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After work today I saw some lovely plants that I just had to take a few pics of....I think I may have actually shot about 225! When I got home I played around in Photoshop with a few of the results and with this one I really liked the colors.
Made Explore on Sunday, April 22, 2007 and dropped out Monday, LOL.
...Highest position: #36
CO (Saguache County)
Day 1
Monarch Pass (Collegiate West 05) to Marshall Pass Road (Segment 15)
No rain yet ... but it frosted again.
Started off a bit chilly but got packed up and waited for shuttle at Spring Creek Pass trailhead. The Sportsman from Lake City was the shuttle. They arrived shortly after 8 with kids in tow. We stopped at the Outfitter to pay and then at General Store for some coffee. Never skip an opportunity for coffee! It took about 2 hours to drive to Monarch Pass.
Arrived at Monarch Pass around 1100. Monarch Crest Souvenier Shop has a hiker area with outlets for charging phones, etc. I took advantage of that and while waiting enjoyed some nachos. After a nice break, I started hiking.
The first 5 miles were on the Collegiate West Segment 05. I hiked this section last year and it was just as easy now. I took a few breaks at the same stops as last year. I'm not sure if this is technically above treeline but it is exposed. After the breakoff from CW05, Segment 15 does dip into the trees several times and passes a shelter near Green Creek Trailhead. The shelter is not very inviting as it does not have a sleeping platform (plenty of tenting opportunities though). The trail finally follows an old road down to Marshall Pass Rd.
I found a nice campsite up above the Marshall Pass Parking Area near the water source. Water may be an issue the next couple of days, so I'll have to carry extra. (Although I've already seen extra sources not listed.)
I didn't see any other backpackers but did see lots of bikers. Total miles for the day was 10.4. It was a good day especially when the sun shines.
This remnant example of a segment of the flumes used to shoot the railroad ties harvested from the surrounding forest down to the Wind River for transport has a nice view of the Wind River and beyond. It's located adjacent to the Tie Hack Memorial:
A few miles east of Dubois, Wyoming, we stopped to take a look at this interesting roadside memorial overlooking the Wind River.
In spite of the informative signage on the monument and at the pullout along the highway below, no where is the carver named, Boris Gilbertson (1907–1982). Gilbertson was a noted sculptor who produced many works used in public spaces such as government buildings and this location.
From the plaque on the monument:
Erected to perpetuate the memory of the hardy woods and river men who made and delivered the cross ties for the building and maintenance of the Chicago and North Western Railway in this western country.
Wyoming Tie & Timer Company
1946
From roadside signage:
Railroads and the West
Tie Hack Memorial
Hacked and Stacked
Ties were made from trees hacked and cut by hand…hence the name “tie hack.” Tie hacks were a special breed of loggers who could quickly fell, limb a tree, and fashion the tie down to the specifications demanded.
A horse and wagon hauled the ties out. Cutting was done in the winter because it was easier to strip off the bark and drag the ties over the snow.
Floating to Riverton
In the early days, ties were delivered to the railroad by floating them down the Wind River on the annual “long walk to Riverton.”
This walk took place just after the Wind River peaked in spring runoff so the ties would move swiftly downstream, but it was dangerous and difficult.
Ties were released into the river current along with a driver who poled the ties down river. Poor timing and high water cold result in injuries, drownings, and an entire season of timber cutting being lost.
The Lost Art
The drives and tie hacks disappeared being replaced by gas powered sawmills, sawyers, cutters, and skidders that pulled the logs to a mill.
Railroads closed as the trucking industry flourished and gasoline was cheap. With no marked for railroad ties, the business died.
This memorial reminds us of the hard-working men and their families whose sweat and toil contributed to the first transcontinental railroad linking our country from coast to coast.
It was very beautiful to watch the colour ripple through the cloud as it drifted. I thought at first it might be a sun dog, but the curve is the wrong way (blue on the inner, red on the outer) and a friend has pointed out it's not concentrated enough either. Could be a circumzenithal arc, given the time of day and curve!
"The design of the pavillon consists of 151 custom laminated lightweight beech plywood segments. In order to combine these ultra-thin plywood strips into a structurally stable configuration, newly developed robotic sewing techniques for prefabrication and manual lacing on site are applied."
further information:
photographed by
Frank Dinger
BECOMING - office for visual communication
L-2: 360° view of the Russian part of Space Station. This is just a mockup in Moscow used for training, soon I will be there for real.
