours et contribuent , avec d’autres plantes exotiques et indigènes, à l’harmonie de ces lieux.
Created by Elsie Reford between 1926 and 1958, these gardens are an inspired example of the English art of the garden. Woven into a natural setting, a series of gardens display perennials, trees and shrubs. A crab-apple orchard, a rock garden, and the Long Walk are also the legacy of this dedicated horticulturist. A microclimate favours the growth of species found nowhere else in Canada, while the stream and winding paths add to the charm. Elsie Reford’s beloved blue poppies and lilies still bloom and contribute, with other exotic and indigenous plants, to the harmony of the site.
Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada
Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
Gouvernement du Canada – Government of Canada
© Copyright
This photo and all those in my Photostream are protected by copyright. No one may reproduce, copy, transmit or manipulate them without my written permission.
Dag 11: Nagar and Hopper Valleys - Ganish village.
Nagar Valley.
Nagar Valley is a stunning high-altitude region in Gilgit-Baltistan, known for its dramatic mountains, glaciers and rich cultural heritage.
There is a danger of running out of superlatives when trying to describe Beverley Minster. It is not only the second finest non-cathedral church in the country but is architecturally a far finer building than most of our cathedrals themselves! It will come as a surprise to many visitors to find this grand edifice simply functions today as a parish church and has never been more than collegiate, a status it lost at the Reformaton. What had added to its mystique and wealth was its status as a place of pilgrimage housing the tomb of St John of Beverley, which drew visitors and revenue until the Reformation brought an end to such fortunes and the shrine was destroyed (though the saint's bones were later rediscovered and reinterred in the nave). That this great church itself survived this period almost intact is little short of a miracle in itself.
There has been a church here since the 8th century but little remains of the earlier buildings aside from the Saxon chair near the altar and the Norman font in the nave. The present Minster's construction spans the entirety of the development of the Gothic architecture but forms a surprisingly harmonious whole nevertheless, starting with Early English in the 13h century choir and transepts (both pairs) with their lancet windows in a building phase that stopped at the first bays of the nave. Construction was then continued with the nave in the 14th century but only the traceried windows betray the emergent Decorated style, the design otherwise closely followed the work of the previous century which gives the Minster's interior such a pleasingly unified appearance (the only discernable break in construction within can be seen where the black purbeck-marble ceased to be used for certain elements beyond the eastern bay of the nave). Finally the building was completed more or less by 1420 with the soaring west front with its dramatic twin-towers in Perpendicular style (the east window must have been enlarged at this point too to match the new work at the west end).
The fabric happily survived the Reformation intact aside from the octagonal chapter-house formerly adjoining the north choir aisle which was dismantled to raise money by the sale of its materials while the church's fate was in the balance (a similar fate was contemplated for the rest of the church by its new owners until the town bought it for retention as a parish church for £100). The great swathes of medieval glass alas were mostly lost, though seemingly as much to neglect and storm-damage in the following century than the usual iconoclasm. All that survived of the Minster's original glazing was collected to form the patchwork display now filling the great east window, a colourful kaleidoscope of fragments of figures and scenes. Of the other furnishings the choir stalls are the major ensemble and some of the finest medieval canopied stalls extant with a full set of charming misericords (though most of these alas are not normally on show).
There are suprisingly few monuments of note for such an enormous cathedral-like church, but the one major exception makes up for this, the delightful canopied Percy tomb erected in 1340 to the north of the high altar. The tomb itself is surprisingly plain without any likeness remaining of the deceased, but the richly carved Decorated canopy above is alive with gorgeous detail and figurative embellishments. There are further carvings to enjoy adorning the arcading that runs around the outer perimeter of the interior, especially the north nave aisle which has the most rewarding carved figures of musicians, monsters and people suffering various ailments, many were largely restored in the 19th century but still preserve the medieval spirit of irreverent fun.
To summarise Beverley Minster would be difficult other than simply adding that if one enjoys marvelling at Gothic architecture at its best then it really shouldn't be missed and one should prioritise it over the majority of our cathedrals. It is a real gem and a delight to behold, and is happily normally open and welcoming to visitors (who must all be astonished to find this magnificent edifice is no more than a simple parish church in status!). I thoroughly enjoyed this, my second visit here (despite the best efforts of the poor weather!).
REFORD GARDENS | LES JARDINS DE METIS
COUCHER DE SOLEIL - Sainte-Flavie
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
Photo taken close to REFORD GARDENS. (Sainte-Flavie)
Mrs Elsie Reford loved those beautiful sunsets.