L-2 : vue à 360° de la partie russe de la Station spatiale internationale. Ce n’est qu’un module d’entraînement à Moscou, mais je vais bientôt enfin rejoindre la version originale!
Credits: ESA
The Natural History Museum in London is a museum that exhibits a vast range of specimens from various segments of natural history. It is one of three major museums on Exhibition Road in South Kensington, the others being the Science Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum. The Natural History Museum's main frontage, however, is on Cromwell Road.
The museum is home to life and earth science specimens comprising some 80 million items within five main collections: botany, entomology, mineralogy, palaeontology and zoology. The museum is a centre of research specialising in taxonomy, identification and conservation. Given the age of the institution, many of the collections have great historical as well as scientific value, such as specimens collected by Charles Darwin. The museum is particularly famous for its exhibition of dinosaur skeletons and ornate architecture—sometimes dubbed a cathedral of nature—both exemplified by the large Diplodocus cast that dominated the vaulted central hall before it was replaced in 2017 with the skeleton of a blue whale hanging from the ceiling. The Natural History Museum Library contains an extensive collection of books, journals, manuscripts, and artwork linked to the work and research of the scientific departments; access to the library is by appointment only. The museum is recognised as the pre-eminent centre of natural history and research of related fields in the world.
Although commonly referred to as the Natural History Museum, it was officially known as British Museum (Natural History) until 1992, despite legal separation from the British Museum itself in 1963. Originating from collections within the British Museum, the landmark Alfred Waterhouse building was built and opened by 1881 and later incorporated the Geological Museum. The Darwin Centre is a more recent addition, partly designed as a modern facility for storing the valuable collections.
Like other publicly funded national museums in the United Kingdom, the Natural History Museum does not charge an admission fee. The museum is an exempt charity and a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. The Princess of Wales is a patron of the museum. There are approximately 850 staff at the museum. The two largest strategic groups are the Public Engagement Group and Science Group.
History
The foundation of the collection was that of the Ulster doctor Sir Hans Sloane (1660–1753), who allowed his significant collections to be purchased by the British Government at a price well below their market value at the time. This purchase was funded by a lottery. Sloane's collection, which included dried plants, and animal and human skeletons, was initially housed in Montagu House, Bloomsbury, in 1756, which was the home of the British Museum.
Most of the Sloane collection had disappeared by the early decades of the nineteenth century. Dr George Shaw (Keeper of Natural History 1806–1813) sold many specimens to the Royal College of Surgeons and had periodic cremations of material in the grounds of the museum. His successors also applied to the trustees for permission to destroy decayed specimens. In 1833, the Annual Report states that, of the 5,500 insects listed in the Sloane catalogue, none remained. The inability of the natural history departments to conserve its specimens became notorious: the Treasury refused to entrust it with specimens collected at the government's expense. Appointments of staff were bedevilled by gentlemanly favouritism; in 1862 a nephew of the mistress of a Trustee was appointed Entomological Assistant despite not knowing the difference between a butterfly and a moth.
J. E. Gray (Keeper of Zoology 1840–1874) complained of the incidence of mental illness amongst staff: George Shaw threatened to put his foot on any shell not in the 12th edition of Linnaeus' Systema Naturae; another had removed all the labels and registration numbers from entomological cases arranged by a rival. The huge collection of the conchologist Hugh Cuming was acquired by the museum, and Gray's own wife had carried the open trays across the courtyard in a gale: all the labels blew away. That collection is said never to have recovered.
The Principal Librarian at the time was Antonio Panizzi; his contempt for the natural history departments and for science in general was total. The general public was not encouraged to visit the museum's natural history exhibits. In 1835 to a Select Committee of Parliament, Sir Henry Ellis said this policy was fully approved by the Principal Librarian and his senior colleagues.
Many of these faults were corrected by the palaeontologist Richard Owen, appointed Superintendent of the natural history departments of the British Museum in 1856. His changes led Bill Bryson to write that "by making the Natural History Museum an institution for everyone, Owen transformed our expectations of what museums are for".
Planning and architecture of new building
Owen saw that the natural history departments needed more space, and that implied a separate building as the British Museum site was limited. Land in South Kensington was purchased, and in 1864 a competition was held to design the new museum. The winning entry was submitted by the civil engineer Captain Francis Fowke, who died shortly afterwards. The scheme was taken over by Alfred Waterhouse who substantially revised the agreed plans, and designed the façades in his own idiosyncratic Romanesque style which was inspired by his frequent visits to the Continent. The original plans included wings on either side of the main building, but these plans were soon abandoned for budgetary reasons. The space these would have occupied are now taken by the Earth Galleries and Darwin Centre.
Work began in 1873 and was completed in 1880. The new museum opened in 1881, although the move from the old museum was not fully completed until 1883.
Both the interiors and exteriors of the Waterhouse building make extensive use of architectural terracotta tiles to resist the sooty atmosphere of Victorian London, manufactured by the Tamworth-based company of Gibbs and Canning. The tiles and bricks feature many relief sculptures of flora and fauna, with living and extinct species featured within the west and east wings respectively. This explicit separation was at the request of Owen, and has been seen as a statement of his contemporary rebuttal of Darwin's attempt to link present species with past through the theory of natural selection. Though Waterhouse slipped in a few anomalies, such as bats amongst the extinct animals and a fossil ammonite with the living species. The sculptures were produced from clay models by a French sculptor based in London, M Dujardin, working to drawings prepared by the architect.
The central axis of the museum is aligned with the tower of Imperial College London (formerly the Imperial Institute) and the Royal Albert Hall and Albert Memorial further north. These all form part of the complex known colloquially as Albertopolis.
Separation from the British Museum
Even after the opening, the Natural History Museum legally remained a department of the British Museum with the formal name British Museum (Natural History), usually abbreviated in the scientific literature as B.M.(N.H.). A petition to the Chancellor of the Exchequer was made in 1866, signed by the heads of the Royal, Linnean and Zoological societies as well as naturalists including Darwin, Wallace and Huxley, asking that the museum gain independence from the board of the British Museum, and heated discussions on the matter continued for nearly one hundred years. Finally, with the passing of the British Museum Act 1963, the British Museum (Natural History) became an independent museum with its own board of trustees, although – despite a proposed amendment to the act in the House of Lords – the former name was retained. In 1989 the museum publicly re-branded itself as the Natural History Museum and stopped using the title British Museum (Natural History) on its advertising and its books for general readers. Only with the Museums and Galleries Act 1992 did the museum's formal title finally change to the Natural History Museum.
Geological Museum
In 1985, the museum merged with the adjacent Geological Museum of the British Geological Survey, which had long competed for the limited space available in the area. The Geological Museum became world-famous for exhibitions including an active volcano model and an earthquake machine (designed by James Gardner), and housed the world's first computer-enhanced exhibition (Treasures of the Earth). The museum's galleries were completely rebuilt and relaunched in 1996 as The Earth Galleries, with the other exhibitions in the Waterhouse building retitled The Life Galleries. The Natural History Museum's own mineralogy displays remain largely unchanged as an example of the 19th-century display techniques of the Waterhouse building.
The central atrium design by Neal Potter overcame visitors' reluctance to visit the upper galleries by "pulling" them through a model of the Earth made up of random plates on an escalator. The new design covered the walls in recycled slate and sandblasted the major stars and planets onto the wall. The museum's 'star' geological exhibits are displayed within the walls. Six iconic figures were the backdrop to discussing how previous generations have viewed Earth. These were later removed to make place for a Stegosaurus skeleton that was put on display in late 2015.
The Darwin Centre
The Darwin Centre (named after Charles Darwin) was designed as a new home for the museum's collection of tens of millions of preserved specimens, as well as new work spaces for the museum's scientific staff and new educational visitor experiences. Built in two distinct phases, with two new buildings adjacent to the main Waterhouse building, it is the most significant new development project in the museum's history.