Reference: Elsie's Paradise, The Reford Gardens, Alexander Reford, 2004, ISBN 2-7619-1921-1, That book is a must for Reford Gardens lovers!
''I shall always, all my life, want to come back to those sunsets.'' Elsie Reford, July 20, 1913. (page 25)
" It is just after 8 o'clock and I am sitting in front of my big window with the gorgeous panorama of a glorious afterglow from a perfect sunset. There is every hue of blue on the water of 'the Blue Lagoon' while Pointe-aux-Cenelles is bathed in pink and crimson and the dark hills of the north shore seem no further than two or three miles distant. I don't think in the whole world at this moment there could be anything more beautiful." Elsie Reford, June 2, 1931. (page 81)
Beautiful flowers at Reford Gardens.
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From Wikipedia:
Elsie Stephen Meighen - born January 22, 1872, Perth, Ontario - and Robert Wilson Reford - born in 1867, Montreal - got married on June 12, 1894.
Elsie Reford was a pioneer of Canadian horticulture, creating one of the largest private gardens in Canada on her estate, Estevan Lodge in eastern Québec. Located in Grand-Métis on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, her gardens have been open to the public since 1962 and operate under the name Les Jardins de Métis and Reford Gardens.
Born January 22, 1872 at Perth, Ontario, Elsie Reford was the eldest of three children born to Robert Meighen and Elsie Stephen. Coming from modest backgrounds themselves, Elsie’s parents ensured that their children received a good education. After being educated in Montreal, she was sent to finishing school in Dresden and Paris, returning to Montreal fluent in both German and French, and ready to take her place in society.
She married Robert Wilson Reford on June 12, 1894. She gave birth to two sons, Bruce in 1895 and Eric in 1900. Robert and Elsie Reford were, by many accounts, an ideal couple. In 1902, they built a house on Drummond Street in Montreal. They both loved the outdoors and they spend several weeks a year in a log cabin they built at Lac Caribou, south of Rimouski. In the autumn they hunted for caribou, deer, and ducks. They returned in winter to ski and snowshoe. Elsie Reford also liked to ride. She had learned as a girl and spent many hours riding on the slopes of Mount Royal. And of course, there was salmon-fishing – a sport at which she excelled.
In her day, she was known for her civic, social, and political activism. She was engaged in philanthropic activities, particularly for the Montreal Maternity Hospital and she was also the moving force behind the creation of the Women’s Canadian Club of Montreal, the first women club in Canada. She believed it important that the women become involved in debates over the great issues of the day, « something beyond the local gossip of the hour ». Her acquaintance with Lord Grey, the Governor-General of Canada from 1904 to 1911, led to her involvement in organizing, in 1908, Québec City’s tercentennial celebrations. The event was one of many to which she devoted herself in building bridges with French-Canadian community.
During the First World War, she joined her two sons in England and did volunteer work at the War Office, translating documents from German into English. After the war, she was active in the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Montreal Council of Social Agencies, and the National Association of Conservative Women.
In 1925 at the age of 53 years, Elsie Reford was operated for appendicitis and during her convalescence, her doctor counselled against fishing, fearing that she did not have the strength to return to the river.”Why not take up gardening?” he said, thinking this a more suitable pastime for a convalescent woman of a certain age. That is why she began laying out the gardens and supervising their construction. The gardens would take ten years to build, and would extend over more than twenty acres.
Elsie Reford had to overcome many difficulties in bringing her garden to life. First among them were the allergies that sometimes left her bedridden for days on end. The second obstacle was the property itself. Estevan was first and foremost a fishing lodge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to a salmon river and its dramatic views – not for the quality of the soil.
To counter-act nature’s deficiencies, she created soil for each of the plants she had selected, bringing peat and sand from nearby farms. This exchange was fortuitous to the local farmers, suffering through the Great Depression. Then, as now, the gardens provided much-needed work to an area with high unemployment. Elsie Reford’s genius as a gardener was born of the knowledge she developed of the needs of plants. Over the course of her long life, she became an expert plantsman. By the end of her life, Elsie Reford was able to counsel other gardeners, writing in the journals of the Royal Horticultural Society and the North American Lily Society. Elsie Reford was not a landscape architect and had no training of any kind as a garden designer. While she collected and appreciated art, she claimed no talents as an artist.
Elsie Stephen Reford died at her Drummond Street home on November 8, 1967 in her ninety-sixth year.