Phase one of the Darwin Centre opened to the public in 2002, and it houses the zoological department's 'spirit collections'—organisms preserved in alcohol. Phase Two was unveiled in September 2008 and opened to the general public in September 2009. It was designed by the Danish architecture practice C. F. Møller Architects in the shape of a giant, eight-story cocoon and houses the entomology and botanical collections—the 'dry collections'. It is possible for members of the public to visit and view non-exhibited items for a fee by booking onto one of the several Spirit Collection Tours offered daily.
Arguably the most famous creature in the centre is the 8.62-metre-long giant squid, affectionately named Archie.
The Attenborough Studio
As part of the museum's remit to communicate science education and conservation work, a new multimedia studio forms an important part of Darwin Centre Phase 2. In collaboration with the BBC's Natural History Unit (holder of the largest archive of natural history footage) the Attenborough Studio—named after the broadcaster Sir David Attenborough—provides a multimedia environment for educational events. The studio holds regular lectures and demonstrations, including free Nature Live talks on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays.
One of the most famous and certainly most prominent of the exhibits—nicknamed "Dippy"—is a 105-foot (32 m)-long replica of a Diplodocus carnegii skeleton which was on display for many years within the central hall. The cast was given as a gift by the Scottish-American industrialist Andrew Carnegie, after a discussion with King Edward VII, then a keen trustee of the British Museum. Carnegie paid £2,000 (equivalent to £229,250 in 2021) for the casting, copying the original held at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. The pieces were sent to London in 36 crates, and on 12 May 1905, the exhibit was unveiled to great public and media interest. The real fossil had yet to be mounted, as the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh was still being constructed to house it. As word of Dippy spread, Mr Carnegie paid to have additional copies made for display in most major European capitals and in Central and South America, making Dippy the most-viewed dinosaur skeleton in the world. The dinosaur quickly became an iconic representation of the museum, and has featured in many cartoons and other media, including the 1975 Disney comedy One of Our Dinosaurs Is Missing. After 112 years on display at the museum, the dinosaur replica was removed in early 2017 to be replaced by the actual skeleton of a young blue whale, a 128-year-old skeleton nicknamed "Hope". Dippy went on a tour of various British museums starting in 2018 and concluding in 2020 at Norwich Cathedral.
The blue whale skeleton, Hope, that has replaced Dippy, is another prominent display in the museum. The display of the skeleton, some 82 feet (25 m) long and weighing 4.5 tonnes, was only made possible in 1934 with the building of the New Whale Hall (now the Mammals (blue whale model) gallery). The whale had been in storage for 42 years since its stranding on sandbanks at the mouth of Wexford Harbour, Ireland in March 1891 after being injured by whalers. At this time, it was first displayed in the Mammals (blue whale model) gallery, but now takes pride of place in the museum's Hintze Hall. Discussion of the idea of a life-sized model also began around 1934, and work was undertaken within the Whale Hall itself. Since taking a cast of such a large animal was deemed prohibitively expensive, scale models were used to meticulously piece the structure together. During construction, workmen left a trapdoor within the whale's stomach, which they would use for surreptitious cigarette breaks. Before the door was closed and sealed forever, some coins and a telephone directory were placed inside—this soon growing to an urban myth that a time capsule was left inside. The work was completed—entirely within the hall and in view of the public—in 1938. At the time it was the largest such model in the world, at 92 feet (28 m) in length. The construction details were later borrowed by several American museums, who scaled the plans further. The work involved in removing Dippy and replacing it with Hope was documented in a BBC Television special, Horizon: Dippy and the Whale, narrated by David Attenborough, which was first broadcast on BBC Two on 13 July 2017, the day before Hope was unveiled for public display.
The Darwin Centre is host to Archie, an 8.62-metre-long giant squid taken alive in a fishing net near the Falkland Islands in 2004. The squid is not on general display, but stored in the large tank room in the basement of the Phase 1 building. It is possible for members of the public to visit and view non-exhibited items behind the scenes for a fee by booking onto one of the several Spirit Collection Tours offered daily. On arrival at the museum, the specimen was immediately frozen while preparations commenced for its permanent storage. Since few complete and reasonably fresh examples of the species exist, "wet storage" was chosen, leaving the squid undissected. A 9.45-metre acrylic tank was constructed (by the same team that provide tanks to Damien Hirst), and the body preserved using a mixture of formalin and saline solution.
The museum holds the remains and bones of the "River Thames whale", a northern bottlenose whale that lost its way on 20 January 2006 and swam into the Thames. Although primarily used for research purposes, and held at the museum's storage site at Wandsworth.
Dinocochlea, one of the longer-standing mysteries of paleontology (originally thought to be a giant gastropod shell, then a coprolite, and now a concretion of a worm's tunnel), has been part of the collection since its discovery in 1921.
The museum keeps a wildlife garden on its west lawn, on which a potentially new species of insect resembling Arocatus roeselii was discovered in 2007.
Galleries
The museum is divided into four sets of galleries, or zones, each colour coded to follow a broad theme.
Red Zone
This is the zone that can be entered from Exhibition Road, on the East side of the building. It is a gallery themed around the changing history of the Earth.
Earth's Treasury shows specimens of rocks, minerals and gemstones behind glass in a dimly lit gallery. Lasting Impressions is a small gallery containing specimens of rocks, plants and minerals, of which most can be touched.
Earth Hall (Stegosaurus skeleton)
Human Evolution
Earth's Treasury
Lasting Impressions
Restless Surface
From the Beginning
Volcanoes and Earthquakes
The Waterhouse Gallery (temporary exhibition space)
Green zone
Dodo
This zone is accessed from the Cromwell Road entrance via the Hintze Hall and follows the theme of the evolution of the planet.
Birds
Creepy Crawlies
Fossil Marine Reptiles
Hintze Hall (formerly the Central Hall, with blue whale skeleton and giant sequoia)
Minerals
The Vault
Fossils from Britain
Anning Rooms (exclusive space for members and patrons of the museum)
Investigate
East Pavilion (space for changing Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition)
Blue zone
Large Mammals Hall
To the left of the Hintze Hall, this zone explores the diversity of life on the planet.
Dinosaurs
Fish, Amphibians and Reptiles
Human Biology
Images of Nature
The Jerwood Gallery (temporary exhibition space)
Marine Invertebrates
Mammals
Mammals Hall (blue whale model)
Treasures in the Cadogan Gallery
Orange zone
Part of the spirit collection
Enables the public to see science at work and also provides spaces for relaxation and contemplation. Accessible from Queens Gate.
Wildlife Garden
Darwin Centre
Zoology Spirit Building
Highlights of the collection
Otumpa iron meteorite weighing 635 kg (1,400 lb), found in 1783 in Campo del Cielo, Argentina
Fragments of the Nakhla meteorite from Egypt, the first meteorite to suggest signs of aqueous processes on Mars
Latrobe nugget, one of the largest known clusters of cubic gold crystals
Apollo 16 Moon rock sample collected in 1972
Ostro Stone, flawless blue topaz gemstone weighing 9,381 carats, about 2 kg (4.4 lb), the largest of its kind in the world
Aurora Pyramid of Hope, a collection of 296 natural diamonds in a wide variety of colours
First Iguanodon teeth ever discovered
Dippy, plaster cast replica of the fossilised bones of a Diplodocus carnegii skeleton
Mantellisaurus and American mastodon skeletons
Full-sized animatronic model of a Tyrannosaurus rex
The most intact Stegosaurus fossil skeleton ever discovered (nicknamed Sophie)
Large skull of a Triceratops
First specimen of Archaeopteryx ever discovered, one of only 12 found and generally accepted by palaeontologists to be the oldest known bird
Rare dodo skeleton, reconstructed from bones over 1,000 years old
Only surviving specimen of the Great Auk from the British Isles, collected in 1813 from Papa Westray in the Orkney Islands
Broken Hill skull, Middle Paleolithic cranium now considered part of a Homo heidelbergensis, discovered in the mine of Broken Hill or Kabwe in Zambia
Gibraltar 1 and Gibraltar 2, two Neanderthal skulls found at Forbes' Quarry in Gibraltar
Cross-section of 1,300-year-old giant sequoia, at the museum since 1893
Rare copy of The Birds of America by John James Audubon, containing illustrations of a wide variety of birds from the United States
Rare first edition of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species
Education and research
A young student at the museum
The museum runs a series of educational and public engagement programmes. These include for example a highly praised "How Science Works" hands on workshop for school students demonstrating the use of microfossils in geological research. The museum also played a major role in securing designation of the Jurassic Coast of Devon and Dorset as a UNESCO World Heritage Site and has subsequently been a lead partner in the Lyme Regis Fossil Festivals.