In 1995, the Reford Gardens ("Jardins de Métis") in Grand-Métis were designated a National Historic Site of Canada, as being an excellent Canadian example of the English-inspired garden.(Wikipedia)
Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Reford
Visit : www.refordgardens.com/
LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS
Créés par Elsie Reford de 1926 à 1958, ces jardins témoignent de façon remarquable de l’art paysager à l’anglaise. Disposés dans un cadre naturel, un ensemble de jardins exhibent fleurs vivaces, arbres et arbustes. Le jardin des pommetiers, les rocailles et l’Allée royale évoquent l’œuvre de cette dame passionnée d’horticulture. Agrémenté d’un ruisseau et de sentiers sinueux, ce site jouit d’un microclimat favorable à la croissance d’espèces uniques au Canada. Les pavots bleus et les lis, privilégiés par Mme Reford, y fleurissent toujours et contribuent , avec d’autres plantes exotiques et indigènes, à l’harmonie de ces lieux.
Created by Elsie Reford between 1926 and 1958, these gardens are an inspired example of the English art of the garden. Woven into a natural setting, a series of gardens display perennials, trees and shrubs. A crab-apple orchard, a rock garden, and the Long Walk are also the legacy of this dedicated horticulturist. A microclimate favours the growth of species found nowhere else in Canada, while the stream and winding paths add to the charm. Elsie Reford’s beloved blue poppies and lilies still bloom and contribute, with other exotic and indigenous plants, to the harmony of the site.
Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada
Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
Gouvernement du Canada – Government of Canada
© Copyright
This photo and all those in my Photostream are protected by copyright. No one may reproduce, copy, transmit or manipulate them without my written permission.
Djupalonssandur is a beautiful pebbled beach, with a series of rocks of mysterious form emerging from the ocean.
It is one of the few areas that lead down to the sea along this coast with its high dramatic cliffs. Watch out for the famous ghosts roaming the place!
The rests of a shipwreck can be seen on the beach. On the beach there are also big stones which people tried to lift and test their strength in the days of the fishing stations: Fully Strong 154 kg, Half-Strong 100 kg, Weakling 54 kg and Bungler 23 kg. Weakling marked the frontier of wimphood, any man who couldn't lift it was deemed unsuitable for a life as a fisherman. (west.is)
The Snæfellsnes Peninsula is a region in western Iceland known for its dramatic landscapes. At its western tip, Snæfellsjökull National Park is dominated by Snæfellsjökull Volcano, which is topped by a glacier. Nearby, a trail leads through lava fields to black-pebble beach
Canon EOS R7 - Canon RF 35mm F1.8 MACRO IS STM
The Los Angeles California Temple (formerly the Los Angeles Temple), the tenth operating and the second-largest temple operated by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, is on Santa Monica Boulevard in the Westwood district of Los Angeles, California. When it was dedicated in 1956, it was the largest temple of the church, later surpassed by the Salt Lake Temple with its additions and annexations. The temple serves 41 stakes in Los Angeles, Ventura, Kern, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo Counties. The grounds includes a visitors' center open to the public, the Los Angeles Regional Family History Center, also open to the public, and the headquarters for the Los Angeles mission.
The Los Angeles Temple was announced when the church purchased 24.23 acres (98,000 m²) from the Harold Lloyd Motion Picture Company on March 23, 1937, by president Heber J. Grant. Construction was to begin soon thereafter, but financial difficulties relating to the Great Depression and World War II delayed the groundbreaking until 1951.
The temple plans were revised at this time to include a priesthood assembly room, an unusual feature in temples built after the Salt Lake Temple. It was also expanded to accommodate an unprecedented 300 patrons per session.
Located at 10777 W. Santa Monica Boulevard in the Westwood district of Los Angeles, California, the temple sits atop a small hill above the intersection of Overland Avenue and Santa Monica Boulevard.
The well manicured grounds, open to the public, are filled with a various plants, including Canary Island Pine trees, several varieties of palm trees, Bird of Paradise trees, olive trees, and rare Chinese Ginkgo trees. At the left and right of the temple are two fountains, and at the front is a large reflection pool. Several family-themed statues further beautify the grounds. In December temple grounds are all aglow with thousands of multi-colored lights in celebration of Christmas.