In 2005, the museum launched a project to develop notable gallery characters to patrol display cases, including 'facsimiles' of Carl Linnaeus, Mary Anning, Dorothea Bate and William Smith. They tell stories and anecdotes of their lives and discoveries and aim to surprise visitors.
In 2010, a six-part BBC documentary series was filmed at the museum entitled Museum of Life exploring the history and behind the scenes aspects of the museum.
Since May 2001, the Natural History Museum admission has been free for some events and permanent exhibitions. However, there are certain temporary exhibits and shows that require a fee.
The Natural History museum combines the museum's life and earth science collections with specialist expertise in "taxonomy, systematics, biodiversity, natural resources, planetary science, evolution and informatics" to tackle scientific questions. In 2011, the museum led the setting up of an International Union for Conservation of Nature Bumblebee Specialist Group, chaired by Dr. Paul H. Williams, to assess the threat status of bumblebee species worldwide using Red List criteria.
In popular culture
The museum plays an important role in the 1975 London-based Disney live-action feature One of Our Dinosaurs Is Missing; the eponymous skeleton is stolen from the museum, and a group of intrepid nannies hide inside the mouth of the museum's blue whale model (in fact a specially created prop – the nannies peer out from behind the whale's teeth, but a blue whale is a baleen whale and has no teeth). Additionally, the film is set in the 1920s, before the blue whale model was built.
The museum features as a base for Prodigium, a secret society which studies and fights monsters, first appearing on The Mummy.
In the 2014 film Paddington, Millicent Clyde is a devious and treacherous taxidermist at the museum. She kidnaps Paddington, intending to kill and stuff him, but is thwarted by the Brown family after scenes involving chases inside and on the roof of the building.
The museum was prominently featured in the Sky One 2014 documentary David Attenborough's Natural History Museum Alive where several extinct creatures exhibited at the museum including Dippy the Diplodocus were brought to life using CGI.
The museum features prominently in the level Lud's Gate from Tomb Raider III, with Core Design launching the game with Jonathan Ross at the museum on 15 October 1998.
Andy Day's CBeebies shows, Andy's Dinosaur Adventures and Andy's Prehistoric Adventures are filmed in the Natural History Museum.
The museum was site of the first Pit Stop on The Amazing Race 33.
The Museum is featured in the fifth episode of the Apple TV+ period drama The Essex Serpent.
Natural History Museum at Tring
The NHM also has an outpost in Tring, Hertfordshire, built by local eccentric Lionel Walter Rothschild. The NHM took ownership in 1938. In 2007, the museum announced that the name would be changed to the Natural History Museum at Tring, though the older name, the Walter Rothschild Zoological Museum, is still in widespread use.
Move of collections to Harwell and Shinfield
There has been some discussion of plans to move major parts of the collections to sites in Harwell (which was abandoned) and then to Shinfield, Berkshire. These plans have been heavily criticized, together with the overall departure of the strategic direction of the museum.
I recall this being the caption in a Railway Magazine photo from the days when I started buying it.
Ormskirk was downgraded in 1970 with one line bisected by a pair of buffers where services from Liverpool and Preston would reverse.
The former were operated by the classic LMS 502 EMUs, fondly remembered from journeys into Liverpool Exchange on Mystexes from Edinburgh, but by the time I visited in 1982 these had just been replaced by the 507 seen here.
The "bypass" line had not seen any use for quite some time, and would later be removed.
Taken during the 9.3% phase at 19:30 (UT-4)
2 panel mosaic.
Celestron CPC Deluxe 1100 HD
Altair GPCAMv2 130 Mono
ZWO Filter Wheel - Red Filter
Part of a series of photos I did on the NY State Pavilion in Flushing, Queens. Not sure why I never put this up.
Tunnel segments are driven into the tunnel by this specialized vehicle. The vehicle can carry 10 segments – enough to build one tunnel ring. Learn more about the Alaskan Way Viaduct Replacement Program at www.alaskanwayviaduct.org or follow Bertha, the SR 99 tunneling machine, on Twitter @BerthaDigsSR99.
Visiting the Serres d'Auteuil in Paris
All rights reserved. Please do not use or reproduce this image on websites, blogs or any other media without my explicit permission.
The Parthenon frieze was a continuous strip decorating the top of the outside wall of the cella (inner building). From the interpretive sign:
"In contrast with the mythological themes of the metopes and pediments, for the decoration of the Parthenon frieze Pheidias chose as his subject the city's major celebration: the Megala Panathenaia — the Great Panathenaic festival. This festival was held every four years and entailed religious rites, sacrifices, athletic contests and musical competitions. The most important and official day of the festival fell on the 28th day of the Attic month Hekatombaion, in the middle of August, and was celebrated as the birthday of the goddess. On this day, Athens’ citizens and metoikoi (foreign residents) formed a procession that traversed the city and ended at the temple of Athena Polias (the Old Temple that was later replaced by the Erechtheion) in order to present a new peplos to the cult statue of the goddess. It is this procession which unfolds across the 160 meters of the Parthenon frieze.
"The frieze depicts 360 human and divine figures and more than 250 animals, primarily horses. Riders, chariots with charioteers, youths leading oxen and rams for sacrifice, musicians, elders bearing olive branches (thallophoroi), young men carrying trays of offerings (skaphephoroi) and jugs of water (hydriaphoroi), girls carrying libation vessels, officers and other figures together make up the Parthenon frieze."
A description of this panel from the museum website (parthenonfrieze.gr/en/explore-the-frieze/north-frieze/?b=6): "Here is shown the file of four hydriaphoroi. They are young men with short curly hair, and with their himatia wrapped around them. The three first bear their water jars on their left shoulders. The weight is so great that the fourth had rested his jar for a moment on the ground and now prepares to lift it up again. According to the literary sources, hydriaphoroi were usually the daughters of metoikoi and they bore their vessels on their heads. Perhaps shown here is an earlier phase of the procession and they carry the vessels on their shoulders rather than on their heads so that the figures coincide with the height determined for the frieze. E. Simon has given yet another interpretation of the male hydria bearers. She believes they may be victors of the lampadedromia (torch-race) that took place the evening before the procession and that the hydria was the victor’s prize. Be that as it may, it is generally believed that the water in the vessels was destined for sprinkling on the altar and for watering the animals."
For too many years there was no joy for me traveling this segment of the earth's orbit, I dreaded the coming of winter.
Living in New Hampshire necessitates, with regularity, not only shoveling the driveway & walkway, but the deck, a path for the oil guy, a path to the bird feeder...a path so my dog (not a small dog) can walk around the house, the roof! There’s also Power outage, frozen pipes, spin-outs and heating oil prices... and we don't even get Auroras but once every 20 years.
I could just remain bitter and hate it all but instead I discovered, serendipitously, the intricacies and beauty that nature coupiously affords me each winter, the snow flake.
This, the first year I've awaited their arrival with any semblance of positive emotion since grade school, found me eagerly prepared to photograph as many as I could in their many ponderous forms.
The previous year I had cobbled together a prototype "snowflake-cam" and was delighted with the results. This year I went from bread board to brass board; all the inefficiencies were addressed, all the “I wish I had that option” were added. In every place where things had once been held together with tape, now existed machined and mated fixturing, all properly aligned. I upgraded the focal plane from a B&W detector and color filters to a much, much larger color chip., and let’s not to forget the optics as they received a sweet upgrade as well.
Almost no snow this year. The past week has seen temps in the 50's , the only chance of snow in the foreseeable future is the heavy wet 32deg crap, slated for the morning commute. It seems I have built not only a new & improved Snowflake-cam but a Snowflake-talisman as well. OK, I guess I’ll take that.
Only thing left to do was test qualify this elaborate system on bugs and things. But what I really wanted was a good surrogate, some kind of plastic snowflake, something I could test out all the bells and whistles, something steady that wouldn’t melt or sublimate away on me.