While not as regionally prominent as the temples in Oakland, San Diego, and Washington, the Los Angeles California Temple is still one of the most distinctive features of Los Angeles' Westside. Thousands of commuters pass it every day on busy Santa Monica Boulevard. The proliferation of high-rise buildings along the Wilshire Boulevard corridor and in nearby Century City has reduced its prominence in the Westside skyline. However, its dramatic night lighting and sheer size still make an imposing sight, particularly for travelers exiting the Santa Monica Freeway northbound on Overland.
Numerous Church facilities are on its grounds including a meetinghouse, a baseball field, the headquarters of the Church's California Los Angeles Mission, and apartments (used by missionaries, temple workers, temple patrons, and visiting church officials).
The remaining land, along Manning Avenue, was subdivided for residential lots, the sale of which considerably offset the expense of constructing the temple. Because it was the church's first temple (save the roughly contemporaneous Bern Switzerland Temple) built outside of an LDS-dominated settlement, the Los Angeles Temple was the first LDS temple explicitly designed for automobile accessibility: its parking facilities were larger than those of any temple built previously, and there is no direct pedestrian connection between the front doors and Santa Monica Boulevard.
The temple's architecture is generally Modernist, an aesthetic that extends to the choice of exterior cladding: 146,000 square feet (14,000 m²) of Mo-Sai pre-cast concrete facing, a mixture of crushed quartz and white Portland cement quarried in Utah and Nevada. The very light brown pigmentation of the Mo-Sai blend has the advantage of concealing the thin layer of soot that accumulates on most buildings in Los Angeles. The temple is 369 feet (112 m) long, 269 feet (82 m) wide and has an overall height of 257 feet (78 m). Atop the temple stands a 15 foot (5 m) tall statue of the angel Moroni.
The rooms include a baptistry, celestial room, four ordinance rooms, ten sealing rooms, and an assembly room that stretches the entire length of the temple. The Los Angeles temple features murals on the walls of its progressive-style ordinance rooms including the celestial room. The only other temple with celestial room murals is the Idaho Falls Idaho Temple.
The Snaefellsnes Peninsula is a region in western Iceland known for its dramatic landscapes. At its western tip, Snæfellsjökull National Park is dominated by Snæfellsjökull Volcano, which is topped by a glacier. Nearby, a trail leads through lava fields to black-pebble beach
Canon EOS R7 - Canon RF 35mm F1.8 MACRO IS STM
Urquhart Castle, a medieval fortress in ruins, stands as a dramatic silhouette on a rocky headland on the shore of Loch Ness in the Scottish Highlands. The castle's history is long and turbulent, spanning over 500 years and witnessing many of Scotland's most significant historical events. Dating back to the 13th century, Urquhart Castle was a strategic stronghold that saw frequent conflict, changing hands between the English and Scots during the Wars of Scottish Independence. It was repeatedly targeted and raided by the powerful MacDonald clan, the Lords of the Isles, before ultimately being deliberately destroyed by government troops in 1692 to prevent its use by Jacobite forces.
Beyond its historical significance, Urquhart Castle's location is intrinsically linked to the legendary Loch Ness Monster, affectionately known as Nessie. The earliest reported sighting of a "water beast" in the vicinity of Loch Ness dates back to the 6th century, an encounter involving the Irish monk Saint Columba. The modern myth, however, exploded onto the global stage in 1933 when a local couple claimed to have seen a large, prehistoric-looking creature in the loch. This sighting, along with others, sparked a worldwide media frenzy and turned the quiet Scottish loch into a destination for monster hunters and tourists alike.
The myth of Nessie has been fueled by a number of controversial pieces of "evidence." The most famous is the Surgeon's Photograph of 1934, which seemed to show a small head and a long neck emerging from the water. This iconic image helped solidify the plesiosaur-like image of the creature in the public imagination, though it was later exposed as an elaborate hoax. Despite countless scientific investigations, including sonar surveys and DNA sampling, no conclusive proof of Nessie's existence has ever been found. Scientists generally attribute sightings to hoaxes, misidentified wildlife, or natural phenomena.
Today, Urquhart Castle is one of Scotland's most visited historic sites, in large part because of its connection to the Nessie legend. Its dramatic ruins provide a prime vantage point for visitors hoping to catch a glimpse of the elusive creature themselves. A modern visitor center at the site offers information on the castle's history and the Loch Ness monster myth, and boat tours often depart from nearby to cruise the loch's famously deep and murky waters. While the mystery of Nessie remains unsolved, the legend continues to draw millions of people to the shores of Loch Ness, making it one of the world's most enduring and profitable modern-day myths.