So what’s a snowflake? A little (2-3mm) tabular hexagonal crystal (the pretty dendrites anyways). Can’t really grow them in the house too easy… but I can grow crystals. Nice flat ones too. Sugar grows real nice crystals, there’re monoclinic not hexagonal but they are birefringent and easy to make 2-3mm in size. So I think I’ve found what I’m looking for. Sugar crystals are beautiful, have bright colors, the right size, lend themselves well to my set-up and don’t melt. So screw you winter and all your stupid, slippery little soldiers of back pain. I got something else now and it’s so sweet. You can go piss up a rope Jack Frost and keep those ten quadrillion subjects off my lawn! I don’t care.
This is a coated glass wall, I thought the different shades and light reflection made for a cool abstract.
Red maple can turn yellow in the fall, which seems to be what has happened here. Chippewa Moraine Segment, Ice Age National Scenic Trail, Chippewa County, Wisconsin.
Our goal was to remove one of the German Flak 88 emplacements along the road.
We were advancing when we were suddenly joined by soldiers in some sort of futuristic body armor, they seemed to be carrying high powered assault rifles of an unknown make.
© Andy Brandl (2015) // PhotonMix Photography
Don´t redistribute - don´t use on webpages, blogs or any other media without my explicit written permission.
Grade II* listed. Public house. circa 1875, remodelled circa 1905 & 1917 by H. Fuller Clark, architect, & Frederick Callcott & Henry Poole, sculptors. Yellow stock brick with granite & Portland stone dressings; mosaic, sculpture & copper panel enrichment. Flat roof with two tall chimneys. Roughly triangular plan on a corner site. four storeys & cellars. one window to Queen Victoria Street, one to chamfered angle & three to New Bridge Street return. Ground floor public house frontage extends around the building with segmental arched entrances to both streets & the angle. Transom & mullion windows with small panes above segmental arched cellar lights. Above, a deep mosaic fascia carrying the words "Saloon / 174 / The Black Friar / 174 / Brandies". Fascia interrupted by carved panels, depicting drinking & devilry, which surmount entrance flanking piers with bronze directional & advertising panels depicting friars. Queen Victoria Street entrance with mosaic tympanum of a friar. Above each entrance an elaborate wrought-iron sign with lamp. Upper floor windows architraved; those to Queen Victoria Street tripartite with enriched pediments to first & second floor; angle with clock to 1st floor &enriched segmental pediments to second; New Bridge street with enriched pediments to first & second floor apart from that above entrance with segmental pediment extending from doorcase. Patterned cast-iron window guards. Projecting cornice & blocking course. Fine Arts & Crafts interior clad in variegated marble with brass, mosaic, wood & copper reliefs. Small, windowless extra rear vaulted room, known as the Grotto, excavated from a railway vault, designed by Clark in 1913 but not executed until 1917-21 owing to the war. In the main bar features include the enriched fireplace recess, framed by a broad tripartite arch, which encloses corner seats; grate with firedogs surmounted by imps; overmantle has bronze bas-relief of singing friars entitled "Carols", flanked by two friars' heads with swags above seats. Stained glass window depicting a friar in a sunlit garden. Above the bar, a bronze bas-relief entitled "Tomorrow will be Friday" depicting monks catching trout and eels; above the entrance to the Grotto, a further relief entitled "Saturday afternoon" depicting gardening monks whose produce is coloured in enamels. Barrel-vaulted Grotto entered from three arcaded arches with bas-relief monks on the pillars. Mosaic vaults with marble-clad ribs. Features of interest include end walls each with a bronze relief, one entitled "Don't advertise, tell a gossip" with a group of monks doing the weekly wash, the other entitled "A good thing is soon snatched up" depicting monks pushing a trussed pig in a wheelbarrow. On the cornice below, devils representing music, drama, painting & literature. Side walls have six alabaster capitals illustrating nursery rhymes, sixteen smaller capitals illustrating Aesop's Fables & mottoes such as "Haste is slow" in good electro-gilt letters by the Birmingham Guild. four lamp brackets with alabaster figures of Morning, Evening, Noon and Night holding up a bronze monk with water buckets. Extra at one end with a relief entitled "Contentment surpasses riches" depicting a sleeping monk surrounded by fairies, executed with mother of pearl and semi-precious stone inlay. The "window" below with red marble colonettes is an arrangement of mirrors. Further mirrors in the Grotto enhance the small space. British Listed Buildings
Sir John Betjeman was instrumental in saving the Black Friar pub from demolition in the sixties,